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Last Updated: Wednesday, 06 May 2020 10:45

Alternate suppliers

Plaques and memorials may be purchased, supplied and affixed in position by cemetery staff or by an external supplier. External suppliers may be found in the yellow pages or on the internet.

To maintain the correct style and placement of externally supplied products to a specific area within our facilities, prior approval must be obtained from us. A permit fee also applies.

We cannot be held responsible for the quality of goods or workmanship of items purchased and installed by external suppliers.

National Competition Policy

The National Competition Policy (NCP) is a set of policy reforms adopted by governments throughout Australia. The objective is to encourage a better use of the country’s resources – and hence provide a higher standard of living – through increasing competition and thus the more efficient allocation of (scarce) resources.

NCP targets the public sector, which has historically been protected from competition. But it is not about “competition for competition’s sake”. It emphasises both the importance of competition in providing better, more efficient organisations, and the need to ensure that the benefits of reforms outweigh the costs to the community as a whole.

The most important aims of NCP are:

• to develop an open and integrated Australian market for goods and services by removing unnecessary barriers to trade and competition;
• to ensure that no buyer or seller in the market is able to engage in anti-competitive conduct against the public interest;
• to ensure that, as far as possible, the same rules of market conduct apply to all market participants, regardless of the form of business ownership (government business activities should not enjoy any special advantages);
• to ensure that business activities which are potentially anti-competitive are subject to some form of assessment of the likely cost and benefits; and
• to reduce regulatory complexity and administrative duplication between various governments.

The Local Government Act 1993 includes provisions relating to NCP for local governments. We have responded to these requirements by applying the Code of Competitive Conduct to its cemetery services.

Some of these business activities include a Community Service Obligation (CSO). The value of a CSO is determined by us and represents an activity’s cost which would not be incurred if the activity’s primary objective was to make a profit.

We provide funding from general revenue sources to the business activity to cover the cost of providing non-commercial community services or costs deemed to be CSO’s. The CSO associated with cemetery services include:

• Drayton & Toowoomba Cemetery - maintain historical headstone section

In our Annual Report we include financial details of the above business activities including CSO’s in accordance with the NCP requirements.