Redland City Council sets concessions and remissions for pensioners, farmers and community groups

Redland City Council has adopted its concessions and remissions framework for 2026-27 at a special budget meeting in Cleveland, with relief rules for eligible pensioners, farming land, community organisations and concealed leaks to apply from 1 July 2026.

The meeting at the Council Chambers on Bloomfield Street also backed the wider 2026-27 budget, but the concessions package is the part that determines who can receive discounts or bill relief on rates and utility charges across Redland City, Cleveland and the Redlands Coast.

Council said community organisations can receive concessions on the Differential General Rate and separate charges if they occupy or hold land under a Queensland State Government lease, licence or permit categorised as rental category 14.1 under the Land Regulation 2020. The organisations must be non-profit and meet the council’s stated community-purpose tests.

The minutes also extend concessions on separate charges, including Environment and Coastal Management, Landfill Remediation, Redland City SES Administration and Redland City Rural Fire Brigade charges, for eligible pensioners who own or occupy adjoining residential lots amalgamated for rating purposes in limited circumstances.

For farming land, Council will remit all but one of each Water Fixed Access charge, Sewerage charge, Separate charge and Special charge that may be properly made and levied on the subject land parcels. The concession applies where land is used exclusively for farming by an owner carrying on a primary production business.

Eligible landowners must have contiguous parcels in the same ownership name. Land separated by a road is counted as contiguous, but parcels with separate water connections are not.

Council’s water charge arrangements also include a reduced tariff for religious and not-for-profit community service organisations, with no fixed water access charge applying.

The community service obligations table also lists concealed leaks relief, described as a remission on the estimated water lost due to a concealed leak. The table puts that item at $184,000 in 2026-27.

Pensioner rebates remain unchanged at $335 a year for a full pensioner and $167.50 for a part-pensioner.

The broader budget adopted at the same meeting includes an 11.23 per cent lift in rates and utility charges revenue for 2026-27, new rating categories for shopping centres and retirement and lifestyle villages, and separate charges including the Landfill Remediation Separate Charge of $99.52 per annum per rateable lot. The concessions framework is the part that will shape who pays less, and by how much, when notices go out from 1 July 2026.