Tapped out: Cash advocates suss on mandate plan

Nov 02, 2025
New Daily
"Cash advocate" Jason Bryce says everyone has a legitimate use for the folding stuff at times.   


When a power outage struck on one of Mitta Mitta Brewing Company’s busiest days of the year, three things kept the family-run business ticking over.

Wood for the pizza oven, gas in the barbecue and beer lines, and cash in customers’ pockets.   


“The electricity flipped off at 11am on the dot, just as we opened and the first group of, like, 30 guests came into the driveway,” venue manager Jen Cabelka said.

Power blackouts and network outages are not uncommon in the town of Mitta Mitta in the foothills of Victoria’s alpine region, where the resident population of a few hundred swells into the thousands over summer.

The blackout, which came between Christmas and New Year, lasted about six hours and cost the brewery roughly 30 per cent of the day’s take.

Without cash, though, the lost revenue might have stretched to five figures.

cash australia
Jen Cabelka says cash saves her business when the tech inevitably fails.

While the use of cash in Australia continues to fall and the relative cost to maintain the system rises, Reserve Bank governor Michele Bullock said it remained a crucial part of the payment system.

“The decline in the use of cash for transactions has put the cash distribution system under pressure,” she said.

The Albanese government has closed submissions for its so-called “cash mandate” draft regulations, which will require grocery shops and service stations to carry cash and exempt businesses grossing less than $10 million annually.


It will provide a “balanced, practical and sensible step to support cash users and give consideration to businesses”, Assistant Treasurer Daniel Mulino said.

“There will be an ongoing place for cash in our society under the Albanese government,” he said.   

But journalist and cash advocate Jason Bryce argues the mandate, with its exceptions and limits, could bring Australia one tap closer to purely electronic payments.

“The regulations they’re calling a cash mandate are literally going to green-light the cashless society in Australia,” he said.

“The current proposal leaves out medicine, leaves out housing, utility bills. It should apply to all the big retailers.”

The first round of consultation on the mandate drew more than 4000 submissions, so many that Treasury published just 52 – from organisations only – and not without a fight from Bryce.

He started his cold hard currency advocacy group, Cash Welcome, during the Covid-19 pandemic.