Alison Penfold (Lyne, National Party) Share this | Hansard source

I appreciate the opportunity to speak on these bills, which provide for the legislative mechanism to additional measures in the government's 2025-26 budget. Commonwealth expenditure is a significant issue for the Lyne electorate and more so than ever, with a lack of funding flowing to regional Australia, including the Mid North Coast of New South Wales. Increasingly—certainly following the devastating floods of last year—constituents throughout Lyne are feeling that we, as an electorate and as a non-government seat, are having to deal with the consequences of the government's poor fiscal discipline, including high inflation and a cost-of-living crisis, and we are not getting our fair share of the funds. This is in spite of my concerted efforts for genuine engagement and collaboration with the ministers and the government, including the many proposals I put forward for funding during the election and since, where my Labor opponent—nor any other opponent—didn't match or even put forward one project for funding. I've heard many times over this last fortnight the government's claim that it is a good friend of regional Australia, and I wish it were so, but the statistics paint a very different picture.

Throughout their first term of government, Labor cancelled, cut and delayed more than $30 billion worth of infrastructure projects across the country. They abolished regional infrastructure programs, including the Building Better Regions Fund, the Community Development Grants Program, the Stronger Communities Program, the very well supported Local Roads and Community Infrastructure Program, Roads of National Significance, the Bridges Renewal Program, the Regional Accelerator Program, the Regionalisation Fund, and the Energy Security and Regional Development Plan. Each of these programs was a vital source of funding, particularly for regional councils, to undertake both transport and community infrastructure upgrades. Most of the regional and community infrastructure programs established by the government in its first term, such as the Growing Regions Program and the Thriving Suburbs Program, have ceased.

I'm not prepared to leave it to the government to come up with the solutions. Since I was elected, I've been working with my electorate on their priorities for funding to the extent that I have drafted and submitted a prebudget submission to Treasury, to the government, to highlight our funding priorities and opportunities for budget reform across multiple portfolios in areas of need, including health, aged care, education, housing, water security, transport infrastructure, emergency recovery and preparation, community and sporting infrastructure, and telecommunications. The submission was developed through consultation and public calls for projects, and I sincerely thank my community for its response and engagement.

Individuals, progress associations, sporting groups and councils have all been party to the document that I sent to Treasury on 29 January. In that document, I call on the Albanese government to reform its funding profile to regional Australia, to dedicate more funding to address the disadvantage and to give due consideration to the Lyne electorate's needs. I'll echo some of those needs here today. Health, as many of you well know, is one of the major concerns on my mind and on the mind of Lyne residents. I'm very concerned about the level of access to health services across the electorate. It is clear that we need more investment by both the federal and the state governments in local health services.

While successive Labor MPs get up in this chamber and speak of the urgent care clinics that have just opened in their electorates, non-government MPs cannot say the same. Of the 122 open clinics, 88—or 72 per cent—appear to be located in Labor electorates. Just two per cent are open in Nationals seats. In New South Wales, 24 exist in Labor seats. Just three are in Liberal seats, and two are in Nationals seats. The Minister for Health and Ageing and, indeed, most members in this chamber are certainly well aware of my efforts and my determination to secure an urgent care clinic for Taree. Whilst there is plenty of friendly banter at times across the chamber on this issue, its delivery is serious and urgent.

Today, I was looking at a social media post that I put up around the urgent care clinics debate earlier this week in the chamber, and the response from one of my constituents was, 'Labor seems to be having a laugh at us.' That's how the people of Lyne are feeling about the response to the call for an urgent care clinic. The only difference between members on the other side of the chamber and the Lyne electorate is that Labor did not promise an urgent care clinic in Lyne at the federal election. I was the one who promised an urgent care clinic, one that would have been delivered if we had gotten into government. It seems to the people of the Lyne electorate that, because we're not a Labor seat, we don't get one. How does that meet the Prime Minister's commitment to govern for all Australians? It doesn't, and it doesn't pass the pub test for the people in the Lyne electorate.

We have the oldest demographic in the country. The obvious negative implications of having an elderly population on the electorate's healthcare infrastructure is compounded by severe low socioeconomic markers which exist throughout large swathes of the electorate, particularly within the township of Taree and the wider Manning. Indeed, in 2016 the SEIFA Index of Relative Socioeconomic Disadvantage score for the Mid North Coast LGA was 943, well below the Australian average of 1,000. In 2021 there were 108.9 GPs per 100,000 population. Again, this is well below the New South Wales average of 123.8. Insufficient numbers of GPs coupled with the socioeconomic fabric of the region mean that an alarming and increasing number of people are either unable to source a GP or cannot afford to see one.

As a result, the area is experiencing sustained growth in ED demand. The Manning Base Hospital, the region's only public hospital, is seeing a substantial volume of semi-urgent and nonurgent triage 4 and 5 presentations that are appropriate for an urgent care pathway. For instance, between 1 October 2024 and 30 September 2025—and these are figures I have provided to the health minister—the Manning Base Hospital saw 12,429 triage 4 patients and 4,698 triage 5 patients. That's 17,127 low-acuity presentations annually. Redirecting suitable triage 4 and 5 presentations to an urgent care clinic would relieve pressure on the ED; free treatment spaces and clinician time for higher-acuity presentations; reduce overall waiting times and the proportion of patients staying greater than four hours; reduce ambulance offload delays by clearing ED capacity and reducing bottlenecks; improve patient experience with faster treatment for low-acuity problems with an urgent care clinic model and less time in ED waiting rooms; and make better use of workforce. Redirecting even just 30 to 50 per cent of those annual presentations would remove 5,000 to 8,500 presentations per year from the ED, delivering noticeable improvements in ED capacity and wait times.

I note that an urgent care clinic was committed to in Maitland and has been delivered—a commitment I also made, and a commitment that I have welcomed because it will benefit many of the constituents in the southern part of the Lyne electorate. I'm grateful, and I thank the government for delivering on this commitment. But Maitland is almost two hours away for constituents in Taree. Whilst I acknowledge that, through the New South Wales government and the determined efforts of my colleague the member for Myall Lakes, Tanya Thompson MP, the New South Wales state government has committed funding for but has yet to deliver an urgent care clinic in Forster-Tuncurry, this is not enough to adequately serve the health needs of residents in Taree, in the Manning Valley and in the Great Lakes region.

I want to take a moment, because, earlier in this debate, a member from the other side talked about how the coalition cuts funding. Indeed, I think 'cuts' is used by the other side as well and certainly by Labor, because the New South Wales state Labor government cut funding when they came into government for a public hospital in Forster. That is Labor, and that is how it cuts. Let's not forget that. I have asked the government. I have written to the minister three times. Indeed, the minister has never personally written back to me in those three letters. I've had two responses from the chief of staff. Having been a chief of staff to a cabinet minister, we never wrote to opposition members. I would have never written to opposition members as the chief of staff. It was always the minister that wrote. But, indeed, I've written three times, and I haven't yet had a response from the minister. I have to work harder for one because I'm on this side, yet Labor did not commit to an urgent care clinic. I did. I'm supporting a policy that many members from the Labor side have come up to me and spoken about, telling me about the benefits it's bringing to their communities. I'm supporting it, yet I cannot get a response from the minister. So the battle goes on.

There are many, many other issues I could speak to, but, in the time remaining, I want to talk about the floods and the flood recovery on the Mid North Coast. It has to be one of the most traumatic events I have experienced in my time, and the trauma continues. Only last week I was in a town called Wingham, which is 10 or so kays west of Taree—a community that is situated on the Manning River; a community that is living the legacy impact of the floods all these months later; a town that continues to be cut off from others like Tinonee and Krambach because there is no work being done on the Bight Bridge, which was completely smashed by the floodwaters. It's a big job to rebuild that bridge and it needs engineering expertise, but the community are frustrated that they're not seeing any action at all. There's the Tiri Bridge, which is a bit further out in a more remote part of the area. Thankfully—and I'm grateful I've seen this message this week—there will be a temporary bridge put there which will help residents out in that area.

But with the Bight Bridge in particular, the business community of Wingham is suffering significantly because, with a large population, it takes an hour and a half now—it used to be 10 minutes—for people to bring their kids to school, go to the family pharmacy and go to the local Coles. It's an hour and a half to come round to Wingham, for people that work in Wingham. A lot of the business now has shifted to Taree, to Forster and to other areas. It's a huge, significant issue, and the community are incredibly frustrated.

They're also frustrated because, as I can see under the disaster funding recovery arrangements, the Wingham pool is not considered an essential piece of public infrastructure. For the people of Wingham, I can tell you, it's an absolutely essential piece of public infrastructure, particularly in summer. The pool was impacted by the floods. The council have decided it cannot be rebuilt where it is. They're going to need to find another location, but there's no guarantee on funding—and that is an enormous issue.

The other concern I have not only in relation to Wingham but across the area is that the Mid-Coast Council, which is the council covering the Taree area, have estimated that the cost of the recovery is $226.5 million. So far they have expended $43 million in recovery. How much have they got from the disaster recovery funding arrangements? Any guess? $3 million. That is all they have been reimbursed under the disaster recovery funding arrangements. This is a huge impact. I'm on a committee that's looking at local government financial sustainability. Here's a case in point—$3 million, when they need $226.5 million. I'm disappointed in the pace of the support for my councils, and I'll be looking to the government to step up across all funding support.

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