David Gillespie (Lyne, National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Last Wednesday, with all the key educational stakeholders, I was present in Taree for the establishment of a steering committee to establish and advise in delivering a larger university presence in Taree to serve the 95,000 residents of the Manning-Great Lakes region. The first meeting of the Taree universities campus steering committee came into being, and there was huge energy and support for the project. We need to lift higher-education opportunities for the people of the Manning-Great Lakes region, both for mature-age students and school leavers.

The federal coalition government is doing and has done recently a lot of work in the higher-education space in regional Australia to boost access to university participation for regional Australians with the regional study hubs and regional university centres. At our first steering committee meeting, all three levels of government were represented, and there were three university partners. New South Wales TAFE, industry and business, and local school principals are all committed to progressing the plan to develop the Taree universities campus centre.

These initiatives, along with other initiatives in the Manning, like the Bushland Health Group project—part of the Figtrees on the Manning plan; the upgrade to radiotherapy services in the region; the new MRI funding; the major expansions of aged care; headspace— (Time expired)