NSW Labor’s plans to win back its Western Sydney heartland would spell doom for Orange City Council’s bid to have the Rural Fire Service headquarters relocate to Orange after its lease expires at Lidcombe in 2019.
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Labor Leader Luke Foley said he would find a new Western Sydney home for the service to boost jobs in the area, and moving it away from Sydney was out of the question.
Relocating the health department from North Sydney to Liverpool is also on his ‘to-do’ plans.
Orange City Council wants the fire service to move here and backs up the bid by promoting our lifestyle and excellent facilities, while NSW Farmers will lobby for a country relocation.
About 380 fire service employees will be affected by the move from the Lidcombe site that is being rezoned by the government for residential development. Dubbo, Octopus of the West, has also put up its hands for the service, boasting it has better facilities than Orange.
Roll out the red carpet
Talking about Dubbo, the city wanted the annual Logie Awards to be held there and had some high-profile backing from its MP and Deputy Premier Troy Grant and Deputy PM Barnaby Joyce.
They reckoned it was time Logies’ organisers tried something new and the deputy premier put a case to TV Week to push Dubbo’s claim but it all came to nought and the awards will go ahead in Melbourne on Sunday week.
But the dodgy nominations this year have stripped the Logies of any credibility they might have had, so Dubbo, you would have been welcome to them.
We’ll have the rural fire service HQ.
Prices are up
COLES' sales slogan is down, down, down but prices for its Shell petrol station in Summer Street are up, up, up.
The company must have thought we’d had enough relief and jacked up unleaded prices to 121.4 cents a litre for the Anzac Dy long weekend.
That’s a whopping 11.1 cents a litre dearer than United in Woodward Street, the cheapest Orange outlet, at 110.3 cents, and most other Orange petrol stations.
Coles unleaded E10 is 119.9, compared with United’s 108.3, 11.6 cents cheaper, and BP Summer Street where it’s selling for 108.5c.
Liberty on Bathurst Rd has unleaded for 110.9. Coles Shell’s premium V power is a huge 141.4 cents a litre compared with 129.5 at the Summer Street BP and 129.9 at Liberty.
Sydney, as usual, is enjoying cheaper prices, with one petrol station at Rockdale selling unleaded for 98.3 cents a litre.
Make hay while the sun shines
WE are two thirds of the way through autumn and our trees are only just losing their leaves.
Usually about now the trees are as bare as a baby’s bum, but the leaves have been slow to fall so are our seasons out of whack?
Because autumn marks the change between summer and the chill of winter, the season, especially in poetry, has often been associated with an air of melancholy as we wake up to frosts and skies turn grey.
But with Orange’s warm weather still here, it looks as though everyone can be happy and cheerful for a few more weeks before winter hits.
Rego reminder
THE Roads and Maritime Services’ money-saving decision to scrap registration labels catches people out regardless of them getting renewal notices in the mail.
A glance at the label every time you jumped in the car was a reminder of when it was due, but now there’s nothing there.
However, most automotive businesses in Orange will sell you a small label called regoit that you stick on your windscreen or motorbike to remind you when your registration is due.
The stickers are the same colour as labels still issued for some vehicles, orange for 2016 and blue for 2017, and show the correct year.
You can buy one for $2.50 or you can get a series of packs designed for families, fleet use or fundraisers, on the regoit website or from most Orange car and accessory businesses.
Some of the proceeds go to help organisations like Wangarang in Orange to provide employment opportunities for people with disabilities.
Scrapping the labels has become a cash cow for the state government, collecting $50 million in fines for drivers with unregistered vehicles, with infringements up by more than 50 per cent.
Lowering the bar
WITH all the fuss about Orange pubs having lockouts and a ban on take-away sales after 10pm, Dubbo publican Joanne Blair challenged Hotels Association president Scott Leach for his job at the association’s annual general meeting.
Country publicans banded together to support her bid and although it failed, she was elected to the executive and no doubt will continue the fight against the takeaway ban.
But who can remember the infamous institution known as the six o’clock swill, introduced after vigorous campaigning by temperance groups.
It usually reached its peak between 5pm and 6pm when workers knocked off and featured hordes of shouting, gesticulating drinkers who fought, pushed and elbowed their way to the bar in an attempt to down as many beers as they could before the dreaded closing time of 6pm arrived.
This was quite the opposite of what the temperance groups had in mind and was a constant source of amazement by overseas visitors.
People later voted in a referendum to discontinue 6pm closing and the hours since then have gradually been increased, with some pubs permitted to stay open all night.
But running a pub these days is far from being all froth and bubble.
Faced with random breath testing, higher overheads, a general decline in patrons and with high prices of up to $4.50 a middy some Orange pubs are charging is not helping, it’s a battle to survive and, in fact, the Occidental has pulled down the shutters.
A little bird told me ...
PAT and Mick are walking down the road and Pat says: “Look, there’s a dead bird.”
Mick looks up in the sky and says: "Where?”