Rural mayors angry at state governments $50 million road funding announcement

The funding announcement came from regional transport and roads minister Sam Farraway on Tuesday, October 25 and Narromine Shire mayor Craig Davies was less than impressed.

"I'm just wondering which shire that money might be going to, because that's about the extent of the damage that we're facing - it's a bloody insult," he said.

"I think it's an insult and it's embarrassing to the government. It's peanuts."

If each of the 95 council's around the state fighting for funding were to receive an equal amount of the $50 million available, they would only receive $536,000.

Orange mayor Jason Hamling conceded the overall amount was "not enough", but said any funding would be welcome as councils, big and small, battled the impact of heavy and continuous rain and crumbling roads.

"We'll look at getting the best value by targeting streets that already have significant potholes and carry out large-scale patching," Cr Hamling said.

Cr Davies made note of the WestConnex project that will be completed at a cost of $16 billion and provides motorists with a continuous, 33km traffic-light free motorway network, with connections for future projects linking the north shore and northern beaches, Sydney Airport and the southern suburbs.

"At any given time you can see $70 to $100 billion of government infrastructure being built in the Sydney basin and they want to offer rural NSW just $50 million - that's a real insult to people in the bush," he said.

"It shows how out of touch and how little control over rural affairs the national party now has."

Mr Farraway said the government was putting more money on the table for councils to repair potholes on the roads regional communities use every day.

"This additional support will help ease the pressure local councils are facing and boost the resources they can draw upon to repair their most damaged roads to improve safety and reduce wear and tear on vehicles," he said.

Cr Davies said he can see a growing and ever-increasing divide between the bureaucracy and what goes on in rural NSW.

"The government is running into a tricky situation where they have an election in five months and they're trying to push out as much good news as they possibly can and show communities that 'we're listening'," he said.

"But Jesus Christ, why weren't they listening months ago."

Council's are struggling with their infrastructure budget to deal with the road repairs without the help of the state government.

"We are totally out of our depth," Cr Davies said.

"The state government for decades has underspent on rural infrastructure, it's as simple as that."

Cr Davies even compared the state of the roads to that of a third world country.

"The Newell Highway at the moment - there are parts of it which have only recently been done up and they're in a terrible state. Look at the state of the Mitchell Highway between Narromine and Dubbo," he said.

Bogan Shire mayor Glen Neil said trying to do roadworks for the last six months has been an "absolute battle".

"In some cases you actually make the roads worse than leaving it as it was because the machines you're trying to work with damage it more," he said.

"The funding is specifically aimed at potholes basically, to try and get in and fix the major holes in the bitumen that are giving everyone grief."

Something of a band-aid solution, Cr Neil said.

"Sam [Farraway] acknowledged it won't fix everything properly but it's going to help and I believe it will substantially," he said.

"It's a lot of money but in terms of what has to happen it probably doesn't go far enough. But it's better than where we started, that's for sure."

Cr Neil said the funding would make a huge difference to roads between Dubbo and Nyngan but a lot more money will be needed down the track.

"For the time being to help out, I think it's pretty significant," he said.

It's not only the rural towns outside of Dubbo that have been seeing problems with the state of the roads. Bathurst has been facing its own issues too.

Bathurst Regional councillor Warren Aubin - a driving instructor with 26 years' experience who is also on council's road traffic committee - also said any new funding for pothole repairs would be welcome, but emphasised that it could not be a band-aid fix.

He said throwing a "bucketful of blue metal into a hole" would not solve anything in the long term.

"It has to be done properly," he said.

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