What specific improvements should the next government make in New South Wales?

Question

As a politician, I know how important it is to listen to the opinions of the voters. I believe there are a great number of issues left neglected in this state - what are your suggestions to fix NSW?

See the Yahoo!7 Answers blog for more information http://au.blog.360.yahoo.com/blog-txN._0woRKfpYuTJw9rObY.WmgiUW5xm?p=1124

Answer 1

Dear Mr Debnam,

Here are my suggestions:
1) Improved public transport in Sydney & rural & regional NSW. Sydney needs to revamp the trains, have better bus connections, consider a metro system, have light rail where practical.
Regional NSW needs much faster train services, that are more extensive. Rail line upgrades are long overdue. Newcastle/Lake Macquarie, Central Coast & Wollongong/Illawara need much improved public transport - extensions of rail services/lines, and a fast train to Sydney from each centre. Significantly improved infrastructure will removed cars from the highways, and stimulate the economy.

2) Climate Change - NSW needs to be at the forefront of examining this issue and investing in energy efficiency, renewable power, and researching cleaner coal technology.

3) Water - NSW needs to re-examine how water is managed, and will require more recycling initiatives, bigger dams in some areas, and other ways to secure water supply in Sydney and rural/regional areas.

4) Road upgrades - many rural roads need upgrading, sealing, old bridges replaced etc. This needs to be a priority.

5) Schools & Universities - invest more money in making schools 1st rate, and university courses more affordable.

Thanks for asking our opinions

Answer 2

The specific improvements to New South Wales should come in the areas of Education, Health & Employment. Education & Health have not been funded as they should have been by the Howard Federal Goverment. As John Howard has stated I have no mates at Premiers conferences so accordingly he does not fund the states in these areas. The Autocratic IR Laws have not made it easy for working families either.Working for NSW Tafe I understand the funding shortfall tafe has experienced at the hands of Howard, placing huge pressure on the state budget.Under federal Labor Tafe flourished prior to 1996 as did Health in NSW.The Howard gov't keeps hinting at taking over hospital responsibility but it won't & it won't responsibly fund the state the way it has to where health is concerned.To fix NSW we need a Federal Labor Govt & a State Labor Gov't. What Mr Debnam needs to do is to get out into the real world & not just pander to those at the big end of town, get out amongst people, people everywhere but like Liberals he will not, he will not listen to the people.Axing people from essential public services is not the answer either services that are needed by the state. And with a Federal labor State Labor relationship there would be a chance to remove & lessen the autocratic Industrial Relations Laws that are hurting working families in NSW, so again if Mr Debnam wants to help families in NSW he would rally against these laws but no he won't. Neglect Mr Debnam is flowing from the Federal Level onto the state level here in NSW that is where Neglect is.

Answer 3

There's a list of things in general:

1) Public transport: It really sucks. I wonder if MPs actually take public transport.
Even though it would be so much better for the environment, I'd rather go where ever I want whenever I want in my car (even if its a few minutes late and petrol costs a fortune).

2) Roads & Infrastructure - All roads lead to USA.
Why do we want to create stress?

3) Public education - we dont need to be putting money into teachers pockets. Public educatiion has eroded over the past 20 years. How smart are NSW kids these days? And what proportion of public school goers undertaking extra tuition? Why isn't what is taught in the classroom good enough? Or is public education just not sufficient to give public school students the edge over private school students?

4) Public hospitals - (looks at NSW on the map) It's in there somewhere.. oh wait, it's right next to 'private hospital - no long queues'. Sigh. Where is the faith?

Answer 4

Dear Peter,

1. Water Crisis is big on my list for everyone in NSW and the rest of Australia. Something has to be done, and should have been done before we ever got this far.

2. Infrastructure - I think one of New South Wales's issues (and unfortunately I'm relating only to Sydney metropolitan in this instance), is infrastructure. It took forever for Labour to fix Windsor Road in the Hills District, and now because of extra housing at Kellyville / Rouse Hill etc. it is congested again and so are all of the arterial road leading into it. The Labor government doesn't seem to think about the future and instead uses band-aid solutions.

3. Public transport is an embarrassment especially when you compare it to the rest of the world.

4. Public Schools - in 2007 NSW children should be educated in a comfortable air-conditioned environment. Are our school days supposed to be the best years of our life?

5. Child care (although I'm not sure if that falls under state or federal). The cost is getting beyond a joke. I am a full time working mother of twins, my husband also works full time, and having the twins in childcare costs more per fortnight then our mortgage, but if I hadn't have gone back to work we would be even worse off.


Hope this helps. Thank you for listening.

Answer 5

Listen to the "Silent Majority" ! Hold plebiscites or do large scale polling across the board.

For too long the Government has listened to loud special interest groups, eg big business or radical greenies, to stay in power and the majority of us have suffered.
Whether you live in the country, with ever decreasing/ non existent government services, or the city with dysfunctional services and/or ones you didn't ask for, (cross city tunnel), we have all suffered under the current style of government.

Listen to the people! Not the ones who promise to deliver a block of votes or money for your election campaign and you will find that the people will vote for you.

Once you are in power fix the services that we expect the government to provide. Instead of worrying about how to sell the next asset, ( that the public owns), or doing the next deal that lets the private sector make money off supplying a government service.

The first political party that wakes up to these fundamental facts will be on a winner.

Cheers

PS Stop all the negative campaigning!!! We all know you're just as bad as each other,( you know what they say, the only problem with elections is that a politician wins!!!), and tell us how you are going to fix the current mess.

Answer 6

Sir, I am very glad you asked this question.

I believe any government, no matter their affiliation, should keep the promises made by the previous government. After all, they are the government for the PEOPLE of NSW. They are not there for their own gains but the gains of the people of the state, as a whole. If a particular party is voted into power on a particular platform, then they have won a mandate to see that platform achieved and the promises made, kept. That mandate does not expire when another government is elected, it (the mandate) is transferred to the incoming government. After all, it is the will of the people. It is most likely that the outgoing government is doing so because they have not met the mandate in a timely manner.

Some of the promises made by both Labor and Liberal governments are: fuel excise of three cents per litre for three years (3x3 was the slogan) but that quickly became 4x4. That excise was to fund roads projects such as the Princes Highway to the Queensland border but it is still incomplete. As well, I might say, are many roads all over NSW in disarray. Another was the increase in taxes (direct taxes) on cigarettes to fund hospitals. They, too, are in a terrible condition.

Instead of the monies from the sources being put straight into consolidated revenue, I feel they should be properly accounted and made public for the states constituents to view and oversee should they not be being put to the use for which they were created, then it can be seen and something can be done.

Another thing I would like to see change within politics, in general, is the practice of elected members failing upwards. If someone is not up to the task of handling a portfolio, they should be demoted to the lower bench, not kicked sideways hoping to find something that they might be good at. It's failed far too often for someone not to have noticed that practice just does not work. The other factor of this is that the members who have been elected have put their hand up and said to the voting public, "I think I can do it and I would like to show you that I can." When they show that they cant, their leader should have the temerity to put them aside as an assistant until such time as they show they are up to the task.

You, Mr, Debnam, have pointed out three such Labor members who are doing just this.

In short, I would like to see a more open and accountable government and members who exhibit responsibility when they take it.

Thank you for your question and your time, sir.

.

Answer 7

Yes, it is important to listen to the opinion of voters but as a politician don't you think it is also important to get out there into your state, find the problems that exist YOURSELF and then do something about it.

i live in the Bankstown area of Sydney and I know for a fact that many of you politicians would not walk down some of the local streets here without your security teams or protection of some sort.

Try coming down to Bankstown, Punchbowl or Lakemba and then you won't need to ask the question, you'll know exactly what the "social" problems are in this area.

As for the rest of the state, well, most of the obvious ones have already been mentioned here on yahoo answers and yes they are all valid however.... most are beyond being fixed. Schools, transport, hospitals, in the public system are always gonna have flaws and that's something you just learn to accept but how about finding a way or coming up with a new system so that its not so difficult for people to get somewhere in life so as not to have to rely on these services.

We work like robots, pay our taxes and then find out how much goes to queensland.

Answer 8

Pressure should be applied to the federal government to stop taking 3 billion dollars per year of NSW GST and giving it to other states.

Do this and the user pays for everything attitude that the local and state government of NSW are taking would hopefully be a thing of the past.

Not to mention that hospitals, police, and education should then be properly funded because there is more money to go around.

A total overhaul of the Rail network starting at the top.

Spend more money on improving the road systems on the Northern Beaches. A trip to the city in peak hour can now take nearly 2 hours for a trip that usually takes 20 minutes.

Cease and desist with all future tollways unless they are government owned. Put an end date on the tolls so that once they are paid off there is nothing more to pay.

State and Federal governments are screwing the road users big time by allowing private consortiums to own tollways. When Tollways should be the sole responsibility of our government!

Investigate why we are still paying exorbitant parking rates in Sydney city. Kathryn Greiner instigated a parking levy to assist paying for the Sydney Olympics however it appears that we are still paying for it. Seriously the people of Sydney are being screwed. $60 to park your car for a day is over the top.

Pressure the federal government to reduce immigration now before its too late. We already do not have the water reserves to sustain the country through severe drought why increase the pressure and things are set to get worse.

Also our transport and roads cannot cope with the number of people here now why make it worse?

I could go on, but a lot of the problems stem from the fact that NSW is being screwed out of 3000 million dollars per year by the federal Liberal government, this is a lot of money in anyones book, except for maybe Brendan Nelson whom wants to commit Australia to 16000 million dollars on 100 aircraft that his own airforce are saying "DON'T DO IT".

Answer 9

As others have said Sydney is not the be all and end of all of NSW. I would like to see the Government put more emphasis on infrastructure for regional areas especially more
- more police and police stations that are open 24/7
- regional job creation (especially for the youth)
- improving the health system by having more hospital beds
and more help for the mentally ill
- enticing more professional people to relocate to regional areas and motivating the ones who are here to stay here. As long as professionals choose not to come and stay then we will continue to see the attrition of the smaller towns.
- Better transportation system

The area that I live in has very few job opportunities and what jobs they do have are more for tradesmen or minimum wage.
I have been in this area for almost 6 months through necessity and not through choice. Even though I am educated there has virtually nothing for me to pick up except for a casual position (I used to try and look for work from Sydney to far north Queensland but I stopped because I was told that I needed to be living in an area to be considered). Government has to do better than than what it has been doing. NSW can't take another 5 years of "business as usual".

Answer 10

The obvious answers are education, health, transport and the states economy.
Environment should be the national domain no question!

Education - having been educated in both NSW and VIC i can say that NSW is so far behind it is not funny - music taught in yr 7 here... and all through primrary in VIC. NSW focuses far too much on how students feel then on what students should know.

Health - local hospitals are useless! As much as we would all like to have a local hospital of the standard of RPA its not possible. Smaller Clinics should be set up - NOT IN HOSPITALS (how much more parking space will be needed then!?) public clinics should be rethought and the clinics should be "manned" 24/7 with facilities for minor day surgery procedures.

Transport - the rail system is a joke.. what a pity that sucessive plannig ministers (on both sides) have forgotten about expansion zones. The rail network would be far to costly to repair... Soooo increase state ownership of public roads (which genius sold them in the first place?!) increase the road Tolls to discourage use and increase public transport facilities -if our rail system could cope i would say increase road tolls to offset free train fares.

Its not all about Sydney though - Rural communities need to find a way to increase their productivity - the Government could help by increasing state industry. The Desalination plant - why can't that be built in Newcastle or the Shoalhaven where unemployment is very high? I dont mind paying the extra 5c a litre (or whatever it is) to pipe it to Sydney.

In-Land - we in Sydney keep complaining about industrial pollution - why cant the State government encourage non essential industry to move to Rural areas? Tax subsidies do wonders when encouraging business.

NSW needs to think about competition both globally and nationally. We can't grow at the rates of NT QLD or WA. We dont have the resources - why do have the population to encourage service based industry or even providing lower cost manufacturing industry to the rest of Australia.

The "New directions" of the Iemma government are the same ones as the Carr Government - i'm still waiting for someone to start the engine though! De-centralising our economic production (i.e. Sydney isnt the be all and end all of our economy) would provide for greater LONG TERM economic growth and stability...

Answer 11

unfortunately none of the current crop of politicians either from the labor or liberal and to a lesser extent the greens, democrats can save this state.
i remember the likes of Greiner. Keating , Whitlam , Carr,
Fahye, just to mention a few .
This state will only go forward if the attacks on the workers rights as well as the bosses rights are upheld.
We need a new party , a new horizon , fresh constructive ideas , the old guard of the Libs and Labor remind me of the former Soviet party still stuck in their same ideologies and forever instilled in their dachas.
Take the water situation , none of the parties have given thought of harnessing the huge amount of water that comes from the Ord river and the unending supply that is available from the top end , years ago a former prime minister wanted to pipe water from New Guinea to Australia and guess what it was rejected , why ? too costly.
How costly is it now , not in monetary terms but in survival terms.
Fix NSW , how can any of you lot fix a leaking dam when you aren't able to fix a leaking tap.