State Elections – Good result for Central Coast

AFTER TWELVE YEARS in the wilderness the Central Coast could be coming in from the cold following the March 2023 State Election.

From the time they were elected the Liberal government identified with Western Sydney and they threw billions at it. But on election night it proved to be fruitless.

Meanwhile the people of the Central Coast got the message that they were being neglected and further entrenched the region as a Labor stronghold.

They went further. In the Terrigal Electorate, which has been blue ribbon Liberal for some forty years the voters showed their displeasure coming close to tipping sitting member Adam Crouch out.

On election night commentators gave Terrigal to Labor. However, pre-polls have bought him back from the dead. Even so Terrigal now has to be considered a marginal electorate.

The Liberals years ago downgraded the region to Parliamentary Secretary status which was an insult considering our population of 340,000 people.

The best news is that along with a new Minns Labor Government comes three Labor Members with Member for Wyong, David Harris being, among other things, Minister for the Central Coast.

CCBR congratulates all three Members; David Harris, Member for Gosford, Liesl Tesch and Member for The Entrance, David Meahan.

We look forward to working with all three to make the Central Coast a better place to live.

In the twelve years since the O’Farrell Liberal Government was elected the region’s population has increased 25,000.

Nothing has kept pace, except health. We did get two new hospitals and the government did contribute to the UON Central Coast Clinical School and Research Institute. We had to drag them kicking and screaming to tip in $18 million as their share of a new UON Campus in Gosford CBD. That only got announced last month!

And, there was the disastrous amalgamation of Gosford and Wyong Councils.

So, where to from here?

Firstly, there are those issues that affect our region and then there are those that affect small and medium businesses across the board.

Central Coast Priorities

• Housing crisis. In September 2022

Business NSW Central Coast held a Housing Summit that highlighted the crisis now facing some 30% of local residents. Both social and affordable housing has reached a critical point exacerbated by a plethora of controls placed on residential housing subdivisions and simple home development applications by the State Government.

Allowing Green activists to control hous- ing supply through multiple government agencies with surreptitious regulations has stopped the supply of new residential land and slowed house building almost to a standstill.

Fixing the Central Coast housing crisis has to be a top priority.

• New TAFE for Gosford. In November 2021 Landcom announced that it would buy the former Gosford Council Chambers land in Gosford and redevelop the site which would include building a new TAFE to replace the old TAFE which would be demolished and affordable housing built in its place.

The Perrottet Government shut down all conversation on this proposal shortly after and despite saying that a positive announcement would be made over the following year they have remained silent. Both projects are essential for the future of Gosford.

This is a top priority that CCBR and Gosford Erina Business Chamber will be championing with the new Government.

• Warnervale High School. A high school to service the Greater Warnervale area is desperately needed. However, the previous government refused to allocate funds. We know the Member for Wyong has been advocating for a high school but the former government preferred to pump billions into Western Sydney.

• Tuggerah Town Centre. In the dying days of the Berejiklian Government in 2019