General News
15 October, 2025
Chaffey's Corner - October 15, 2025
Comment by Jamie Chaffey, Federal Member for Parkes
Regional Australia Missing Out
The past week has seen some very important issues for the Parkes electorate - and for all of regional Australia - raised in parliament.
I questioned the agriculture minister about the neglect of our primary producers over the past three years.
When you live and work in regional NSW, you know what it is to make do. You make do without the health care, without the same choices for education, housing, and childcare.
If you are a farmer, or one of the many people in our communities whose livelihood depends on agriculture, you also know what it is to deal with more constraints, more red tape and less assistance when it is most needed. One of those constraints is a severe shortage of workers for the agricultural industry. This government discontinued the dedicated agriculture visa and have made changes to the Palm Australia Labour Mobility (PALM) Scheme for workers that have made it much less effective both for Australia and the countries under the PALM scheme.
The result has been fewer workers in agriculture.
Another challenge faced by farmers is the substandard regional road network. As regional Australians we have no choice, we have to use the roads available to us to get goods to market, to get the children to school and to go to work.
Apart from the fact that many roads have been damaged in the past few years by natural disasters, regional roads funding as a whole is going backwards. According to NRMA figures, we are looking at an average road infrastructure backlog of more than $222 million a year for the past three years in the Parkes electorate.
Our councils have been knocked back to the tune of $150 million for disaster relief funding for roads across the electorate.
Our farmers in the Murray-Darling Basin – one of the biggest river systems in the world – do not even have certainty of that most basic of needs – water.
Water buybacks are having a terrible impact on our agricultural communities.
All of this adds up to losing income, losing farms and losing population in our regional areas.
There is only so many times farmers can adapt before they run out of options.
We need to strike a balance between nurturing and growing our vital agricultural industry and regional lifestyle, and pursuing unworkable schemes and unrealistic net zero targets.
Funding for Remote Airstrips
In more positive news, seven air strips and aerodromes in the electorate of Parkes will receive funding through the federal Remote Airstrip Upgrade Program.
A working, safe and accessible airstrip is not a luxury, it is absolutely essential, particularly as we approach another flood and bushfire season.I am pleased to see that the Brewarrina, Goodooga, Lake Cargelligo, Wilcannia, Tibooburra, Warren, and Lightning Ridge airports and aerodromes have all been included, and I look forward to seeing these projects implemented.
