THE Federal Government will honour its pre-election commitment to deliver $17.4-million towards the upgrade of the Bucketts Way between Gloucester and Wingham, federal member for Lyne, Dr David Gillespie said today.
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Dr Gillespie was responding to a media release issued by Greater Taree City Council about road funding.
“In relation to our election commitments, they will be honoured. I have recently announced tens of millions of dollars in new funding under the Coalition’s new Community Development Grants program for infrastructure projects in the Manning and Gloucester areas and I can confirm our commitment to the $16.8-million upgrade of the Bucketts Way will be funded under another program.
“Had we not won the election, we would not have expected Labor to honour our promises and we won’t be honouring theirs.
“The $12-million Labor promise to Greater Taree City Council in relation to roads and bridges was just that – a promise. There were no contracts signed by the Commonwealth and this was confirmed to me by both the mayor and general manager in a discussion I had with them a couple of months ago when they informed me that the former Labor minister Anthony Albanese told council to spend the money that Labor had promised and the general manager said he had indicated to the minister that he could not spend money that was not there.
“There has been no withdrawal of funding. I will be honouring my election commitments.
“I will always fight for more funding for our region. That’s a given.
"But what I now call on council to do, is start fixing our local roads through better tendering and construction practices and ensure the millions of dollars that is already being invested by the Federal Government in Greater Taree City Council’s roads are being spent wisely.”
