MINISTER for the Hunter Yasmin Catley has heralded last week’s NSW Budget a success for the region, highlighting key funds for essential services, education, healthcare and roads.

According to the NSW Government, more than six thousand teachers across the Hunter will receive their biggest pay increase in almost 30 years.

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More than a thousand education staff are also expected to be made permanent.

Labor’s $86 million regional road upgrade package should also benefit people across the Hunter, with funds contributed locally to safety improvements along Nelson Bay Road between Williamtown and Bobs Farm.

The NSW Government has also pledged funding for the introduction of a long-awaited public high school in Medowie alongside $300,000 to support services for vulnerable residents in Port Stephens.

Minister Catley said the Hunter has had to fight for its fair share of funding for too long.

“This Budget prioritises people, services and projects to ensure our great region can thrive now and into the future.

“People are the backbone of the Hunter – from our frontline workers to our teachers and everyone in between.

“These people are heroes who deserve recognition which they’re finally getting under the Minns Labor Government.”

NSW Treasurer Daniel Mookhey said the 2023-24 Budget sets out the Government’s plan to

“start the work of repairing the budget in a sustainable way, to rebuild our essential services and to help NSW families with the cost-of-living”.

“Budget repair begins with a $4 billion improvement in the Budget result over four years,” Mr Moohkey said.

“The Budget is forecast to return to a modest $844 million surplus in 2024-25 after five years of deficits under the Liberals and Nationals.

“The 2023-24 Budget reduces the growth of debt by $14.8 billion by 2025-26.

“Reducing debt will save taxpayers $2.3 billion of interest, which will be redirected to supporting essential services.”

Mr Mookhey said a Comprehensive Expenditure Review of previous spending allowed the Government to redirect $13 billion – including $700 million saved by freezing the pay of politicians and reducing the number of senior executives.

“This is on top of a $2.7 billion budget improvement from increasing coal royalties, $4.3 billion reduction in net debt from restructuring TAHE (Transport Asset Holding Entity) and a $7.7 billion gross debt reduction from temporarily suspending contributions to the NSW Generations Fund,” Mr Mookhey said.

According to the Budget papers, these savings have now been redirected into essential services, including $3.6 billion for the Essential Services Fund, $13.8 billion on hospital and health facilities, $9.8 billion on schools and education facilities, $1.4 billion to support 2,312 nurses and 500 new rural and regional paramedics, and $4 billion in natural disaster support and response programs.

With Mr Moohkey describing housing affordability and availability as the “biggest single pressure facing the people of New South Wales”, the Treasurer announced a raft of changes to “begin addressing the historic neglect of new housing supply”.

Long-term housing supply will be addressed by a $2.2 billion Housing and Infrastructure Plan which includes $300 million reinvested in Landcom to accelerate the construction of thousands of new homes (with 30 percent of these to be affordable housing), $400 million reserved in Restart NSW to deliver the infrastructure that will unlock housing across the State, and $1.5 billion committed for housing related infrastructure through the Housing and Productivity Contribution.

The Government also announced a $38.7 million Faster Planning Program, intended to speed up the delivery of quality housing projects.

A further investment of $224 million will support the Government’s Essential Housing Package, a highlight of which is $70 million in debt financing to accelerate the delivery of social, affordable and private homes, primarily in regional NSW.

In addition, the Commonwealth’s $610 million Social Housing Accelerator program will permanently increase social housing by around 1,500 dwellings.

During last Thursday’s Budget Reply, NSW Opposition Leader Mark Speakman said the NSW Government had “squandered” an opportunity to deal with the housing crisis in a meaningful way.

“Chris Minns’ Budget has had $14 billion tax revenue windfall, but he’s chosen to put these funds towards union wage deals that he’d promised would cost nothing, missing a golden opportunity to help deliver the housing that NSW needs,” Mr Speakman said.

“We wouldn’t have squandered this opportunity – we would have delivered policies with vision for a better future for this state.

“First home buyers deserve choice and that’s exactly what the Liberals and Nationals would have provided.

“We would have kept and sought to expand the First Home Buyer Choice scheme and kept the Government’s reduced threshold and rates of stamp duty – providing our next generation with choice in how they enter the housing market and giving them the best possible chance of realising the Australian dream.

“The Minns Government has told communities to ’get out of the way’, while we would have sought to engage with local councils and communities to review housing targets and establish a Community Benefit Fund of $2 billion or more to incentivise and reward local communities which achieve their targets.

“We also believe in supporting opportunities for one generation to help another – and would have sought to help empty nesters downsize and to free up appropriate housing supply for younger families, with a stamp-duty exemption for older downsizers,” Mr Speakman said.

Shadow Minister for Housing Scott Farlow said additional taxes and charges in Labor’s Budget will make home ownership less achievable for the people of New South Wales.

“Housing was supposed to be the centrepiece of this Budget, yet the Labor Government’s only answer is to impose more taxes for those building new homes, which makes homes less affordable.

“It also imposes more costs and increases the difficulty for the private sector, which provides the vast majority of housing supply, to deliver more homes,” Mr Farlow said.

“The Government’s infrastructure centrepiece is funded by a tax on new homes, with the associated infrastructure not tied to the area in which the development occurs.

“Rather than outlining new vision and focussing on measures to increase supply, the Government has increased taxation.”

Also reflecting on the Budget announcement, the Community Housing Industry Association of NSW (CHIA) said the Minns Government had missed a “golden opportunity to start rebuilding NSW’s broken housing system”.

CHIA NSW said the funding announced was primarily for existing, under-funded programs and services to continue and doesn’t commit funding to put more homes on the ground.

“There is no money in this Budget to help build more social housing despite the State’s social housing wait list standing at 56,000 households, the largest in the country.

“The only commitment to build more affordable housing was through reinvestment in Landcom.

“This initiative is welcome but will only deliver around 1,400 homes by 2039-40.

“That is roughly 80 affordable homes a year, at a time when the unmet housing need in NSW stands at over 220,000 homes.

“It is a drop in the ocean – it wouldn’t even meet the projected demand in any one of Sydney’s LGAs, let alone the statewide demand.
“This Budget was the perfect opportunity to show the people of NSW that the Minns Government is determined to help solve the state’s chronic social and affordable housing shortage.

“That opportunity has been missed,” said Mr Degotardi.