IT hasn’t been the best week for the Baird Government and the Illawarra.
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Firstly the Government got very excited about the new state budget and “record levels of spending”, but the budget lacked any real new vision for the Illawarra region.
The Illawarra Mercury front page the day after carried the headline “The Cupboard is Baird”.
It didn’t go down well, especially when members of the Opposition started brandishing it at Premier Mike Baird as he rose to his feet to answer a Dorothy Dixer about the budget response.
The Speaker subsequently banned the display of the front page and threatened to throw any member out of parliament who dared defy that order.
Then, on the same day, the Baird Government again did something which will win it no favours with the Illawarra region.
With the steel procurement bill up for debate and vote in Parliament, the Government instead chose to play politics and use delaying tactics to ensure it would not get to a vote.
With Parliament now on winter break until August, it means yet again an issue critical to this region just continues to sit on the backburner.
Simply not good enough.
The bill, put forward by the Greens with support from all but the Government, aims to mandate locally-made steel in government infrastructure projects.
Greens MP David Shoebridge took aim at the stalling tactics which involved long-winded speeches from Government members and who can blame him.
“The antics show that the NSW Coalition is more interested in protecting the electoral interests of their federal counterparts than the jobs of 4500 people in the Illawarra,” Mr Shoebridge said.
“The Baird government’s arguments against a government steel procurement policy were ill-informed, contradictory and plain ridiculous.
“In an insult to steelworkers one Liberal MP even said that he supported the dumping of steel into the Australian market.”
Mr Shoebridge said the Parliamentary Secretary for the Illawarra Gareth Ward and the Premier Mike Baird would at some point have to justify their position to the people of the Illawarra.
Perhaps firstly, Premier Baird might actually have to discover where Wollongong and the Port Kembla steelworks are on a map.