MAITLAND mayor Philip Penfold says NSW Labor's plan to ditch the government's road reclassification program, which would see the state take back responsibility of local roads, in favour of a $670 million emergency road repair fund will cripple local councils in the long run.
NSW Labor announced the road repair fund on Friday, comprising $280 million from the Coalition's existing regional pothole repair program, a $193 million reallocation from the government's "failed" reclassification scheme and $197 million in new money.
The funds are designed to help councils tackle mammoth repair bills after last year's devastating floods, but Cr Penfold said councils needed the state government to take the financial burden of busy local roads off their hands.
"Instead of acting on what they criticise the government for, which is the delay, the Labor opposition is saying it will further delay that but give us money in the short-term to keep us happy and patch roads up," he said.
"We don't need a short-term outcome or short-term funding; we need wholesale action and the state government to take over those roads that are the connection between the ones they already own."
Maitland is the fastest-growing regional city in NSW, and Cr Penfold said the council alone could not afford to continue to upgrade roads at pinch points like Thornton and Metford.
"The state should take that responsibility to connect its own roads, but instead council is left with the financial burden to push onto the ratepayer. It's not good enough," he said.
Local councils such as Singleton and Cessnock have struggled after the July floods left behind crater-like potholes and cracked major thoroughfares, including Broke Road, in two.
The 2019 road reclassification program was designed to take roads out of the hands of regional councils struggling to keep up with maintenance and repairs.
To date, 15,000km of local roads across NSW remain in limbo.
Maitland MP and Shadow Minister for Transport and Roads Jenny Aitchison said Labor's focus is on getting roads fixed now.
"The minister has this report on his desk and failed to do anything with it, we will go out right now and get that money out to councils and make sure can do the work they need for their roads," she said.
"What we're saying is, yes, it may be a band-aid, but these councils are bleeding.
"The money is sitting there, in government accounts, it's not being used and we want to make sure those councils, communities and people struggling every day getting bogged or not able to get from A to B - that councils have real money to fix that."
As far as Singleton mayor Sue Moore is concerned, the road reclassification program has been nothing but an "absolute failure".
"We had a number of roads we put forward and it went nowhere, the program was never delivered," she said.
"It's very frustrating for people when they see potholes, their vehicles, tyres, rims and axles in some cases are being damaged and all we can do is put up signage to warn people to take it steady."
Minister for Regional NSW Paul Toole said Labor's announcement fell "drastically short" of what would be delivered under the Liberals and Nationals.
"Labor has already committed more than 10 per cent of the package to specific roads in Sydney and Wollongong. Yet no mention of any funding for communities like Singleton, Maitland, Lismore or Bega or a guaranteed share for the regions," he said.
"Labor has shown yet again it thinks of NSW as Newcastle, Sydney and Wollongong. There's a lot more to NSW than that."
The state government committed a further $280 million to regional roads last year after its initial $50 million for the Fixing Local Roads Pothole Repair program was met with significant backlash.
Cessnock mayor Jay Suuval called it a "literal drop in the pothole".
"I don't know whether the Nats have been hoodwinked by the Liberal Party or they're wilfully allowing the Libs to pork-barrel in Sydney, but the funding that went to Sydney councils per kilometre of road was over five times the amount that's gone to regional councils," he said.
"We've been asking the current government to reclassify some of our roads as state roads. They have had four years since they made the promise to do 15,000km of regional road reclassification into state roads and from my understanding they haven't really delivered on anywhere near that if any of that."
Minister for Regional Transport and Roads Sam Farraway said he was shocked at Labor's U-turn on road reclassification.
"Labor has spent the last few years arguing how important this program is and now they're putting it in the 'too hard' basket," he said.
"The only reason we're reclassifying roads is to clean up Labor's mess from when it was last in office and dumped hundreds of millions of dollars of road maintenance costs on councils overnight.
"Now they're deserting them again. We've got on with the job of righting their wrong and have already funded and implemented the first 32 of 37 recommendations from the Independent Panel that oversaw the Regional Road Transfer and Road Classification Review priority round."
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