A POLITICIAN on the NSW South Coast wants to reopen the debate about what "regional" means for the state government.
Upper House member and Shooters Fishers and Farmers representative Mark Banasiak has been drawn to the issue in the wake of the government's announcement of a $250 Seniors Travel Card.
The card, for use on public transport services, is only available to regional areas.
This means Shellharbour seniors will get the card - and the $250 - when it rolls out next year while those in Wollongong won't.
A Transport for NSW spokeswoman the definition of regional the government department was "consistent with that used for Restart NSW".
That body defines regional as any local government areas outside of Sydney, Wollongong and Newcastle.
Mr Banasiak said the government's definition of regional was "a bit of a bugbear around the state".
"I think it definitely needs to be looked at and cleared up," Mr Banasiak said.
"I think there does need to be some clarity."
Not just for Wollongong but for all those other towns around NSW. Up in Newcastle there are some suburbs up there that have that same concern.
For Mr Banasiak it wasn't as simple as classifying all of Wollongong as regional. He said that, while some areas of the LGA are regional the city centre might be classed as metro.
He said the way areas were defined was inconsistent, with a so-called metro Local Government Area like Wollongong showing some distinct regional characteristics.
"If you're defined as regional for one element it should be for everything," Mr Banasiak said.
"If public sector and private sector workers are being paid regional wages then that must mean the're regional.
"Our train line is classed as a regional line, then that must make us regional - we don't have metro service.
"If you're regional for one think then you should be regional for everything. There shouldn't be this flip flopping."
The issue of a regional definition came into sharp focus with the 2018 sale of the Snowy Hydro.
Premier Gladys Berejiklian said the $4.2 billion in proceeds would be spent on regional infrastructure.
In state parliament in March last year, Deputy Premier John Barilaro said Wollongong and Shellharbour would not benefit from the funding, saying the Illawarra was a region but that didn't make it regional.
By May, the definition changed to include Shellharbour as "regional".
But in June a spokesman for Mr Barilaro's office said "there is no standard methodology for defining a Local Government Area as metropolitan or regional".
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Glen Humphries
I'm an award-winning senior journalist with the Illawarra Mercury and have well over two decades' worth of experience in newspapers. I cover the three local councils in the Illawarra for the Mercury, state and federal politics, as well as writing for the TV guide. If I'm not writing, I'm reading.
I'm an award-winning senior journalist with the Illawarra Mercury and have well over two decades' worth of experience in newspapers. I cover the three local councils in the Illawarra for the Mercury, state and federal politics, as well as writing for the TV guide. If I'm not writing, I'm reading.
