Housing pressures, regional services among top concerns in electorate survey

Housing pressures, support for rural and regional communities and the cost of living have emerged as the leading concerns in an ongoing survey of the Parkes electorate.

Federal Member for Parkes Jamie Chaffey said his 30-second survey, which has been open to constituents since mid-July, had highlighted a range of issues causing concern across the electorate.

Respondents were asked to select four issues that concerned them most from a list of 15 choices.

“The two top concerns from respondents to date are reducing migration to ease housing, infrastructure and services (48.33 per cent of respondents), and backing rural and regional communities (47.85 per cent),” Mr Chaffey said.

“These concerns were closely followed by a need to reduce cost-of-living pressures and a call for better hospitals and health outcomes.

“Other significant issues were tackling local crime and drugs, boosting defence and national security, protecting retirement savings from unfair taxes, and reducing the tax burden.

“There are no real surprises here. The people of the Parkes electorate and all regional Australians know they are being robbed of services and funding and left to bear the brunt of new environmental laws, new gun laws, and huge cost of living hikes.

“While appropriate migration is very important to our communities, there has been an absolute lack of control in meeting standards – and the strain on our housing, infrastructure and services is showing.”

Mr Chaffey said the Nationals’ plan puts Australian values first and caps net migration each year below the number of new homes completed.

“Our strength has always been in supporting the regions, and we will continue to do that with better services for the regions, including childcare, pharmacies, the NDIS, health, communications and connectivity,” he said.

“We are committed to lower taxes and cheaper power.

“The cost of living, housing, health, and better services are all concerns I have already brought forward to this government, and I will continue to do so to fight for better outcomes for people in the Parkes electorate.”

Continuing the Inland Rail north of Parkes, the ‘real cost of net zero’, red tape and aged care were also identified as important issues by survey respondents.