MAYOR Robert Taylor says there are "obviously no votes in regional NSW" after NSW Labor leader Chris Minns' shock announcement about the party's plans for $1.1 billion set aside for a proposed Great Western Highway tunnel.
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And there were stronger words at Forbes, where long-time mayor Phyllis Miller - appearing at an announcement with Minister for Regional Transport and Roads Sam Farraway - described NSW Labor's decision as an "absolute disgrace".
Mr Minns, who is seeking to topple the NSW Coalition at this month's election, used a speech on Thursday in western Sydney to make his party's position on the tunnel clear.
He said NSW Labor was not convinced that the NSW Government had "properly completed its planning" for the 11-kilometre "unfunded tunnel" from Little Hartley to Blackheath.
"This could be an $8 to $11 billion tunnel," he told the Future Western Sydney event.
"It has no business case. And it only has $1.1 billion allocated to it in the budget. And let's be clear, that does not buy you an 11km tunnel under the Blue Mountains.
"The remaining $10 billion cannot be found. It's not in the budget - and is completely unfunded. That $1.1 billion is far better spent on local roads across western Sydney and regional NSW."
Bathurst mayor Cr Taylor told the Western Advocate that, after the duplication of the Hume and Pacific highways, it should now be the Great Western Highway's turn.
He said regular problems on the highway - which, in recent years, have included fires and landslips - were crippling for Bathurst's tourism and for its potential population growth.
"People looking at coming here to live will have second thoughts," he said.
As well, he said Bathurst stood to benefit from the construction of the new international airport at Badgerys Creek - but only with the right connectivity to the Sydney basin.
"To pull the funding, it's devastating," Cr Taylor said of NSW Labor's plans to redirect the $1.1 billion.
Speaking at Forbes, Mr Farraway said Mr Minns and NSW Labor had shown "what they really think of regional NSW".
In answer to the NSW Labor leader describing the tunnel as unfunded and lacking a business case, Mr Farraway said the plan from the start had been for a 20-80 funding split between the state and the Commonwealth.
He said that was "the same way we are building the Muswellbrook and Singleton bypasses" and "the same way we built the Pacific Highway".
He said the NSW Government had its money budgeted for its 20 per cent contribution.
Mr Farraway also said the plan from the start had been to start with the "road surface" duplication for the highway - the sections that do not include the central tunnel - before moving on to the tunnel itself.
He said that would allow tunnel boring machines such as those currently at work in Sydney on new Metro rail lines to move on to the Great Western Highway project.
Also at Forbes, mayor Cr Miller said she had been in local government for 28 years "and 25 of those years we have been fighting to get better access over the Blue Mountains and we were elated to think that we saw some light at the end of the tunnel in the last couple of years".
"To have that taken away from us is dreadful," she said.
"I think Western Sydney is the only people that are going to get any benefit from a Labor government.
"I have never brought politics into how I think about things, but this is a disgrace, an absolute disgrace for the people of western NSW."
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In his speech this week, Mr Minns said the NSW Coalition would leave behind the largest debt ever handed from one government to another in the history of the state and NSW Labor "will not privatise assets and we will not run up unsustainable debt".
He said NSW Labor will prioritise roads "that people actually need - and which can be delivered by the next government".
The Minns Opposition's decision on the Great Western Highway tunnel is the latest twist in the story of the overall highway upgrade from Lithgow to Katoomba and its ambitious central feature.
While work on the small Medlow Bath section of the highway duplication and another section between Lithgow and Little Hartley is due to start this month, Federal Government funding was delayed last year for the larger east and west sections of the project.
The proposed tunnel from Little Hartley to Blackheath has money committed to it from the current NSW Government but still needs billions of dollars in Federal Government money for it to become a reality.
Federal Infrastructure Minister Catherine King said earlier this year that there was no federal money available for the proposed tunnel.
