Albo tells farmers they’ve been ignored on Inland Rail

Labor leader Anthony Albanese has said that consulting farmers should be a mandatory step when making decisions about the Inland Rail. Rather than speaking at regional Australians, politicians need to listen to them and understand their concerns.

He has called for an inquiry into the project as it is “too important to get wrong”. He followed this by saying Australia needs high speed rail in regional areas to make them more accessible and incentivise more people and companies to live there.

Calls for a better regional transport network to connect more people and increase rural business are echoed by Bob Hayden, RTBU Loco Division Secretary.

“It’s the duty of both the federal and state government to connect regional NSW through appropriate rail infrastructure. We need to increase the use of and investment in the regional rail network to take the pressure from the regional road network to make the roads safer and tap the economic benefits that rail has over road especially in regional areas. Instead of spending billions on new, driverless metros maybe they can focus on easing the load on public transport and fix and extend the existing regional rail infrastructure instead.”

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