MANAGING a smooth transition to Australian society for skilled immigrants, the ageing and overwhelmed electricity lines, a dilapidated water supply and declining population are just some of the trends Cobar is dealing with.
But the diverse town nestled on the mineral rich, red earth of NSW’s far west, a service centre for a diaspora of arid farmers and transient miners is populated by determined souls.
It has always been a town of boom and bust and fluctuating population.
Julie Payne knows well the issues of family drift, a problem that confronts many regional towns away from the coastal regions and capital cities.
“I have three grown children and two of them have left, never to return to Cobar,” she told The Land and Good Fruit and Vegetable’s Next Crop forum at the Cobar Bowling and Golf Club on Thursday night.
She believes a shift by the three predominant mines in the area to a seven days on, seven days off roster has contributed to less children attending the town’s schools.
Cobar Shire Councillor Peter Yench lamented the fact people can’t have babies at Cobar District Hospital anymore and said medical services had been waning for decades.
“You run into people in the streets of Dubbo who are from Cobar, but you often find they’re there for medical reasons,” he said.
Dubbo is more than three hours’ drive away.
Next Crop panellist Ellie Russell said education was a huge issue for the town.
She said she felt perhaps the school needed a funding boost to re-market itself, so people understood what standard of education was available in the town.
“I went to boarding school and since coming back to town I’ve found families are choosing to leave when their kids are getting up into the higher primary grades,” she told Thursday night’s Q&A session.
Regional Development Australia’s Tracy McIntyre said maybe a readjustment of rules for skilled migrants was needed.
“You find skilled migrants apply for their visas and they might last seven months in regional areas and then they gravitate to Sydney or Melbourne where they feel more comfortable.
“You’re desperately short of skilled labour out this way.
“Maybe they should have to stay five years,” she said.
Chris Bruce, an “Iron Ringer”, born and bred in Cobar, and who has worked in mines for 28 years questioned the need for skilled immigrants, suggesting upskilling locals would be preferable.
“We should be training our own,” he said, noting once Cobar was one of the biggest areas for apprenticeships in the state.
The Cobar Weekly’s correspondent Sharon Harland said at one point the pre-school at Cobar had children of 12 different nationalities attending it, their mothers didn’t have great English and all involved found navigating the early and formative years, be they children or parents, difficult.
Chief planner, NSW Planning and Environment Department, Gary White said he was there to learn, to expand the breadth of knowledge needed to adequately serve people throughout NSW.
He believes capacity building and the ability to explain a community’s needs must be improved along the way.
“Too often the argument is about whether or not to build the bridge, what needs explaining is what role the bridge plays in a community,” he said.
“I’m here to learn, I can explain your issues to government for you.”
