Banging the Table for Nobbys?

Back in June 2007 I wrote to our State Member for Newcastle to seek her support for our Mater Hospital.

A representative from her office wrote back to say it was not in her electorate and to write instead to the Member for Wallsend.

Given the reported $50,000 in undisclosed donations from property developer Buildev (NH 14/4), and her recent ‘banging of the table’ for local developer Neil Slater’s redevelopment proposal for Nobbys I would like to know why she wasn’t prepared to ‘bang the table’ for our besieged Mater hospital?

And why, for that matter, couldn't our Region’s elected representatives come together, as they did so majestically in support of the restaurant and love nest for Nobbys, to support our public hospitals, transport, police and renewable clean energy future?

Is it that political donations have rendered those in the community as mere ‘non-developers’, as Wollongong MP Noreen Hay said in this week's ABC Four Corners program (14/4/08)?

Could it explain the divisive rhetoric that was this month placed into NSW State Parliamentary Hansard by Jodi McKay that all who opposed the Nobbys redevelopment ‘have done their best to delay and stop Newcastle's growth’?