The Labor opposition has called on the Baird Government to provide certainty to the Lower Mountains community by committing to a timetable for a new Service NSW centre in Springwood.
While the NSW Government has been sporadically extending the lease on the Raymond Road premises that currently house the Springwood motor registry, the long term future of the registry has been in doubt for over 18 months.
“The Baird Government needs to lay out a clear timeline for the conversion of the Springwood Motor Registry to a Service NSW centre,” said Labor’s roads spokeswoman Jodi McKay.
“It’s not very reassuring to see that the lease is being extended every six months with no clear progress being made to establish the new service centre. Will there be continuous, uninterrupted service provision, or will there be a cutover period where Blue Mountains residents have to travel to Penrith for routine transactions?”
Blue Mountains MP Trish Doyle said the service provided by the Springwood Motor Registry is “critically important for the Mid and Lower Blue Mountains communities”.
“You only have to drive past at 8.45am every morning to see the queue of people forming to use the registry.
“The staff at Springwood RMS are hardworking, dedicated members of our community. They should be acknowledged for their experience and given a guarantee by this government that they will keep their jobs.”
Ms Doyle said she has been “pursuing this issue since before the 2015 election, and it has been allowed to draw out further and further by the Baird Government”.
“The Blue Mountains deserves a firm commitment from this government that services will continue uninterrupted and that no local jobs will be lost.”
A spokesperson for Services NSW said the ongoing leasing arrangements for the Springwood motor registry “are being made in the best interests of the community, and are designed to ensure continuity of existing motor registry services, while at the same time enabling the Service NSW network to be rolled out without unnecessary delay”.
“Existing motor registries like the one in Springwood will continue to operate until the transition to Service NSW in those areas is complete, and staff are being updated regularly on progress,” the spokesperson said.
“Service NSW offers a vastly expanded range of services throughout NSW, with Service NSW centres offering lower waiting times and access to more than 850 services and transactions, complemented by a convenient 24/7 online and phone service.”
Service NSW has so far opened 59 service centres around NSW.
