INDEPENDENTS had the freedom to back good ideas and policy regardless of their origin was the message Richard Torbay told supporters at his campaign launch in Inverell this week.

The independent MP said he had developed a good working relationship with both sides of state politics over the last 12 years and if re-elected at next week's poll would continue to focus on his unfettered position as an advocate for his communities.

"This form of direct democracy has delivered almost $1 billion in capital funding since 1999," he said.

"It has been a successful formula for us with the community generating the projects and ideas and working with me to achieve the outcomes.

"Often we have to battle hard to get the results we want but more often than not we succeed.

"People power is a mighty force as we found when we fought the government to successfully save the Armidale rail service and the Glen Innes Agricultural Research Station."

Mr Torbay said no political party had a monopoly on good ideas and policy and any government in power produced a mixed bag, which its MPs were obliged to support regardless of whether or not it was in the interests of their electorates.

"That's the downside when radical reforms and restructuring becomes the new order," he said. "It's how we lost our rail service to the Queensland border and how we lost so many local public service jobs and government services when this seat was held by the Nationals."

Mr Torbay said that if elected he would make local hospital upgrades and more investment in regional development the priorities.

"My surveys of the electorate have shown these issues are at the top of the list," he said. "They are also predominant in the recommendations of the Rural and Regional Taskforce, many of which are still on the table to be implemented," he said.

"There's never been a better time for a government to focus on decentralisation and investing more to promote growth in rural and regional NSW.

"It's what our communities have a right to expect from the new government."

© 2011 Inverell Times

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