HUNTER workers have labelled Gladys Berejiklian's comments about NSW and Australia not being able to manufacture quality trains "farcical" while the state Opposition has called for the premier to visit one of the region's train-building sites to apologise to the workforce.
Deputy NSW Labor leader Yasmin Catley and Newcastle state MP Tim Crakanthorp joined workers from the local industry outside UGL's Broadmeadow site on Friday to push for an end to offshore manufacturing.
Earlier this week, the premier said the government had gone abroad for new or replacement fleets because Australia and NSW were "not good at building trains".
The comments hit a nerve with 54-year-old mechanical fitter Phill Walters, who has worked in the rail manufacturing and servicing industry for almost four decades.
"I've spent my whole life in the rail industry and I'm proud of what I've done," he said. "To be told we can't build rolling stock is farcical.
"I worked on the first Tangara [trains] in Newcastle at a place that was buzzing.
"It was a place that had 50 or more apprentices, it was a place that had 500 employees, it was a place of positivity. It was a place of a sense of achievement; you would go home feeling proud every day of what you'd done. You supplied a product that millions of people would use and continue to use."
Mr Crakanthorp called for the premier to visit Newcastle and issue an apology.
"Right here in these sheds we had 450 Tangara carriages manufactured," he said.
"That was over 30 years ago and they are still on the tracks. We've got the First Fleet class ferries that were manufactured at Carrington slipways and they're still working Sydney harbour.
"She should come and see the high-quality work in manufacturing that we do and she needs to apologise. It is simply not good enough from the leader of this state to make disparaging remarks."
Ms Catley said the Coalition government had sent billions of dollars offshore since it came to power in 2011 by having almost all of the state's new public transport vehicles built overseas.
This included the new intercity trains (South Korea), metro trains (India), trams (Spain, France), buses (Malaysia) and most recently the river class ferries (Indonesia) that were last week found to contain asbestos and remain tied up at Carrington.
Australian Manufacturing Workers' Union organiser Tim Jackson said there was still the skills and resources in the Hunter to manufacture passenger trains, but they could soon be lost forever if the government continued to send work offshore.
"Private enterprise are trusting these workers, the government not so," he said. "The decisions made by the governments not to award local contracts has just absolutely decimated the industry. Having contracts back here at a time like this is absolutely imperative. Not only for these workers, but secondary industries that support these companies."
The Labor MPs said the Victorian government had "proudly" built more than 180 trains and trams in the state since 2015 and Western Australia would soon start building rail cars in Perth.
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