By Corey Everitt
The year has started off promising for Berwick MP Brad Battin as his long-awaited electorate office has finally secured a location.
After over a year running an informal mobile office that saw Mr Battin hopping between local cafes and restaurants, he took to facebook on Thursday 4 January to announce that his constituents will soon be able to find him and his staff in a permanent office in the heart of Berwick.
Mr Battin office will be on 4-6 Wheeler Street just off High Street, Berwick. The location was formerly a TAB.
“There will be no betting here, it’s 100 percent odds on,” Mr Battin quipped in his facebook video.
This comes after a long wait ever since the last State Election in November, when Mr Battin’s former seat of Gembrook was abolished which made his old office in Officer redundant as he nominated and was elected to the new seat of Berwick.
State Parliament offices are responsible for securing an electorate office for MPs, as the weeks turned to months and then eventually to a year, Mr Battin became increasingly frustrated as his constituents had no easy place to find him locally.
He resorted to raising the issue in Parliament itself in November last year. He said in session, “it is getting to a stage that is ridiculous – that a lower house member of this Parliament cannot get an office in their electorate to represent those that they are supposed to represent, a place for the local community to go.”
With a location secured, Mr Battin wishes this to be the home stretch for the new office, saying in the facebook post that he hopes works on site will start this month.
