Ms Sharpe met with representatives from various organisations at a forum to discuss the issues and challenges faced by them in their work in the family, disability and community services sectors.

While Ms Sharpe applauded the good work done by groups in the region, particularly in the wake of devastating drought conditions, she said there had been a common theme throughout the issues raised.

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"There's incredible people in Dubbo working so hard for people in the community doing it tough, but I think there's a couple of key things people wanted to raise," Ms Sharpe said.

"The major challenge is funding and support from government to make their work a bit easier."

"A big issue is the uncertainty of funding, short term contracts mean you recruit someone and they're fantastic, but they can't guarantee the work, so they lose good people, it's hard to run a service and keep great staff, that's a big issue for these groups."

Ms Sharpe said that organisations were having to make their funding from annual grants and funding allowances work for longer than they wanted it to and wants to see changes made in that area.

"It was inspiring to meet all the great people doing great things, they're having to stretch their funding a lot further."

Ms Sharpe said that the next step would be to take the information she's heard about the issues faced to the government and Minister for Families, Communities and Disability services Gareth Ward.

"I want to raise the issue of funding certainty with the minster, I want to share with the government the good work that some organisations like Apollo House are doing, but make it clear that the level of uncertainty is just making it that much harder."

"One of the issues I want to raise with the government and with the minister is about the role of government there, government spends a lot of time writing grants, filling in reports and not working on the ground," Ms Sharpe said.

"I think there's a role for government in trying to make it easier for these organisations to do this work, but for that we need to look at funding commitments that aren't just year to year."

Ms Sharpe said she'd like to see a chance to longer term funding agreements, that would allow organisations to employ workers for longer stretches of time and ensure continuity.

"We can recruit people and give them work for three to five years with those kinds of funding agreements and ensure they can build trust."