SHORT of a forced ingestion of truth serum, we are unlikely to ever know what the powers that be in Sydney really think about the community's demands for action on the continued erosion of the Stockton foreshore.
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Sure, we have a whole library of reports and action plans, and a professed desire by all involved to work as hard as possible towards finding a permanent way to arrest what is a relatively limited amount of coastal erosion, caused by "improvements" to the nearby mouth of the Hunter River.
But as this week's reporting on Stockton reminds us, a lot of the current talking points have been with us since the 1990s - if not earlier - and although the prominent rock walls that run along Mitchell Street provide protection of sorts, they bring with them a considerable loss of public amenity.
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Repeated delays in finding a permanent solution to Stockton's woes have done a lot to erode public trust.
At seemingly every turn, another conflict emerges to hamper progress.
The David Allan no longer drops dredged harbour sand off Stockton.
State bureaucrats say the government can't hold an offshore sand mining licence because that would be a conflict of interest with the state's role as regulator.
Onshore, there is ample sand further up Stockton Bight, but it's either on Worimi land, meaning a need to negotiate access, or in the national park, where sand mining is generally prohibited.
These and other difficulties are often given as excuses for the lack of progress.
But none are insurmountable.
To the contrary, all have solutions.
What's lacking, it seems, is a unified will to put the public interest above politics, enabling a blame game between the Labor-led council and a Coalition state government stumbling unsteadily towards the March 25 election.
Were Stockton really a government priority, sand could already be pouring onto the beach, whether from an onshore source further up the bight, or from an offshore dredge brought in for the purpose.
Especially as the deputy premier's taskforce on Stockton learned last year that Stockton's "recession rate" was exceeding predictions.
John Barilaro's resignation robbed the project of its champion, but his departure does present an opportunity to wipe the slate clean.
If March 25 does not bring progress, at least we know what both sides of politics thinks of Newcastle.
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