NSW politics no longer stuck in neutral

ANDREW Constance’s first Budget as NSW Treasurer delivers a down payment on the future of the state and next year’s election.

After three years of repair work on the economy smashed under Labor, NSW under Premier Mike Baird is gearing up for action. Constance is implementing the program Baird laid out as treasurer and has the luxury of working with a proactive Premier — Baird was held back by the hyper-cautious Barry O’Farrell. NSW went backwards under four premiers during the 16 years Labor reigned. Hamstrung by factional disunity and trade union influence, the state bled money and jobs. Not even the 2000 Olympics, won under the Fahey Liberal government, delivered the expected boost. The Baird-Constance Budget is based on realising the cash tied up in state-owned assets and using that money to build infrastructure and jobs for the future. Remember when premier Bob Carr put up the “full house” sign on Sydney and Australia? That’s now come down and the money is starting to flow, bringing NSW into the 21st century. This month should see $6.7 billion flow into the Restart NSW program from unlocking the capital tied up in Port Botany and Port Kembla, Newcastle Port, the Sydney Desalination Plant and the Eraring Power Station. A few hundred million more will come from state bonds, interest and windfalls. The process is called “asset recycling”. Bearing in mind that Labor has ­opposed every savings measure proposed over the past three years, its current scare campaign over the proposed leasing of “poles and wires” comes as no surprise. But, without freeing up the capital by the assets already recycled, projects like WestConnex, the Pacific and Princes Highway upgrades, and other infrastructure totalling $3 billion would not have gone ahead. One of the projects for which a modest $5 million down payment has been made in this Budget is a scoping study for a dam at Needles Gap on the Belubala River, part of the Murray-Darling system in the Central West of the state. If the dam goes ahead, it will be the first major dam built since 1987. Building a new dam over the ­objections of Labor and the Greens, and providing jobs while guaranteeing water for seven local government areas, sends just as powerful a message to those who believe in a prosperous future as securing a second airport or providing light rail links around Sydney. NSW is on the move again.