Nationals could lose seat of Barwon for the first time since 1950 because of severe drought
The Nationals face losing Barwon, a drought-stricken NSW seat the size of Germany the party has held since 1950; Labor Leader Michael Daley is dogged by SCG Trust issues; private schools to get half a billion in extra funding; vile social media posts come back to haunt a Labor candidate; a recycling furore; NSW’s gas woes and, They Said It. STATE POLITICAL WRAP
NSW
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- Shooters candidate could snatch seat from Nationals
- Six seats could force NSW Coalition into minority government
Barwon, a drought-stricken NSW seat the size of Germany, will be one of the major bush battlegrounds for the Nationals as they face the very real prospect of losing it to another party for the first time since 1950.
Drought, water security and access to healthcare remain the three biggest issues for the electorate, where the Nats vote has slipped while support has risen for Labor and the Shooters, Fishers and Farmers.
It will be an expansive battlefield for the state election — the electoral district is about the same size as Germany and takes up 44 per cent of the NSW landmass, spreading from Broken Hill in the west to Tibooburra in the north and Narrabri in the east.
According to the 2016 Census, the population is 77,345, the median weekly household income is $1023, and the main industries of employment are farming, local government administration, healthcare and teaching.
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Polling obtained by The Daily Telegraph shows support for the Coalition has slipped from 49 per cent to 35 per cent since the 2015 election, while at the same time support has risen for the Shooters, Fishers and Farmers and Labor.
Nationals MP Kevin Humphries is stepping down after 12 years in the role, with their new candidate Andrew Schier set to contest the seat against Labor’s Darriea Turley and the Shooters Fishers and Farmers’ Roy Butler.
The recent Menindee Lakes fish kill has left many in the electorate upset over the way the NSW government has managed water in the region but most voters listed their primary concerned as the lack of rain slowly crippling the regional economy.
Job creation is another key issue for the electorate, including for the town of Narrabri, which The Daily Telegraph visited last week.
One proven job creator is the Santos Narrabri Gas Project, which would create 400 jobs during the construction phase while the energy company drills up to 850 gas wells on 425 sites around The Pilliga forest. A decision by the Independent Planning Commission is expected later this year.
The Liberals and Nationals support coal seam gas mining as long as it occurs outside certain exclusion zones and gets the tick of approval from the IPC, whereas Labor wants a statewide moratorium on CSG, underpinned by a range of permanent “no go” areas where CSG should never be permitted, including core water catchments.
Polling obtained by The Telegraph shows more than half of the town supports the Santos project, but the further you travel from Narrabri the more the support slips due to a lack of awareness and concerns over contaminating water in the Great Artesian Basin.
Farmer Anthony Brennan and wife Donna, whose property is 10km south of Narrabri, support the project.
“In terms of economic benefit for the region, I think it (the gas project) will be a great thing, and my biggest reason for that is keeping our young people here having jobs. I’ve got a son who’s going up to the Territory because I can’t keep him here,” Mr Brennan said.
PRIVATE SCHOOLS GET CASH INJECTION
By Rose Brennan
Private schools in NSW will have access to an extra half a billion dollars in funding to spend building new classrooms or upgrading existing sites so more students can be enrolled in their schools.
The injection of $500 million over the next four years will be announced by Premier Gladys Berejiklian who said the spending for Catholic and independent schools is on top of record funding for the public school system.
Education Minister Rob Stokes said the funding will be delivered via grants under the Building Grants Assistance Scheme which directs cash to areas identified as having the greatest need.
The scheme considers demographics and socio-economic make-up of the school when allocating funding.
“This record funding announcement will continue to ensure that every student in NSW continues to receive the best possible education, in the best facilities — no matter where they go to school,” Mr Stokes said.
“The NSW Liberals & Nationals recognise that funding for school infrastructure should be consistent with a needs-based sector-blind approach to support the schools who need it the most.”
The schools that have benefited this year from funding include St Francis Catholic College in Edmondson Park which received $3.6 million while the Australian Christian College at Marsden Park in Riverstone got $950,000.
Nowra Christian School has received $800,000 and St Peter’s Anglican College in Broulee, on the South Coast, was granted $300,000.
Treasurer Dominic Perrottet said the $500 million was more than double the amount Labor invested in non-government school infrastructure in their last four years of government.
“The Liberals & Nationals take strong financial management and turn it into better schools for your kids — that’s the difference. No empty slogans — we secure the funding and get then job done,” Mr Perrottet said.
DALEY DOGGED BY SCG TRUST ISSUES
By Anna Caldwell and Rose Brennan
Demolition is set to start on Allianz stadium before the NSW election after the Berejiklian government won a key battle in court to push ahead with its sports infrastructure plan.
An injunction is set to be lifted at 2pm today which would allow Lendlease to commence the tear-down of the Moore Park stadium for its $730 million rebuild after the Land and Environment Court yesterday ruled against a challenge to the demolition launched by Waverley Council and a community group.
It is understood major knockdown work will begin before the state election on March 23, unless the same court grants a new injunction on appeal.
The stadium has emerged as a flashpoint for the campaign with Labor Leader Michael Daley siding with the Greens to oppose any demolition of the ageing facility.
The Greens last night even vowed to put their bodies in front of demolition trucks.
Premier-hopeful Mr Daley said it was now a “moral” question of whether the major infrastructure redevelopment would continue.
A day after declaring he would axe the board of the Sydney Cricket Ground Trust who Mr Daley claims colluded with the government on pushing for the new stadium, he pledged he would change the law if that’s what it took to summarily sack the highly experienced members of board.
He bizarrely then said his new board would do what he told them to do when it came to financing the agreement.
“The Trust will do what it’s told, that’s their job. They are subject to the direction of the government, they are a state owned corporation, a statutory corporation subject to the direction of the government,” he said.
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When asked whether he could legally sack the current Trust, Mr Daley said if he couldn’t that still wouldn’t stop him.
“Well if I have to change legislation to do it I will, they’re going okay? Come hell or high water they’re going.”
Mr Daley also sought to defend himself after he misled the public on Tuesday during an interview with Alan Jones in comments on stadium safety standards. In those comments he accused the Trust of removing fire sprinklers at Allianz Stadium “under the cover of darkness”, despite there never being any sprinklers there in the first place.
SCG Trust Member and respected businessman Maurice Newman is seeking legal advice over the allegation, and told The Daily Telegraph “I am deeply offended that I have jealously guarded my career for over 50 years — I would never stoop to doing anything Michael Daley said I had and that is why I am looking to legal remedies.
Mr Daley was unrepentant. “I regret nothing about what I did or said yesterday,” he said. “I don’t care how many people at the top end of town feel threatened — their day is over, if they think they can monopolise public land and run the show by themselves — game over.”
Mr Daley said the sprinklers issue was “the great red herring of the day”.
Mr Daley said that he hadn’t named anyone personally during his interview with Jones and his bid to sack the board members wasn’t anything “personal”.
But in a slick petition on his website calling for the public to support his idea to sack the SCG Trust board, Mr Daley has singled Jones, former Liberal Premier Barry O’ Farrell and top business figure Tony Shepherd for being board members.
FINDING TRUTH IN FIELD FICTIONS
DALEY’S CLAIM “The board has ripped (the fire sprinklers) out under the cover of darkness.”
TRUTH The venue was constructed in 1988 and “never had a fire sprinkler system”.
DALEY’S CLAIM “The ladies stand and the members stand at the SCG, they don’t comply with modern standards … but we don’t knock them down, do we?”
TRUTH The Members Pavilion and Ladies Stand were heritage-listed, but have been retrofitted with sprinklers and other fire safety measures.
DALEY’S CLAIM “Tony Shepherd swore on oath that those seats were flammable and the next minute we see Stuart Ayres … shopping those seats to rugby clubs.“
TRUTH Ayres said the seats weren’t forced on clubs but made available to teams that wanted to collect them. He said 40,000 flammable seats in a stadium was a problem, but “100 seats on the side of a hill in Cootamundra is not a risk”.
VILE POSTS COME BACK TO HAUNT CANDIDATE
EXCLUSIVE by Rose Brennan
LABOR’S candidate for Hornsby has been forced to apologise over offensive social media posts in which she compared Donald Trump to Adolf Hitler, called Alan Jones an “old dog” that should have been put down and said all politicians are liars.
In a 2016 Facebook post Katie Gompertz called top-rating broadcaster Jones a “fat while entitlement (sic) man” and said “this old dog should have been put down years ago”.
The candidate for the Upper North Shore electorate, who calls herself a “social justice warrior”, also claimed on Facebook in 2014 that “politicians are liars”.
“I believe it’s a general prerequisite for the position,” she posted.
In a 2016 tweet she shared images comparing Time magazine covers of Hitler and President Trump with Ms Gompertz saying “#HindsightShould Work”.
NSW Jewish Board of Deputies Chief Executive Vic Alhadeff condemned the post.
“The comparison is gratuitous and absurd. Whatever one may think of President Trump, bringing Hitler into the discussion is offensive on so many levels,” he said.
When contacted by The Daily Telegraph Ms Gompertz apologised for the posts.
“I am sorry for posting offensive material and deeply regret doing so,” she said. “I am particularly sorry for offending survivors of the Holocaust.”
Labor leader Michael Daley declined to comment on whether he still supported Ms Gompertz or if he disagreed with her offensive comments.
STATE CRITICISED FOR FAILURE TO SPEND ON RECYCLING
Critics have attacked the NSW government for not spending enough of its waste levy revenue on recycling programs.
The state’s recycling efforts were the focus of a Sydney summit on Sydney which heard from Environment Minister Gabrielle Upton, opposition spokeswoman Penny Sharpe, the Greens’ Cate Faehrmann, local councillors and other key stakeholders.
“It’s not good enough today that the NSW government, the environment minister, refuses to commit any extra funding (for) the waste crisis,” Ms Faehrmann told reporters after the CBD summit.
AAP understands about one-third of revenue from the waste levy is currently spent on environmental programs with two-thirds going to consolidated revenue to be spent on health, education and infrastructure.
Local Government NSW wants 100 per cent of the money raised to go towards waste reduction programs and help boost recycling.
But Ms Upton argues such an approach is “simplistic” because the money is needed elsewhere.
“What are we going to cut across our community if we were to dedicate … 100 per cent of the waste levy to waste and particularly recycling management,” Ms Upton said at the summit.
Licensed waste facilities across NSW are required to pay a contribution for each tonne of waste received.
The contribution aims to reduce the amount of waste being landfilled and promote recycling.
The Labor opposition is yet to release its waste policy but is expecting to do so within the next week, AAP understands.
The Greens released their “zero waste” plan on Wednesday which also advocates 100 per cent of the waste levy being diverted into tackling the waste crisis.
The minor party would also like the levy to increase five per cent per annum and is pushing for a new independent resource recovery commissioner. A recent Australian Packaging Covenant Organisation study suggests just over half of all recycled packaging is recovered nationwide.
Australians last year generated 4.4 million tonnes of packaging waste, but only 68 per cent was put in recycling bins. Of that, just 56 per cent was recovered.
WORKERS UNION SLAMS DALEY ON HALTING GAS PROJECT
By Edward Boyd
Australia’s oldest and largest workers union has slammed NSW Labor leader Michael Daley over his decision to stop the Narrabri gas project from going ahead if he gets elected on March 23.
Mr Daley last month told people in Coonamble, in the NSW Central West, that the Santos project represented an “unacceptable risk” to land and water.
Australian Workers’ Union national secretary Daniel Walton said tens of thousands of manufacturing workers are being let down by Mr Daley’s decision to put a blanket ban on the project.
“When I heard Michael Daley pre-empt the regulators to spear a project that could shore up the jobs of thousands, I found it hugely frustrating,” Mr Walton said. “The imagined concerns of a noisy few shouldn’t trump the livelihoods of manufacturing workers.”
Mr Walton said NSW was facing a gas crisis which could result in thousands of jobs lost.
“Steelworkers in Rooty Hill, glass workers in Penrith, chemical workers in Botany — their workplaces are all desperate for a reliable, affordable, long-term source of natural gas,” he said. “If the Narrabri Gas Project passes through all the stringent independent regulatory and environmental hurdles required under the law, it is impossible to see how an evidence-based state government could justify coming in over the top to axe it.”
NSW WARNED TO DEVELOP GAS RESOURCES
NSW must develop its own gas resources or risk losing thousands of jobs, the federal resources minister has warned both state Labor and the Coalition.
Matt Canavan has urged the state to end its reliance on Queensland gas which is contributing to sky high prices crippling manufacturing and food processing.
Senator Canavan has weighed into the debate following the consumer watchdog’s latest salvo to state governments holding back gas developments.
ACCC chair Rod Sims wants states to ditch blanket moratoria and tough regulatory restrictions and instead case manage risks of individual gas development projects.
He also raised concerns that large gas producers were withholding gas that’s in the ground from development suit their commercial priorities.
In a nod the Morrison government’s big stick in the energy market, Mr Sims said it was vital for state government to use compliance and licencing requirements to make sure companies were doing the right thing.
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