Chris Minns: the back-to-basics, no-nonsense bloke with big ambitions as Premier

Aspiration, education, old-school foundation, transformation: For a bloke accused of running a small target election campaign, Labor’s Chris Minns has some pretty big plans if he wins NSW.

NSW Labor Leader Chris Minns. Picture: John Appleyard

Chris Minns may be a softly spoken man but he’s already transformed NSW Labor and now he wants to transform NSW. For a bloke accused of running a small target election campaign that’s a pretty big ambition.

But his game plan isn’t the big picture reform of his rival Dominic Perrottet — whom he very much likes and respects as an individual — as much as a back-to-basics approach that goes straight to the heart of family life.

At the core of it is education — from the commitment to fast-track Perrottet’s plan for universal preschool, to a ban on phones in schools, to attracting more and better teachers to the classrooms through better pay and conditions.

“My dad became a teacher in 1973 and the reason he did was he wanted to give something back to the community,” he tells The Daily Telegraph.

“But it wasn’t a volunteer job. At that time, you could earn enough to raise a family in suburban Sydney. Those days are over.”

Chris Minns with his mum Caroline Minns, in Oatley, where she started a law business Picture: Justin Lloyd.

Minns is on the campaign trail in Oatley, just next door to his own marginal electorate of Kogarah and outside the law firm his mother founded with encouragement from her own father, who was a firefighter.

That too is foundational to Minns’ convictions and what he calls Labor’s “true north”. That the party’s purpose is to help people get ahead in life, that it is a party of aspiration — a refreshing reset from the class war rhetoric that sometimes besets the ALP.

“We are about upward economic mobility,” says Chris Minns Picture: Tim Hunter.

“The Greens have got the environment and woke politics, the Libs are all about big business and the Nats are about country people. We are about upward economic mobility,” he says.

“And when we’re at our best — and I’m not saying we’re always at our best — but when we’re at our best people look at Labor and say we are the party of opportunity.”

Again, this comes back to education. Making sure people have the skills and learning they need to get ahead and making sure NSW has a workforce that can compete against and beat not just other states but countries overseas.

And again, this comes back to a no-nonsense, almost old fashioned approach. While his ban on mobile phones in schools has attracted most of the headlines it is part of a broader scepticism he has about screens and social media more generally. He thinks kids should be getting outside more and playing more sport.

Every man and his dogs: Minns catches up with Labor supporters in Oatley. Picture: NCA NewsWire / David Swift

“I think that for a little bit there the idea that technology, social media in particular, could be damaging for young people was considered a troglodyte argument. And then I think reasonable people went hang on a second, this is not right,” he says.

“And of course young people are finding it difficult to get off their mobile phones and devices. I’ve been in situations where I’ve looked at, you know, Instagram reels or something and then after a while, I’m like: What am I doing? Like this is wasted time. So if I’m struggling and other adults are struggling, what hope does a young mind have? So I’ve got no problem at all calling it out.”

Likewise he thinks it’s important to hold on to religious traditions, even as he personally wrestles with or examines his Catholic faith. He thinks rituals such as Mass are an important way of reflecting on the world and thinking about other people.

NSW Labor Leader Chris Minns and Prime Minister Anthony Albanese during the launch of Labor’s campaign for the 2023 NSW state election. Picture: Mick Tsikas

“I took the kids to Mass because everything today’s about consumerism right? And other than us parents telling them you’ve got to live your life for others, not just yourself, where is that belief structure?”

And if he is lucky enough to become Premier on Saturday night it is the time spent away from his kids — Joe, 14, Nicky 12 and George, 6 — that will be the hardest for him. And he knows it is not fair on them.

“You know, I coached both of my older boys’ soccer teams when they were growing up. And I haven’t even been to any of my littlest boy’s games. So I’ve gone from being the coach to not even being able to get there,” he says.

“So yeah, I know it’s going to be full on.”

As for his rival, Minns would have no problem reaching across the aisle to work with him.

“I’ve got no doubt that we haven’t heard the last of Dom if he doesn’t win the election,” he says.

“It’s no secret that I absolutely rate him as a human being. I just wish he wasn’t in the Liberal Party!”