NSW election 2023: Chris Minns the winner of People’s Forum debate

Chris Minns has been declared the winner of the final NSW leaders debate after he and Dominic Perrottet were peppered with questions by undecided voters at The Daily Telegraph and Sky News People’s Forum three days out from the state election. Who do you think won the sparring match? Vote here.

Labor Leader Chris Minns has chalked up a win in a crucial debate against Dom Perrottet ahead of Saturday’s election, with both leaders quizzed by Western Sydney voters on cost of living, privatisation, and funding for key services.

Almost half of voters in the audience gave the Sky News Daily Telegraph People’s Forum to Mr Minns, voting 48 per cent in his favour.

Mr Perrottet won over 32 per cent of the crowd, while 20 per cent remained undecided after the debate.

Questions from the audience, selected by Q&A Market Research, largely favoured the Labor leader’s election platform.

Voter Kim opened the questioning, criticising the Perrottet government on its history of privatisation: “clearly you keep selling our assets … which worries me you guys can’t budget properly”, before asking Mr Perrottet if he’d privatise anything else.

NSW Labor leader Chris Minns won over the attendees of The Daily Telegraph and Sky News People’s Forum on Wednesday night. Picture: Justin Lloyd.

Mr Perrottet was forced to reiterate a pledge that “there’ll be no privatisations in the next term of government” if he wins.

It played into Mr Minns hands, with both leaders also quizzed on what they could do to help with cost of living pressures, with the Premier citing Coalition measures like Back to School Vouchers, and a 40 per cent rebate on tolls.

Mr Minns said Labor’s $60 a week cap on tolls would help, but the Premier missed a chance to strike a blow when the Labor leader said it would cost “more than a $100m”, when in reality the move will cost $145m over two years.

Voter Fiona quizzed the pair on the state of maternity services in NSW’s public hospitals.

Mr Minns went on the attack, claiming the hospital system was in a worse state now than at the peak of the pandemic.

“I don’t think there’s any doubt that our public hospital system is in crisis at the moment, and it’s in many cases in a worse condition than it was even during the worst parts of the pandemic,” Mr Minns said.

The pair made their pitches in front of an audience of a hundred undecided voters. Picture: Justin Lloyd.

He said Labor’s investment into public sector wages — by removing the pay cap — was the answer to boosting the state of healthcare.

“Firstly in relation to skills we are going to offer 2000 scholarships every single year to train up nurses and healthcare professionals, paramedics as well,” he said.

“And of course the wages cap has got to go. I’m proposing … that we have the ability to sit down and negotiate with frontline workers, the people that saved us during the pandemic.”

Mr Perrottet seized on Mr Minns’ claim and attacked Labor for not setting aside additional dollars in their policy costings to pay for the rising wages.

The Premier fired back “when you have a major budget costing you come clean and say what it’ll cost”, attacking Labor over the plan to scrap the cap.

NSW Premier Dominic Perrottet during the debate. Picture: Justin Lloyd.

“You need to say what the impact on the budget is,” Mr Perrottet said of the move.

“We want every single person across NSW to have the best health care possible … here in NSW we have the strongest health system in the country.”

Mr Perrottet described the move to the audience as similar to if a family planned a “major renovation” of their kitchen, but hadn’t budgeted anything for it.

Both leaders also had a shot at asking the other a question, with both choosing their targets carefully.

The Premier asked Mr Minns about the $250 energy rebate – saying his party was offering that rebate to every single family, while claiming under Labor’s plan 1.5 million families will miss out, with more than 6 per cent in western Sydney missing out.

Mr Minns said the main reason Labor made the decision was because of small businesses, and a desire to spread the rebate to include businesses rather than every applicant.

Mr Perrottet was asked why in July 2020 the government froze public sector pay rises during the Covid pandemic.

“It was a tough decision. In the heart of the pandemic … we lost 300,000 jobs. I was Treasurer at the time and … it was my job to keep small businesses going.’’