Bank accounts for kids the rabbit pulled from Perrottet’s hat

Dominic Perrottet desperately needed to pull a rabbit out of the hat in these last two weeks of the campaign and – voila! – there it was: a bank account for every kid in the state.

Dominic Perrottet at the NSW Liberal Party's 2023 election campaign launch. Picture: NewsWire/Monique Harmer

Dominic Perrottet desperately needed to pull a rabbit out of the hat in these last two weeks of the campaign and – voila! – there it was: a bank account for every kid in the state, kick-started with a $400 gift from the government.

The superannuation for children idea is big and bold, but comes perilously late for a government that needs all the help it can get to look fresh and energised.

This is the NSW Premier appealing to aspirational voters – mums and dads who want their kids to have the same advantages in life they had, including a home.

For many despairing middle-class parents, that now seems wildly out of reach. Thousands will look at what the Premier has to offer and see a little bit more hope for their children.

Perrottet needed to come up with something he could pay for without selling any more assets.

Privatisation, his last signature policy, has been dumped in the face of mounting outrage over spiralling power bills and crippling road tolls. He also needed to address the now overwhelming focus of this election: out-of-control cost of living pressures. This policy does both, up to a point.

The plan is to set up every child in NSW with an account containing $400. Parents can add up to $1000 a year, matched by up to $400 a year by the government.

That will deliver up to $49,000 that can be used when the child turns 18 to fund education or buy a house. But 20 years down the track is a long way away for some parents who can’t afford to pay their own mortgage right now.

Many won’t be able to find the money to secure the government contribution, and many of those who can easily come up with the cash – the program isn’t means-tested – don’t need the handout.

The plan also does nothing for the young, yet-to-be-parents who can’t even afford their rent and are the single biggest group of ­undecided voters in the state.

The last Newspoll survey had Labor ahead by 52-48 on a two-party-preferred basis, but with the Coalition catching up.

Perrottet needs to keep that trajectory to win government, and to avoid a hung parliament.

The Liberal launch on Sunday was telling.

The message was a rejuvenated government, kicked off by a bouncy Premier high-fiving a row of kids – some of them his own – who were lining the stage.

No sign of any past premiers, even popular ones, who might remind voters this was a 12-year-old government. Gladys who?

Predictably banished were ­former prime minister Scott Morrison and current Opposition Leader Peter Dutton, both of whom were barely seen during the campaign and are considered even by the NSW party’s right to be too negative and backward-looking to risk.

John Howard made the cut as possibly the party’s only living legend, and certainly the only one guaranteed to draw a standing ovation just by showing up.

NSW Treasurer Matt Kean. Picture: Justin Lloyd

The Liberals have been trying to write off Chris Minns as the invisible man, but if there was any doubt the Labor leader has got under their skin it was dispelled as soon as Matt Kean strode onto the stage at the start of the launch.

The Treasurer was let loose to put the boot in, devoting his entire seven-minute speech to bagging the Labor leader as a hostage to the unions and the gaming lobby, and – dangerously – invoking the spectre of Eddie Obeid and the ALP’s “Aldi bag” bribe scandal.

Interesting move for a government mired in several scandals, and with many voters more concerned about their own problems.

But Kean’s attack-dog performance freed Perrottet to play to his strengths: the family man, handing out presents.

It might work. But would you bet your house on it?