Less can be Moore: 20 years too long for me, says Minns

Chris Minns has ruled out his own 20-year political rule but stopped short of a full-throttle call for Sydney Lord Mayor Clover Moore to ‘pass the baton’.

NSW Premier Chris Minns with former premier Mike Baird at the Sydney Cricket Ground on Sunday. Picture: Nikki Short

NSW Premier Chris Minns has ruled out his own 20-year political rule but stopped short of a full-throttle call for Sydney Lord Mayor Clover Moore to “pass the baton”, instead choosing to drum up support for Labor’s ticket and promising that his government would work with whoever the people picked.

It comes as Ms Moore looked set to clinch an unprecedented sixth term as mayor in next month’s local government elections, taking her tenure at Town Hall to 24 years and the age of 82, and amid debate about whether her seemingly immovability was holding back Sydney.

Speaking at the Sydney Cricket Ground on Sunday to announce the retention of the New Year’s test until at least 2031, Mr Minns said not to expect him at the helm in 20 years time.

“No, no I wouldn’t,” the Premier said to whether he’d contemplate a similar length tenure to Ms Moore’s but at Macquarie Street.

Spruiking Labor’s ticket for September’s local elections – the party’s mayoral candidate is former Anthony Albanese adviser Zann Maxwell – Mr Minns conceded the party members were “realists”.

“If I lived in the City of Sydney I’d vote for the Labor ticket – we’re competing for every vote,” he said.

When pressed if such a long tenure was healthy for democracy, Mr Minns said it (the mayoralty) was, each time, the decision of Sydneysiders.

“That’s democracy, that’s why we have these elections,” he said. “Those communities will decide who their leaders are, who their mayors are, who their (councillors) are, and I respect that.”

Mr Minns warned against putting the “horse before the cart”, adding that September’s poll remained a month away.

Sydney Lord Mayor Clover Moore. Picture: Facebook

“The surest way a politician will be out of office is if they (believe they are) guaranteed to win,” he said.

Mr Minns was speaking alongside former Liberal premier Mike Baird, now Cricket Australia chair.

In 2014, when premier, Mr Baird’s government passed since-abolished amendments to the city’s electoral system, which had given businesses two compulsory votes and was widely seen as an ultimately unsuccessful attempt to oust Ms Moore from Town Hall.

When asked if 20-plus years in any role was healthy, Mr Baird said: “Democracy is incredibly important, and everyone has an opportunity to go to an election, and if they win a mandate (then) they have every right to continue”.

He said it was “hard to believe” that the Liberals could miss the deadline to register 140 local government candidates as the party threatened legal action if the NSW Electoral Commission refused to reopen nominations, alleging it breached its regulations by failing to provide a seven-day notice before Wednesday’s deadline.

Mr Minns gave his guarantee that whoever was elected in the local council elections, they could be assured of the “co-operation” of his government.

“I think often politics gets in the way of good ideas, and we’ve been able to show across the past 18 months that we work across the aisle,” he said, pointing to how the government worked with conservative independent mayors to tackle regional crime.

The Premier has criticised Ms Moore’s “rigid rules” around residential developments, but did last year decide to turn about 20 hectares of Moore Park Golf Course into a park, something long called for by the Lord Mayor.