If WA Labor has created WA Inc 2.0 and turned the west into a petro-state where fossil fuel interests control the state policy apparatus, the police and the media, then NSW Premier Chris Minns and NSW Labor seem determined to follow a similar path.
Under Minns, New South Wales is now avowedly a fossil fuel state. Minns is handing $450 million of NSW taxpayers’ hard-earned cash to fossil fuel giant Origin to continue to operate its unviable coal-powered station at Eraring — a decision that, along with its impact on the state’s carbon emissions, will directly lead to between 150-200 extra deaths from particulate pollution. The NSW Planning Department has been imposing multi-year delays on renewables projects, while the Minns government has approved major coal mine expansions despite knowing NSW would not meet its carbon emissions goals.
Anyone daring to protest against NSW Labor’s embrace of coal now faces a dramatic escalation in the state’s response. Under legislation the Minns government is introducing this week, climate protesters face $22,000 fines for obstructing a railway — on top of punitive restrictions on protests introduced by the Perrottet government. In a nice piece of trolling, Minns is claiming the new laws are for protesters’ own good, although Labor Attorney-General Michael Daley seemed to suggest it was more about the safety of workers transporting coal. Needless to say, the NSW Minerals Council is delighted with the new laws. Perhaps Minns gave the Minerals Council a heads-up when he met with them in August.
Admittedly, Minns has form when it comes to stifling protest. He proposed to ban pro-Palestine protests and alter hate speech laws to target protests against Israel — laws he perhaps discussed with Israel’s ambassador to Australia Amir Maimon in a meeting on August 6 (despite lecturing pro-Palestine Labor MPs that “We don’t have a foreign policy in the state. We don’t have a minister for foreign affairs.”) But the new laws are in support of the fossil fuel industry, rather than a reflection of Minns’ personal longstanding advocacy for Israel.
Minns has also met with News Corp, once in July, once in August. That’s separate from meetings with media outlets, which all politicians — to the shame of both sides — engage in. The August meeting was explicitly about Minns’ planned social media summit, held jointly with South Australia in October. News Corp has been campaigning against its social media company competitors, using child safety as the pretext (hilariously, given News Corp’s abiding contempt for young people).
Like Anthony Albanese, Minns fell into line with News Corp’s demand, with his “summit” given over to moral panic about the impact of social media on kids. Last week he was among premier and chief ministers endorsing Albanese’s plan for a national online identity requirement, dressed up as an age verification scheme.
Meanwhile, the results of another episode of Minns’ pandering to corporate interests continues to unwind. His mechanism for stymieing pokies reform, the cashless gambling trial (already laughably small) has now been exposed as “set up to fail”, with Labor — which handed a lifeline to the rotten, corrupt Star Casino at the expense of NSW taxpayers in 2023 — reassuring its friends at ClubsNSW that cashless gambling will never happen.
What fossil fuel companies wanted, fossil fuel companies got from Minns. What News Corp wanted, News Corp got from Minns. What the gambling industry wanted, the gambling industry got from Minns. It may be a decidedly ordinary government for the citizens of NSW, but the Minns government is very good at delivering for its corporate friends.
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