'NSW should have it all': Berejiklian launches re-election campaign
Premier Gladys Berejiklian has officially launched the Liberal Party campaign re-election pitch by promising to spend billions on new hospitals, schools and a rail link to the new western Sydney airport should her government be re-elected.
In a speech to the Liberal Party faithful at Penrith Panthers Leagues Club in Sydney’s west, Ms Berejiklian announced the Coalition will spend $2 billion over the next four years on a metro rail line from St Mary's station to the airport at Badgerys Creek.
Ms Berejiklian announced work would start to build or upgrade 29 hospitals and health facilities during the next term of government.
Sunday's launch came as new polling shows the Coalition is trailing Labor 49 to 51 on a two-party preferred basis with less than two weeks until election day.
A swag of Liberal luminaries attended the Liberal Party launch including Prime Minister Scott Morrison, who did not speak at the event, the former Prime Minister John Howard and the former Liberal premiers Mike Baird, Barry O’Farrell, John Fahey and Nick Greiner.
Ms Berejiklian said the Bankstown-Lidcombe hospital in Sydney’s southwest will be redeveloped on a new site at a cost of $1.3 billion. Another $780 million will be spent redeveloping the John Hunter Hospital in Newcastle.
The Premier also announced an extra $917 million to build eight new schools and upgrade another 31 across the state. That will lift the government’s investment in schools infrastructure over the next four years to $6.5 billion.
Ms Berejiklian said the opportunity of a new major airport in Sydney’s west only comes along “about once in a century".
Work on the new airport metro rail link will begin in 2021 and be ready for the airport's opening in 2026.
“No one should underestimate the impact this rail line will have for the people of western Sydney,” Berejiklian said.
“The way it will connect people moving across the north-west and south-west, and the convenience and quality of life it will deliver.”
Berejiklian also announced that by 2021 all public primary school students in NSW will be able to access before and after school care from 7am to 6pm.
“This will mean that, for the first time, every family across NSW will have access to convenient, flexible and more affordable before and after school care - to help take the pressure off you,” she said.
The Liberal campaign was held in the heart of the hotly-contested electorate of Penrith which the Liberals hold by a margin of 6.2 per cent.
The Premier's speech focused on the strong recent performance of the NSW economy including a record low unemployment rate.
"As Premier, I will never ask you to choose between having world-class schools, hospitals, transport, roads, stadiums or cultural facilities - because the hard work we've done means that today, NSW can have it all," she said.
"And NSW should have it all."