WHEN was the last time a NSW Premier served a full term?
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Some political junkies would know the answer to that question, but for the rest of us it would take some thinking, such has been the turnover rate of our premiers in recent years.
Yesterday it was Mike Baird’s turn. While his predecessors over the last decade have been rolled by their own party, lost the support of the public, or been
While our state MP Adam Marshall remained coy on the topic of Mike Baird’s resignation, upper house MP Scot MacDonald paid tribute to Mr Baird.
The Guyra-based member of parliament had kind words to say about the departing leader.
He said the outgoing premier as “probably the best premier we have had in many decades” and praised the economic record of Mr Baird’s time as the state’s leader.
Mr MacDonald noted that within the past decade, first as treasurer then as premier, Mr Baird had helped turn around the financial position of the state from a deficit to a strong surplus.
He pointed out that Mr Baird had also increased expenditure on front line services, and while council amalgamations have not been a popular topic across the local region, Mr MacDonald said it had to happen to tackle the infrastructure backlog that was increasing at the local government level.
It is less than three years since he came to the job, in April 2014 following Barry O’Farrell’s resignation.
In that time Mr Baird has had controversies. Most notably the decision to ban greyhound racing, which was later reversed, and while not anything that affects us locally, the Sydney lock-out laws were an issue in the big smoke.
In the face of that, we always saw a calm leader, who displayed integrity, and could be very amusing on social media as well.
Prior to Mr O’Farrell’s time as premier, which lasted less than a term after winning office, the Labor Party went through three premiers.
Kristina Keneally was the leader until the party lost the 2011 state election, after she replaced Nathan Rees during its final term in office. In that same term Mr Rees had replaced Morris Iemma who had led the party to victory at the 2007 election before being rolled by the party in 2008.
Which takes us back to Bob Carr. The last premier to serve a full term, from 1999 to 2003.