Days before the March 2015 NSW election, tensions over the Baird government's proposal to privatise the state's electricity assets were running high.

Unions had unleashed a TV ad warning of the national security implications of selling assets such as transmission company Transgrid to Chinese government-owned State Grid Corp.

NSW Premier Mike Baird's rhetoric has come back to bite him. Credit:Fiona Morris

Then-NSW Treasurer Andrew Constance slammed the ad as a "racist rant", while Mike Baird declared it a "disgraceful scare campaign".

The slagging match over StateGrid continued after the election.