Former South Australian premier says NSW Coalition is a barrier to getting action among the states

This article is more than 1 year old

This article is more than 1 year old

The New South Wales Labor party has wheeled out the former South Australian premier, Jay Weatherill, to help bolster its credentials on climate change in key seats where the issue could be the decider.

Climate change is the top issue in Coogee, currently held by the Liberals on a margin of 2.9%, and Balmain, which Labor hopes to reclaim from the Greens, which holds it by 4.7%.

Weatherill said the NSW Coalition had been a barrier to getting action on climate change when states tried to achieve an agreement on pricing carbon in the face of the federal Coalition’s inaction.

“I think the conservative forces have completely misapprehended the community’s demand to take action on climate change and I think there will be very substantial judgments made by the electorates,” he said.

Michael Daley claims Asian workers taking young people's jobs in Sydney Read more

“When the states were trying to search for a mechanism to put a price on carbon in the national electricity market – just about everyone in the universe thinks it’s a good idea – [the Berejiklian government] were backing the commonwealth’s compromise,” he said.

As Labor premier for six years until 2018, Weatherill put South Australia at the forefront of adopting renewable power, which now provides 50% of the state’s electricity.

However, a statewide blackout in 2017 during a ferocious storm, which caused windfarms to shut down and led to a chain of events that cut the interconnectors bringing electricity from interstate, prompted federal criticism of renewable energy and questions about whether intermittent power from renewables was viable.

Weatherill responded by announcing a tender for a giant battery to stabilise the system, which was won by Tesla and built in under six months.

He told the Guardian that the battery has almost paid for itself in a year. “It cost us $46m over 10 years; in its first year of operation it saved people in the SA region $45m. It’s largely paid for itself in 12 months, not to mention the stabilisation services its provided to the national electricity market,” Weatherill said.

Famously, the then federal minister for energy Josh Frydenberg and Weatherill locked horns at a joint press conference over SA’s energy strategy.

NSW Coalition would need to borrow $7bn to fund election promises, analysis shows Read more

Frydenberg accused SA of trying to “go it alone” and Weatherill of “crash-tackling” his event.

Weatherill hit back, claiming the Coalition was the “most anti-South Australian commonwealth government in living history”.

Elly Howse, who is attempting to unseat the Greens’ Jamie Parker in Balmain, said the problem for minor parties was delivering on the promises they make.

“If we don’t win, we will have four more years of a void in this policy space, and it doesn’t matter how much your local Green might be saying about this issue,” she said.

Marjorie O’Neill, Labor’s candidate for Coogee, said climate change and the environment was the issue most raised with her, followed by overdevelopment and education.

She said single-use plastics was a major concern in the beachside electorate. “Every other state has banned them except NSW,” she said.