ANALYSIS: Matt Kean’s big spending on progressive programs looks designed to appeal to Liberal voters lost at the federal election.
More female firefighters and construction workers; a program to stop women being harassed in public; subsidised preschool childcare; the Aboriginal flag flying alongside the Australian and NSW ensigns atop Sydney Harbour Bridge.
A Liberal politician, NSW Treasurer Matt Kean, can take credit for these policies, which will be funded in Tuesday’s state budget. They represent a progressive project that demonstrates what is becoming apparent to political observers: Kean and the centrist “moderate” faction he leads are dominating the NSW government.
While the faction has always been strong in the NSW Liberal Party, Kean may be the most powerful NSW treasurer in decades. That’s because Premier Dominic Perrottet’s conservative faction, which counts former prime minister Tony Abbott and former energy minister Angus Taylor among its members, represents a minority of NSW Liberal MPs.
Numerical superiority has allowed Kean to pursue, since he became energy and environment minister after the 2019 election, what would today be regarded as a teal-like approach focused on global warming, the environment and sexual equality.In this role, he opened national parks, campaigned to protect endangered species and promised big subsidies for wind and solar farms. He didn’t talk about the prospect of cheaper energy from gas, which the state has abundant supplies of underground.
Last year he became treasurer, and on Tuesday will present his first budget. Many of his spending plans have already been published, and demonstrate how the government is being made in Kean’s image. The treasurer has racked up a bill, so far, around $7.6 billion across 26 areas. Many of the projects fit his progressive priorities, and may appeal to those wavering Liberals who deserted the party for independents financed by environmentalist Simon Holmes à Court at the federal election.
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