The New South Wales State Budget has landed with all the fanfare of a Temu package tossed onto the front porch by a harried delivery driver.

It’s not that Treasurer Daniel Mookhey hasn’t been working to sell the Minns Government’s last big economic announcement before the March 2027 State Election.

All but a handful of spending measures were unveiled in the week before and the media reception has been muted, at best.

That’s how it goes for governments these days. You’d have to go back to the Howard and Rudd eras to find examples of Budgets that prompted a positive bump in polling numbers. The polling isn’t yet in but it would be stunning if this one broke the mould.

Treasurer Mookhey’s fourth Budget projected the image of a government going about the business of fiscal repair. It predicts an operating deficit of approximately $2.3 billion before returning to surplus in 2027–28.

The Budget delivers significant new spending in health, education and transport, domestic and family violence services and hands out modest offsets to household travel expenses.

It also contains just under a billion dollars in unannounced spending that we’ll hear more about as the election draws closer. Much of it will be allocated to infrastructure in marginal seats on Sydney’s growing fringes, where the threat of One Nation is greatest.

Mookhey says NSW is experiencing  “booming investment by private investment in renewable energy and AI-related infrastructure”. His Budget papers predict the State’s economy is slowing…without saying by how much.

To be fair, there’s not a lot a State can do to supercharge its own growth when the national GDP was + 0.2 percent in the last quarter with annual growth crawling at +1.3 percent.

But if there’s a silver bullet for suddenly reviving productivity, you won’t find it in the NSW Budget papers.

Craig Regan, Senior Account Director

Image: AI generated

Barack Obama once said: “A budget is more than just a series of numbers on a page; it is an embodiment of our values.”

That’s a noble objective but values tend to be tweaked in the run to an election – especially when there’s a clear and present danger of you not being re-elected.

The Minns Government is no different to any other in wanting to retain its place on the Treasury benches while facing a s fracturing of the two-party system.

Chris Minns is arguably the most centrist Premier in the country. His values are to manage existing debt by not committing to new mega projects, while doing his best to improve the lot of a public sector workforce that backed him in to win government.

Many forget that Chris Minns is already governing from a minority position. The pressure is really on the low-profile NSW Opposition under Kellie Sloane to present as a credible alternative while shedding votes to One Nation.

It all brings the importance of next Tuesday’s State Budget into sharp focus, as it’s the last one scheduled before the March 2027 state election.

By our tally, we’ve seen $15.09 billion in pre-Budget commitments announced in the last two weeks. Measured against the 2026-27 Budget, that’s about 13 percent of spending already on the table.

There’s been $10.1 billion unveiled in new health spending, for 9,000 workers and four new hospitals, and expenditure in other priority areas for schools and improving housing supply.

The Transport portfolio has flagged $2.1 billion for a Rail Reliability Plan for maintaining Sydney’s ageing trains while $557m will subsidise loans for 32,000 low income homes to move to greener energy.

While some commitments are multi-year and not directly comparable to a single-year budget, the scale of the announcements so far suggests there will be few fiscal surprises on Budget Day.

The usual budgeted but unannounced spending commitments to be rolled out in the election lead-up will be there, but the lolly bag may not be as large as expected six months ago, thanks to high interest rates and fabled stiff economic headwinds.

It is clear the Government is focussing on service delivery across Health and Transport alongside some cost-of-living relief measures as it prepares the way for the election in March next year. Expect more announcements about Planning as the Government seeks to continue the delivery of housing which has occupied much of the term.

Craig Regan, Senior Account Director

Primary was honoured to help bring together leaders and community representatives at Parliament House in Hobart, to celebrate 110 years of Royal Life Saving, and its enduring contribution to water safety and drowning prevention across Tasmania.

RLS TAS CEO, Michael Ilinsky, opened the event by acknowledging distinguished guests and reflecting on the organisation’s legacy as a leader in water education and lifesaving. He also highlighted the significant milestones achieved and the ongoing challenges in keeping communities safe around water.

Guests were privileged to hear from The Hon. Felix Ellis MP, Minister for Police, Fire and Emergency Management, who said that “lifesaving begins long before a life needs saving”, as he recognised the importance of strengthening drowning prevention efforts and building lifesaving capability across the community.

A highlight of the day has been the presentation of the first-ever Royal Life Saving Tasmania Commendation Award to Amelia Hodge, a student from St Patrick’s College, Launceston.

At just 12 years of age, Amelia demonstrated remarkable courage and composure when she rescued a four-year-old boy who had fallen into deep water at Port Sorell. Acting quickly, she entered the water and safely brought him back to shore; an extraordinary act that reflects the very essence of community lifesaving.

Amelia’s actions are a powerful reminder of the importance of water safety education and the impact it can have in critical moments.

We extend our congratulations to Amelia and our sincere thanks to all attendees and those who sent their best wishes including Members of Parliament, emergency services, local government, aquatic industry stakeholders and partners and our media friends – whose ongoing collaboration is vital in continuing this lifesaving mission.

Community opposition is often treated as a risk to be managed or neutralised during the planning pathway process. Community engagement becomes a procedural requirement rather than a strategic asset. However, when handled the right way, community opposition can materially strengthen a development proposal rather than weaken it.

It all depends on how feedback is used, how you build credibility, especially with critics. Controlling the narrative around the project is also important. An effective Stakeholder Engagement Strategy should always be part of any community engagement. However, this is often neglected by proponents.

Community opposition is information. It’s not noise

There is always a reason for community opposition to a development proposal. Concerns about scale, traffic, overshadowing, amenity, heritage or social impact are often early indicators of issues that will later attract regulator, media or political scrutiny. Treating community feedback as low‑value or emotionally driven is a missed opportunity.

A well‑structured community and stakeholder engagement strategy recognises that local communities hold deep, place‑based knowledge. Residents often understand movement patterns, operational pressures and cumulative impacts better than desktop analysis. When this information is incorporated early, before designs are locked in, it can lead to tangible improvements in built form, staging, mitigation measures and operational commitments.

It’s much easier to defend proposals that demonstrably evolve in response to local community feedback. Planning authorities are more confident approving developments that show evidence of listening, testing assumptions and adapting outcomes rather than simply justifying predetermined decisions.

Using feedback to strengthen a proposal

The strategic value of community feedback lies not in agreement, but in traceability. Strong proposals do three things well:

1. They separate sentiment from substance. Not all feedback requires design change, but all feedback deserves to be understood. Patterns matter more than volume.
2. They translate concerns into planning responses. Issues raised by the community should be visibly addressed through design changes, management plans or clear planning justifications.
3. They close the loop. Communities lose trust when feedback disappears into a void. Showing how input influences outcomes builds legitimacy, even among those who remain opposed.

Community engagement strategies used to support major NSW planning proposals explicitly frame engagement as an ongoing relationship rather than a single consultation event, reinforcing this feedback‑to‑outcome connection.

Building credibility especially with opponents

One of the most counterintuitive truths in development communications is that credibility is not built with supporters; it is built with opponents. And this must be embedded in any stakeholder engagement framework.

Opponents test the robustness of a proposal. They ask the hard questions, challenge assumptions and often articulate concerns that planning authority is thinking but not yet expressing. Any community engagement strategy should ensure that engagement with opponents is done respectfully and consistently. This sends a signal of confidence in the proposal and maturity in the proponent.

Credibility is built through:

• Consistency: Saying the same thing across forums, even when it is uncomfortable.
• Transparency: Being clear about what can and cannot change.
• Follow‑through: Delivering on commitments made during consultation.

Importantly, credibility does not require consensus. A community may still oppose a development while acknowledging that the proponent listened, responded and acted in good faith. That distinction matters enormously in planning assessments, political decision‑making and public narratives.

Why controlling the narrative matters

If a proponent does not clearly articulate the purpose, benefits and mitigations of a development, others will do it for them, often selectively. Narrative control is not about spin; it is about clarity.

A strong narrative explains:

• Why the development is needed
• How impacts have been identified and managed
• What benefits flow to the community, not just the proponent

Engagement and communication strategies are an integral and important component of any planning proposal. Proactive storytelling is so important across multiple channels, particularly in the public exhibition stage. This ensures that decision‑makers, stakeholders and the broader public are hearing a coherent, evidence‑based story rather than fragmented objections.

When feedback is visibly incorporated into that narrative, opposition loses its power to destabilise. Instead, it becomes part of the project’s evolution.

From risk mitigation to strategic advantage

The most successful development proponents shift their mindset from “managing opposition” to “leveraging engagement.” Community feedback becomes a design input, critics become stress‑testers, and consultation becomes proof of credibility.

In an environment of increasing scrutiny, transparency expectations and reputational risk, this approach does more than smooth approvals -it strengthens the proposal itself.

Development proposals that can demonstrate they listened, adapted and communicated clearly are more defensible, more resilient and ultimately more sustainable.

Chris Downy is Managing Director, Primary Engage.

On Monday I argued the South Australian result was not just a Labor triumph but a warning. The numbers in the SA upper house have now firmed up, and the warning is louder.

As of Tuesday night, One Nation has won one seat in the Lower House and is currently leading the count in three more.  In the South Australian Legislative Council, it looks like they will win three seats of the eleven that went to the election. Cory Bernardi, who leads the state party, is confirmed as one of them, alongside Carlos Quaremba and Rebecca Hewett.

What makes this more striking is the starting point: One Nation held one upper house seat from the 2022 election, held by Sarah Game, but she quit the party before 2026 and sat as an independent. So, One Nation entered Saturday’s election with zero sitting upper house members. They rebuilt from nothing and won three seats on the strength of a 23.8% primary vote in the Legislative Council alone.

So, Peter Malinauskas won the lower house in a landslide and simultaneously the balance of power in the Legislative Council has fallen to One Nation to review every piece of legislation he proposes. That is the structural reality of what a fragmented primary vote produces.

NSW: Zero seats, 23% of the vote

One Nation currently holds zero seats in the NSW upper house. They won three Legislative Council seats at the 2023 election, but all three members have since defected from the party and now sit as independents. By the time the 2027 election arrives, One Nation will have had no sitting representatives in NSW parliament for years. No platform. No profile. No incumbency advantage and yet they are polling at 23% statewide.

The SA result proved that none of those things matter when the discontent is structural. One Nation entered that election with zero upper house members and no lower house presence. This is exactly the same position as One Nation in NSW will be in come 2027.

Voters are not looking for a credible alternative government. They are looking for somewhere to put their frustration.

The NSW upper house math is straightforward and significant. At the 2027 election, 21 of the 42 Legislative Council seats will be contested. The quota for each seat is approximately 4.5%. On 23% of the primary vote, a well-run One Nation ticket is mathematically positioned to win four, possibly five, upper house seats. They won two in 2023 on a lower vote but had three members as Mark Latham resigned halfway through his eight-year term and gifted the remaining four years to former Labor MP Tania Mihailuk. Starting from zero and landing four or five seats would likely also give them crossbench power over every bill Chris Minns sends to the upper house. It would be the most significant shift in NSW parliamentary balance in a generation.

That leaves us with the question of the lower house. NSW is the only state with Optional Preferential Voting, meaning you don’t need to number every candidate. You could just vote one and not pass your preference on to any other candidate. This strongly favours the party who has the highest primary vote.

If Labor leads, and One Nation gets a higher primary than the Coalition, it could lead to an even bigger Labor landslide than what we just witnessed in South Australia despite a swing against the Government on primaries.

Where will One Nation surge in NSW?

Kos Samaras of Redbridge said One demographic profile of where One Nation does well is “outer-suburban communities under mortgage and rental stress, lower formal education attainment, industrial and logistics employment belts, and regional towns carrying a deep anti-establishment sentiment. Education levels were the strongest single predictor of where the One Nation surge was largest.”

Using the 2021 ABS census electorate profiles, the communities most likely to produce a One Nation surge are identifiable right now, and they concentrate in three geographic clusters.

The Hunter Valley is the most exposed

Cessnock ranks first in the entire state for trade qualifications, with 29.6% of residents holding one. Its Year 12 completion rate of 34.9% is the second lowest in NSW. One-parent families rank fifth statewide. Maitland sits alongside it with the third-highest trade qualification rate in NSW and Year 12 completion of just 41.8%, ranking 75th of 93 electorates. Upper Hunter ranks second in the state for trade qualifications and 86th for Year 12 completion. These are Labor and National seats that demographically mirror the SA electorates where One Nation led on primary votes last Saturday.

The Central Coast is the second cluster

Wyong has a no-post-school qualifications rate of 42.8%, 13th highest in NSW, with Year 12 completion ranking 81st in the state and 41.5% of renters paying more than 30% of their income in rent. The Entrance sits alongside it with the 13th highest rental stress in NSW. Cost of living is not an abstraction in these communities. It is the organising fact of daily life.

The third cluster is outer south-western Sydney

Campbelltown has the second-highest single-parent family rate in NSW, ranks tenth for no post-school qualifications and carries significant mortgage stress. Wollondilly and Camden sit at the rural-suburban fringe where the growth corridors meet communities that feel left behind by the pace of change around them. These are not just outer-suburban statistics. They are the demographics of alienation.

This is not to say One Nation won’t poll well in other areas. For this piece I have only presented these three clusters.

The first test comes on 9 May

None of this is inevitable. One Nation still needs to recruit candidates, build a NSW-specific profile, and convert polling into an organised campaign. The resignation of Susan Ley from the Federal parliament has caused the Farrer by-election on 9 May. This is the next test of whether Saturday’s SA result has momentum or was a one-state event. I think it’s the former.

Farrer covers a large swathe of southern NSW, and One Nation is polling at close to 29% in the seat, ten points clear of the Liberal candidate and six points ahead of the independent. A strong result would signal that the Hunter, Central Coast and outer south-western Sydney are genuinely in play and very likely other communities across the state.

The discontent is measurable. And the SA blueprint has just been published in real time.

Finally, my friends who know me know my love of the GWS Giants. So, I’ll leave you with this. In 2026 it looks like the Orange Tsunami is building in the electorate stronger than on the footy field.

Chris Hall is CEO, Primary Comms Group, and Chair at Sport NSW