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No sooner had the ABC psephologist Antony Green let the cat out of the bag – that the Baird government's vulnerability to defeat was being hidden by the reporting of opinion polls – than Sportsbet rose to the moment and opened betting on a NSW hung parliament.
The Irish-owned, Northern Territory-licensed bookmaker has in recent years come to enjoy fortune-teller status around Australia come election time and it is offering $1.40 against a hung NSW parliament.
Sportsbet reckons $2.75 is a fair wager on the likelihood there will be one.
Twenty-three days from polling day, Sportsbet has a Mike Baird victory for $1.08 while Luke Foley is on $7.
Sportsbet's Will Byrne said the NSW Coalition looked a lot safer than their Queensland colleagues.
Jurassic joke
The dishevelled Palmer United Party neglected to register as a party for the NSW state election and although boss Clive Palmer urged acolytes to stand as independents, the omens are not good.
Jeff the Dinosaur, the Queensland "Big Thing" that stood in the golf course on Palmer's Sunshine Coast resort and served as an ironic backdrop to the great man's media campaign during the federal election, burst into flames and melted to a metal frame in the early hours of Tuesday.
There were jibes that the dinosaur, like PUP, had self-combusted. Palmer, however, blamed an electrical fault.
Boundary jumpers
An electoral redistribution means the March 28 poll is being fought on new electoral boundaries.
The NSW Electoral Commission has sent out 365,000 notices to registered voters informing them of changes.
Almost all electoral districts have been affected. The western NSW electoral district of Murrumbidgee has been abolished and the inner Sydney district of Newtown has been created. Six districts have been renamed.
"Electoral boundaries need to be periodically redrawn to ensure that each of the 93 electoral districts in NSW has an equal number of electors," said Electoral Commissioner, Colin Barry. "This protects the concept of one vote, one value."
People can read about the redistribution process and check their electoral district by visiting www.redistribution.nsw.gov.au.
Power politics
The major parties arm-wrestle over privatisation of the power industry and now the power industry has stepped in and said "hands off our poles".
The CEO of Networks NSW, Vince Graham issued a po-faced press release on Tuesday warning political parties to keep clear of that most traditional of electioneering tools, the power pole.
"Candidates for the upcoming NSW election are again being reminded that attaching posters to power poles is unsafe for untrained campaign workers and against the law," he said.
Graham also announced that NSW political parties had been invoiced for the removal of 599 election posters (he even bothered to have somebody count them) illegally attached to power poles in inner Sydney and the Central Coast.
The posters are being held by power companies as a sort of ransom until political parties pay costs involved in their removal from poles.
"The unauthorised use of assets owned by Ausgrid, Endeavour Energy and Essential Energy is a breach of the Electricity Supply Act and the Graffiti Control Act," Graham said. Quite.
Defamation news
Pity poor Tania Mihailuk, the Labor MP for Bankstown. She is simultaneously trying to conduct a state election campaign and defend a defamation case.
She spent Monday in the Sydney District Court. And with the case slated to last well into next month, Mihailuk can expect to spend precious campaign time over the next few weeks in conference with her solicitors.
Mihailuk is facing defamation proceedings over allegations that she defamed one of the political opponents of her husband, Alex Kuskoff, when he was standing for Blacktown Council in September 2012.
The court has heard evidence that she told locals at a school polling booth not to vote for a minor independent, Rabie Chehade, because one of his relatives was "a drug dealer and a murderer".
After the election, in which Kuskoff won a seat and Chehade lost, the latter's solicitor contacted Mihailuk to demand an apology. She refused, and maintains she never made the comments.
Time out
There can be a public life and a private life, even as the state election campaign grinds on remorselessly.
Premier Mike Baird stepped away from electioneering on Monday to attend the funeral of Dan Haslam, the young Tamworth man, who became the national face of a campaign to legalise medical marijuana. He died last week aged just 25 after a five-year battle with cancer.
Hundreds attended the funeral at the Tangaratta Vineyard outside town.
The service was led by Sunday Night journalist Helen Kapalos. Radio talkback host Alan Jones spoke and the Deputy Premier, Troy Grant, was also in attendance.
Baird, who credits Haslam with changing his mind on the medical use of marijuana, told mourners the young man was an inspiration.
"What he has done will make a difference for thousands upon thousands of people to come and that is something he should be very proud of, and all of us should be very proud of," he said.
