It is perhaps a measure of how much the climate wars have calmed in recent times that coal is no longer the word on the lips of the main combatants in Upper Hunter.
On April 8, 2021, Nationals candidate Dave Layzell stood beside then treasurer Dominic Perrottet and John Barilaro at Glencore's Ravensworth mine to spruik the Coalition's coal credentials in the lead-up to the May by-election.
Five days later, mining union official and Labor candidate Jeff Drayton joined Jodi McKay in Singleton to announce that the party would guarantee $100 million in mining royalties returned to the community every year.
Labor's woeful performance in the by-election appeared to validate federal MP Joel Fitzgibbon's widely shared view that the party had lost its base while pandering too much to inner-city craft beer drinkers.
Fast forward two years, and with Labor now calling the shots in Canberra, the steam has gone out of the coal jobs "debate".
Layzell, now defending his patch as Member for Upper Hunter, and Labor candidate Peree Watson both agreed with Election Diary that grassroots issues like roads and hospitals were dominating this year's campaign.
"I would always see that job security is massively important in Upper Hunter, but we're all working together to get there now," Watson said.
"There's a realisation within the community that we can do both."
Layzell said the coal talk had cooled down.
"I think the by-election brought a whole lot of focus from the state onto the coalmines and where they sat in the government's vision, and I think a lot of people now understand where we're going with it," he said.
New growth industry
The Legalise Cannabis Party is launching its election campaign in Newcastle on Monday with the intoxicating suggestion that the Hunter could become a centre for commercial weed growing.
LCP upper house lead candidate Jeremy Buckingham told ED the party's vote in last year's federal election had been particularly strong in the Hunter.
Asked why this was so, Buckingham said: "Cannabis is a working-class drug.
"It's a working-class recreation.
"People in the Hunter recognise that it's just part of society, part of life, and the war on drugs hasn't worked."
The former Greens MP said the region would be the "absolute ideal place" to establish a marijuana industry if NSW legalised the drug.
"The Hunter, with access to good water, cheaper land, a workforce, relatively close to markets, would be the perfect place to establish a legalised cannabis industry," Buckingham said.
Women and the west
Returning to one of ED's favourite subjects, the prospective State Government of Western Sydney has been relative quiet this week in handing out wads of cash in the west metropolis.
But one event which caught our eye was the government-backed Future of Women in Western Sydney Summit at Parramatta's CommBank Stadium on International Women's Day.
ED looks forward to the government-sponsored Future of Women in the Hunter Summit.
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