The Minns government might just finish the year on a high, but it’s line ball. It might just as well finish with a humiliating exposure of its minority status and its struggle to gain support from the crossbench. It’s little wonder Labor has dramatically slashed the number of sitting days next year. Parliament is emerging as a headache that Labor feels it could well do without.

NSW Labor is about to enter its final two sitting weeks of the year. Strap in for a very bumpy ride. The government faces some big tests and has left itself little time to ensure it can finish its first year in power with the wins it promised.

A bruising end to his first year in power … Premier Chris Minns.Credit: Dominic Lorrimer

When it comes to delivering on election commitments, it no doubt thought legislating emissions targets in its climate change bill would be easy. It promised to have its greenhouse gas reduction targets of 50 per cent by 2030 and net zero by 2050 enshrined in law.

Instead, it faces an uphill battle, starting in the upper house where the bill was introduced by Environment Minister Penny Sharpe. The Greens say the former Coalition government had a stronger position on climate than the one Labor is now proposing. They are demanding the government be far more ambitious. Progressive crossbenchers, including Sydney MP Alex Greenwich, are siding with the Greens.

Under the Coalition, then-energy minister Matt Kean regulated an interim target of 70 per cent by 2035. Premier Chris Minns seemed to miss the memo about that. He has repeatedly referred to Kean’s target as nothing more than a line in a press release. When Minns faced budget estimates last month, Greens MP Sue Higginson asked him: “What do you say to the fact that your climate targets right now are less ambitious than the current targets that were set by the Coalition government?”

Minns’ response? “I don’t think they had a target,” he said. But they did indeed.

In a sign Labor knows it faces trouble, a mass email to party members earlier this month pleaded with them to lobby the Coalition to back the bill. “Right now, the NSW Liberals are refusing to support the bill,” the email from Sharpe said. “We need you to help us put pressure on the NSW Liberals to vote for the Net Zero Future Bill.”

In truth, the Liberals still have not formalised their position, in part because they cannot get their country cousins onside. The Nationals are yet to be convinced to support Labor’s bill and are considering splitting with the Liberals on the issue so they can freely oppose it. Should the Libs side with Labor, the Nationals’ opposition wouldn’t be enough to stop the bill, but it would leave offside the Greens and progressive crossbenchers who Labor needs to keep on board in the upper house.