Nathan Rees (; born 12 February 1968) is an Australian former politician who served as the 41st Premier of New South Wales and leader of the New South Wales Labor Party from September 2008 to December 2009. Rees was a Member of the New South Wales Legislative Assembly, representing Toongabbie for Labor from 2007 to 2015.
Rees replaced Morris Iemma as Premier and party leader on 5 September 2008. At 40 years and 206 days of age, Rees became the youngest person to assume the office, a record that has since been surpassed by Dominic Perrottet. On 3 December 2009, Rees was deposed as leader of the Labor Party by Kristina Keneally after he resoundingly lost a secret ballot in the Labor Party caucus after fifteen months as Premier. He is the shortest-serving member of the New South Wales Parliament to become Premier since Federation, and the only Labor Premier of New South Wales not to lead the party into an election.
Early life Rees was born in 1968 in Western Sydney to parents Daryl and Frances, his mother being a longtime member of the Labor Party, reportedly from Penrith, New South Wales. He attended Northmead Creative and Performing Arts High School where he served as school captain. On leaving school he initially took up a horticultural apprenticeship and worked as a greenskeeper for Parramatta Council. Subsequently, he went on to study English literature at the University of Sydney, attaining an honours degree in 1994, supporting himself by working as a garbage collector at the same council. During his time at the Council he became Secretary of the then Municipal and Shire Employees Union.
Rees was a long-distance runner, and a member of the Parramatta Cycling Club, where he won many events. When training for races, Rees would cycle up to 1,000 km per week. He once attained third place in a state triathlon.
Politics Rees's first job in politics was in 1995, when he became an adviser to the then deputy premier Andrew Refshauge, for whom his mother, Frances, worked. During this period, Rees cycled between Bullaburra in the Blue Mountains, where he lived at the time, and central Sydney, a distance of more than .
He subsequently worked for Ministers Craig Knowles and Morris Iemma, and as chief of staff for Minister Milton Orkopoulos. Rees transferred to the Premier's office in 2006, three months before Orkopoulos was charged with child sexual abuse. Rees has stated that he had no knowledge of the crimes committed by Orkopoulos, and would have reported him to the police had he been aware of them.
Minister for Water Utilities and Minister for Emergency Services Rees was elected to the New South Wales Legislative Assembly on 24 March 2007. He was almost immediately promoted to cabinet, becoming Minister for Emergency Services and Minister for Water Utilities on 2 April 2007.
As Minister for Water Utilities, Rees was responsible for implementing the $1.9 billion Sydney Desalination Plant at Kurnell, and the proposed Tillegra Dam in the Hunter Region.
At the time Rees was appointed Minister for Water Utilities, Sydney was experiencing extreme drought conditions requiring transfer of water from the Shoalhaven River to Sydney and the imposition of water restrictions.
The construction of the controversial Sydney Desalination Plant to prepare Sydney for future droughts was completed whilst Rees was Minister. The project came in $60 million under budget and doubled the initial capacity. Contracts were also entered into to provide for the powering of the desalination plant through renewable sources.
In July 2008, he was touted by the Sydney media as being a contender for Premier. Rees denied that he was a contender for the role, saying that "Premier Iemma has my rock-solid, unequivocal support and he knows that". Two months after this interview, Morris Iemma was deposed as Premier in favour of Rees.
Premier
Iemma resigned on 5 September 2008 after his own Right faction rebuffed his plans to reshuffle the Cabinet. However, the Right had no credible replacement candidate. It thus agreed to support Rees, a member of the Socialist Left faction.Green, Antony. 2011 NSW election preview. ABC News. Thus, later in the day, Rees was unanimously elected Labor leader, and hence Premier. He was sworn in by the Lieutenant Governor of New South Wales, Chief Justice of New South Wales James Spigelman after only nineteen months as a member of parliament. Carmel Tebbutt was elected unanimously as Deputy Leader, and thus Deputy Premier. The following Monday, 8 September, Rees was also sworn in as Minister for the Arts.
A slump in revenues during the 2008 financial crisis compelled Rees and the State Treasurer Eric Roozendaal to implement a mini-budget which was handed down on 11 November 2008. The mini-budget increased taxes and charges such as land tax, mineral royalties, parking space levies and also announced the privatisation of state assets. A universal scheme providing free travel on public transport for all students going to and from school was curtailed—a decision since reversed—and the previously announced North West Metro and South West rail projects were indefinitely postponed. A series of by-elections to replace former Premier Morris Iemma, Deputy Premier John Watkins and Health Minister Reba Meagher resulted in massive swings against the government and saw John Watkins' former seat of Ryde resoundingly lost to the Liberals.
Soon after returning from his wedding in New York, Rees dismissed rumours of a leadership challenge within the Labor party. After the resignation of John Della Bosca as Minister for Health and the Central Coast, and after a subsequent cabinet reshuffle, Rees appointed himself as Minister for the Central Coast.
On 14 November 2009, Rees was granted extraordinary powers by the New South Wales Labor State Conference to pick his own cabinet (usually the Labor caucus and Head Office chooses the ministry, and the leader only assigns portfolios). The next day Rees sacked Finance Minister (and Labor powerbroker) Joe Tripodi, Primary Industries Minister Ian Macdonald, and Parliamentary Secretaries Henry Tsang and Sonia Hornery for blocking key reforms aimed at distancing the government from corruption and improving the provision of services to constituents and for plotting to remove him from the premiership. This was the fourth cabinet reshuffle since Rees took over the premiership.
Economy Rees took over as Premier on 5 September 2008. Eleven days later, Lehman Brothers collapsed during the 2008 financial crisis.
The Rees government responded to the crisis with a three-point plan. Firstly, Rees reaffirmed his government's commitment to the retention of a Triple A credit rating. Rees emphasised that as finance and credit became harder to get around the world, retaining a Triple A credit rating was essential to being able to borrow money at the lowest rates available. Secondly, as chair of the government's Budget sub-committee, Rees announced there would be a mini-budget which was delivered in November 2008. The mini-budget delayed a number of large-scale capital works projects with long lead times and instead emphasised capital expenditure on smaller projects which could generate employment more quickly. Third, Rees drew industry and business leaders together to conduct a job summit. This summit was co-chaired by Roger Corbett, Steve Harkins and David Gonski. In addition to the Work Plan developed by the summit, Rees also announced the establishment of 4,000 government apprenticeships across the state and 2,000 cadetships.
After the delivery of the 2009/10 Budget, the AAA credit rating in NSW was reaffirmed by the major credit ratings agencies and the agency's outlook for NSW was upgraded from negative to stable. Rees has since claimed that NSW is the only jurisdiction in the world to have improved its credit rating during the 2008 financial crisis.
The 2009/10 Rees Budget had the largest capital works expenditure to date in the State's history, more than $18 billion.
Education In his short period as Premier, Rees and his Education Minister, Verity Firth, made substantial changes to the NSW Education system. From 1998 to 2008, there had only been a slight increase in the retention rate for students remaining to complete Year 12, with significant inequality as measured by socio-economic status. In response, in January 2009, Rees announced that he would be increasing the minimum leaving age from 15 to 17 years.
Together with the Federal government, Rees also established 175,000 new training places in the vocational training sector, and provided a training guarantee for apprentices who had had their apprenticeships interrupted.
Controversially, Rees also introduced non-religious Ethics classes into primary schools against fierce opposition from church groups.
Law and order Shortly after coming to office, the death of an outlaw motorcycle gang member at Sydney airport required Rees to introduce controversial laws aimed at banning criminal gangs. Fierce opposition from civil libertarians followed, and in June 2011, the High Court ruled against the government.
In the 09/10 Budget, the NSW police force was provided with $10 million to equip frontline police with Taser stun guns.
Rees also introduced measures aimed at reducing alcohol-related violence. These included mandatory lockouts, plastic cups and the naming and shaming of the most violent venues. In the comparison period, 'glassings' went from 17 incidents in the previous year to one incident after these measures were introduced.
Despite ongoing disputes between criminal gangs, the Bureau of Crime Statistics and Research reported that in the 24 months to December 2010, ten of the 17 major offence categories were stable and seven were falling.
Environment Building on the environmental legacy of Bob Carr, Rees announced the preservation of the last remaining large tract of River Red Gums in the state's south. This completed the forest preservation program commenced by Carr, who had preserved the North Coast and Brigalow natural heritage areas.
Rees also announced the establishment of Yengo National Park in the Upper Hunter region; 120,000 hectares of pristine bushland, in June 2009. Furthermore, the Rees government announced an additional 65,000 hectares of land in Yanga National Park in the Riverina.
Transport Successive Labor administrations had been criticised for inadequate spending on public transport. Financially restrained from large-scale projects due to the 2008 financial crisis, Rees and his Transport Minister David Campbell determined that massive expansion of the bus network would improve transport options more quickly than large heavy rail expansions. Accordingly, 450 new buses were ordered.
Rees also opened the Epping to Chatswood rail line, the first piece of significant rail infrastructure in a decade, and projected usage was quickly outstripped.
In November 2009, Rees announced approval for Stage 2 of the South West Rail Link, a $1.3 billion project to improve public rail services to south western Sydney.
Rees and Campbell enjoyed a close working relationship, and on their watch train service reliability rose to a ten-year high of 95% on-time running. They also announced the restoration of ferry services from the city to Parramatta to ease rail and road congestion. To ease congestion in city centres, free shuttle buses were also introduced into Sydney city and Wollongong. To encourage public transport use on weekends, the Rees Government introduced $2.50 Family Fun Day fares for Sundays, with discount entry to museums and other tourist locations. Rees and Campbell also delivered a simplified fare structure for the rail network and 300 new buses.
Health