Footage has emerged of Labor volunteers handing out material on behalf of a rival Greens candidate to voters days out from the state election.
The countdown to this Saturday’s NSW election is in full swing where thousands have already casted their votes.
Voters flocked to polling booths on Saturday, the first day of pre-polling where one video sparked concern for Labor leader Chris Minns.
The footage shows two female volunteers wearing Labor T-shirts standing under an umbrella in the 35C-plus heat handling out pamphlets to voters walking past.
One woman is visibly shown giving a man a how-to-vote pamphlet for the Greens along with a Labor one.
The video was filmed in Ryde in Sydney’s north-west, where candidate Lyndal Howison hopes to win the seat for Labor for the first time in 15 years.
Labor volunteers were filmed handing out Greens material to voters on the first day of pre-polling on Ryde on Saturday
Liberal minister Victor Dominello holds the seat with a majority of 11.5 per cent but announced last year he’s quitting politics.
Mr Minns didn’t like what he saw in the video, as he issued a desperate plea to party volunteers and voters.
‘I don’t know the circumstances of that incident, but I want people voting Labor. My message to voters is to vote Labor, don’t vote for the Greens,’ he told Daily Mail Australia in a statement on Monday.
He earlier admitted there could be a simple explanation for what happened in the video.
‘I don’t know the circumstances, but I don’t like that,’ Mr Minns told 2GB breakfast host Ben Fordham.
Chris Minns has demanded an explanation as to why Labor volunteers were handing out Greens how to vote cards on Saturday
‘We want people voting Labor at this election campaign. We want Labor volunteers handing out how-to-vote cards for Labor.
‘I’ll have to see what the circumstances are, maybe the Greens volunteer went to the loo or something, I’m not sure.’ I can’t explain it as I wasn’t there.
‘My message to Labor volunteers and to Labor voters is that we need your votes.’
Mr Minns insists Labor has struck no deal has been struck with the Greens in what is shaping up to be a ‘competitive’ election.
The Liberals have directed preferences to the Greens above Labor for the first time in the party’s history in several seats, including the city’s inner-west seats of Balmain, Newtown and Summer Hill.
NSW Labor has only won from opposition three times since World War II.
Almost one-third of the state’s 5.5million voters are expected to cast their votes early at 2,000 pre-poll centres across NSW this week.
Another 480,000 have requested postal voting.
The pre-polling controversy occurred in Ryde, where candidate Lyndal Howison (pictured right with Chris Minns) hopes to win the seat for Labor
The latest Resolve Political Monitor poll shows Labor and the Liberal Coalition neck and neck on 38 per cent of the primary vote, with the government gaining six points since last month’s poll.
Premier Dominic Perrottet gained ground as the preferred premier, appealing to 40 per cent of those surveyed, while Mr Minns remained steady at 37 per cent.
The poll indicates a 4.5 per cent swing to Labor, meaning the party is still tracking to end the coalition’s 12 years in power but will likely need support from independent crossbenchers to form the government.
