Parties eye western Sydney as sparks fly

NSW ELECTION CAMPAIGN - THURSDAY, MARCH 12

WHERE THEY WENT

Mike Baird: Eveleigh, Sydney CBD

Luke Foley: Girraween, Penrith

WHAT THEY SAID

"The ads have got to such a stage that I'm almost afraid of what I'm going to do. I'm checking with myself: 'Is everything OK? Yes it is, Mike.' None of it is true," Baird jokes about the Labor campaign against electricity privatisation at an infrastructure industry lunch in Sydney.

"There are many elites who champion electricity privatisation. The people who own the electricity network do not want it sold," Foley's response to former federal Labor Minister Martin Ferguson urging him to back the privatisation plan.

TODAY'S PROMISES

Govt

- $395 million for technological upgrades to a 36km stretch of the M4 in western Sydney, completed by 2020.

- A fund, in partnership with social services body NCOSS and infrastructure organisation IPA, to raise $1 billion for affordable housing.

Labor

- $351 million redevelopment for Nepean Hospital in Sydney's west.

- $22.7 million to hand apprentices $500 each for tools and clothes.

- Halving the cost of car registration for apprentices.