Within the space of 10 days, the party's federal Labor candidate for Calare Jess Jennings and state candidate for Bathurst Beau Riley have both made education central planks of the first stages of their campaigns.

Dr Jennings launched his third bid for Calare by promising a $24 million boost for public schools across the Calare electorate.

“That's additional funding and it's over three years, so the funding for this would start to flow on January 1, 2020,” he said.

“It's obviously the full Gonski funding, that is reversing the cuts that the coalition put in place in the last five years.”

Of the funding, $5,770,000 would go to 16 schools that fall under the 2795 postcode. 

They are big number and they are figures that are sure to be repeated plenty of times between now and election day.

The Nationals’ Andrew Gee would appear to have an unassailable head start in Calare, but with opinion polls pointing to a nationwide swing against the government, Dr Jennings will be hopeful of seriously damaging Mr Gee’s margin.

The key will be finding issues with a local flavour that can directly impact on the lives of voters.

A boost to school funding must be a solid starting point.

At a state level, Mr Riley is facing a similar battle and his strategy must mirror Dr Jennings’.

Mr Riley is unlikely to defeat the Nationals’ Paul Toole but, again, polls are pointing to a general swing against the government.

Mr Riley knows his best chance to claw back some percentage points for Labor is to run a campaign focused on purely local issues rather than rely on general dissatisfaction with the government’s performance to translate to votes for Labor.

His first policy position, to buy land behind Eglinton Public School to allow for future expansion as the suburb grows, ticked plenty of boxes – except one.

Despite Labor’s claims, the policy did not put Mr Riley at odds with Mr Toole and, in fact, the deal to buy the land could well be finalised before the election in March.

It was a good first attempt, but also a valuable lesson in the dangers of assuming you have all the facts.

If either Labor man is going to have any sort of success, though, this must be just the beginning rather than the end.