With an eye on the rising tide of support for minor parties such as a resurgent One Nation and Shooters, Fishers and Farmers, the pair took the extraordinary step of announcing their line-up in regional Queanbeyan.

The spin is that this shows the new administration is serious when it says it will "govern for everyone".

But it was lost on nobody that it was in Barilaro's seat of Monaro, which he holds by a tiny margin of 2.5 per cent and not long after the Nationals' disastrous loss of Orange to the Shooters at last year's byelection.

First, the oddities. Having forced Jillian Skinner out of the health portfolio, ostensibly in the interests of renewal, Berejiklian has installed another veteran minister, Brad Hazzard.

Berejiklian says this is because of the experience he will bring to the role; the same could have been said of Skinner, who spent 14 years as opposition spokeswoman and almost six as minister.

The move appears to be an attempt to remove an easy target for the opposition following last year's health system scandals.

The appointment of Rob Stokes to education also defies logic. Stokes is the bloke former Premier Mike Baird described as the best planning minister in NSW history.

He is halfway through the difficult and complex business of overhauling the planning system.

Stokes was even away studying planning at Oxford when Baird announced his retirement from politics and Berejiklian began mustering the numbers to replace him.

Yet Berejiklian chose to move him after Barilaro dumped highly regarded education minister Adrian Piccoli from cabinet – most likely as a consequence of his support for former Nationals leader Troy Grant to stay in the job.

Explaining the Stokes decision on Sunday, Berejiklian offered the unconvincing explanation that it's important that experienced ministers use that experience elsewhere.

In other moves, the elevation of Don Harwin to cabinet and as leader of the government in the upper house exposes Berejiklian to the accusation this was an appointment designed to reward a key factional ally.

Harwin, along with another fresh cabinet appointee, Matt Kean, was instrumental in securing the numbers for Berejiklian to become Premier.

To their credit the number of women has increased in Berejiklian and Barilaro's cabinet, if only by one.

Skinner and the Nationals' Leslie Williams have been dumped, but Barilaro has appointed two women – the experienced Melinda Pavey (a strong supporter of Barilaro to become party leader) and up-and-comer Sarah Mitchell.

The appointments were sorely overdue, with just one Nationals woman in the previous line-up.

Tanya Davies' appointment not only counters the loss of Skinner on the Liberal side, but –  with an eye on 2019 – also brings another western Sydney MP into cabinet.

So, too, does the elevation of Castle Hill MP Ray Williams and the handing of the new WestConnex portfolio to the minister for western Sydney, Stuart Ayes.

The later is pretty clear attempt to reset the conversation on WestConnex from inner-city protests to a focus on the government's claim it will benefit western Sydney families.

The same families whose support the Coalition will need to be returned for a third term at the 2019 poll.