Mettam defiant despite big South West margins

Despite trailing most seats in the South West by double digits, Liberal leader and Vasse MLA Libby Mettam has refused to give up on winning the seats and her party taking back power. The Liberals hold only the seat of Vasse with a margin of 4.3 per cent and are widely expected to retain it. In Murray-Wellington, Labor holds the seat on a 17.2 per cent margin thanks to a 15.5 per cent swing in 2021. In both Bunbury and Collie-Preston, Labor hold the seats by 22.5 and 23.4 per cent respectively. Labor previously held them by more than 8 per cent. Despite the mountain of work to do, Ms Mettam was upbeat on her party’s chances. “There is no doubt that the Labor Government is the most resourced government in Australian modern political history,” she said. “We certainly will put a strong fight in the lead up to the next election and I’m confident we are in a position to be able to win the next election. “There are a number of key areas we will be very much focused on, cost of living and ensuring that access to housing, and the dream of owning your own home, is once again attainable for people. “As well as fixing a broken hospital system and addressing the serious issues of law and order that we’re seeing across the State.” Ms Mettam said there were a number of candidates putting up their hands for the party. “I’m very confident about the number of outstanding individuals who are putting their names forward for preselection,” she said. Another area of contention in the regions is the changes to the Upper House system with the six districts being merged to make one Statewide ballot. The previous system meant some votes in the regions were worth six times as much as those in the city. Ms Mettam said her party would continue to fight the changes. “The Liberal party membership body continues to fight the Labor Government removing regional representation, our model for preselection supports and maintains regional representation as part of our preselection process,” she said. “Which means that our model reflects the regions right across the State ensuring that every region such as South West is represented, unlike Labor, who has the region.”