Cook says he would be ‘heartbroken’ if Labor loses Secret Harbour
Premier Roger Cook says it would “break his heart” to lose the seat of Secret Harbour as polls opened in the southern suburbs electorate.
Cook stood aside candidate Georgia Tree at Secret Harbour Primary School just after polls opened where the pair made their final pitch ahead of what is expected to be a strong showing from One Nation’s Luke Herdegen.
“It would break my heart, but we’re in the hands of the people of Secret Harbour today,” Cook said.
“I’m just today immensely proud of the woman that’s standing behind me. I’m immensely proud of the campaign that we’ve run.”
Tree denied Labor had left the electorate in the lurch because it has been such a safe seat for the party with the failure to deliver the Karnup train station a major criticism of Labor during the campaign.
“I think Labor has a really strong story to tell...we’re already building a hospital in Mandurah, we’ve made public transport cheaper, so $2.80 fares from here into the city.
“That’s a palpable, tangible cost of living relief change that WA Labor has implemented. So I don’t think that it’s fair to say that Labor has left this seat in the lurch, absolutely not.”
Down the road at Coastal Lakes College, Herdegen said he remained confident he could wrestle the seat from Labor.
“People want change. They feel like they’ve been neglected and taken for granted down here for too long. Their cost of living’s through the roof, and they’ve just had enough,” he said.
Herdegen said he’d received a call from party leader Pauline Hanson who gave him a “pep talk” and wasn’t concerned she wasn’t joining him on the trail.
“No, I mean she’s the busiest woman in Australia, so I’m sure her schedule was full before this was probably even announced,” he said.
Liberal candidate Ryan Robertson faces an uphill battle with One Nation drawing votes from conservative voters but he said he was still a shot.
“For sure we can win. I think it’s anyone’s game, absolutely,” he said.
“I don’t say that arrogantly, I say that, of course, with humility, but if anyone is going to lead West Australians with honesty and integrity, it’s the WA Liberal Party in my view.”
Liberal leader Basil Zempilas again defended his party’s effort in Robertson’s campaign.
“I’m very confident that we have absolutely put our best foot forward behind the best candidate in the field, and our campaign has been about our candidate,” he said.
Zempilas paused for a few moments when told about Cook’s heartbroken comment.
“Well, I’ll give him a buzz tomorrow morning and check in on him. I suppose that would be the right thing to do,” he said.
Half of the electorate has already voted with more than 18,000 people opting for prepoll or postal voting meaning volunteers vastly outnumbered voters at the booths this masthead visited in the morning.
The parties have crossed paths with Cook and Tree bumping into WA Liberal leader Basil Zempilas and Liberal candidate Ryan Robertson at Singleton Primary school where they shook hands and wished each other good luck.
Tree and Cook bumped into Herdegen at Coastal Lakes College where Cook shook Herdegen’s hand and Herdegen hovered near the premier while he bought his democracy sausage.
Singleton Primary P&C members Jade and Kirsten had not yet voted in the morning and remained undecided.
Both women said previous votes were easy because they liked retiring Secret Harbour MP Paul Papalia because of his support of the school but without him there it made their vote more difficult.
“I guess just knowing that maybe Georgia is not necessarily from this area straight up, we don’t really know much about her until recently,” Kirsten said.
“Paul was around for so long that it was nice to know who we were with.”
Jade said it would likely come down to Labor and Liberal because she didn’t support Hanson.
One Nation volunteer and Secret Harbour voter Trevor Hale said he’d voted mostly Liberal but the past few elections had switched to Hanson’s party because of federal Labor.
“We only joined the party formally just recently, but we’ve been following Pauline for some time, and we voted One Nation at the last two or three elections, federal and state,” he told this masthead.
“I’ve had enough of Labor. I’ve only voted twice for Labor in my whole life. Normally Liberal, but Liberals no longer are a threat to anybody, and Labor is just destroying the country, both state and federal.
“To me, this is more a vote against Albanese than it is against Roger.”
Party branches across the country will be watching the byelection result closely to see whether national polling success for One Nation will translate to votes in outer suburban electorates and where those votes are coming from.
Hasluck Labor MP Tania Lawrence whose federal electorate shares similarities in demographics to Secret Harbour said her party would take into account the results.
“I think the national secretary will always have regard to every election and understand what the constituency is saying on different issues because at the end of the day, every policy we work on is framed around what the community is looking for and what they need,” she said.
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