The Greens smell blood in the water in the federal seat of Perth, with leader Adam Bandt arriving in Western Australia on Monday to embark on a week-long push to oust Labor’s Patrick Gorman at the next election.
Bandt will spend the next week doorknocking the Perth electorate hoping to connect with its large cohort of renters, and will attack both the state and federal Labor on housing while spruiking the Greens’ policies.
Greens leader Adam Bandt is in Perth this week.Credit: Alex Ellinghausen
Bandt believes Perth is in play because his party only needs to increase its primary vote by 8.4 per cent to 30.6 per cent to tip preferences in their favour – a feat they managed to do in the electorates of Melbourne, Griffith and Ryan in 2022.
“In Queensland at the last election, the places where people switched their vote to the Greens were seats where there were high numbers of people who were renting and in housing stress,” he told this masthead.
“I think people increasingly see that the Greens are the party for renters.
“If just one in 10 people switch their vote, the Greens can win the seat of Perth.”
Gorman, who is Assistant Minister to the Prime Minister, was first elected in the 2018 byelection and currently holds the seat by 14.8 per cent.
But the Greens believe this margin was inflated by the post-COVID Mark McGowan effect which is attributed to Labor’s electoral fortunes in the 2021 state election and 2022 federal election.
If the Greens are successful in Perth, it would be the party’s first-ever federal lower house seat and would vastly increase Bandt’s bargaining power in the event of a hung parliament.
Housing has rapidly become a bitter battleground between the Greens and Labor, with Bandt and his party blocking the Albanese government’s Help to Buy legislation.
The Help to Buy scheme operates similarly to WA’s Keystart program, where the government helps pay the deposit of a new home buyer.
Bandt said his party was not supporting the bill because home prices were so high that as soon as someone entered the scheme they would not be able to afford the repayments.
He also noted Keystart was struggling to attract new buyers because of home prices in WA.
The Greens’ policies on housing also include ending no-ground evictions and controlling rent increases.
They also have a “Robin Hood” profit tax, which the party said would reap $514 billion in revenue over 10 years by targeting corporate profits as well as profits from fossil fuel and mining companies.
The tax has been panned by business and industry groups in WA, as well as the state Labor government, which warned it would wreck the economy, cost jobs and damage business investment.
Bandt has not received a warm reception in WA, with Premier Roger Cook on Monday describing his policy platform as “crazy”.
“I think everyone in Western Australia recognises that the Greens are a risk to jobs, and they’re a risk to our economy, and their reckless agenda will do nothing to secure jobs and the future from Western Australia,” Cook said.
Gorman was equally critical of Bandt’s visit.
“So far this year the Melbourne Demons have spent more time in WA than Member for Melbourne Adam Bandt,” he said.
“I am gobsmacked at how destructive the Greens Party has become.
“Western Australians are deeply disappointed that the Greens Party aggressively blocked the Help-To-Buy bill.
“We know that WA’s Keystart has helped 120,000 Western Australians into their own home.
“It is time that the Greens stopped blocking and started voting for more housing.”
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