WA leaders Roger Cook and Libby Mettam both suffer slip-ups in only election debate

Roger Cook made a gaffe while discussing his government’s health record while Liberal leader Libby Mettam struggled for detail.

WA Premier Roger Cook. Picture: AAP

You can now listen to The Australian's articles. Give us your feedback.

You can now listen to The Australian's articles.

West Australian Premier Roger Cook and Liberal leader Libby Mettam have both suffered awkward moments during the one and only election debate of the state’s election campaign.

Mr Cook made a gaffe while being grilled on his government’s mixed health record, saying “we put Labor first”.

He quickly corrected himself, saying “we put health first, WA Labor always does perform best in healthcare”, but the slip-up was seized upon by Ms Mettam.

“You just said it, Roger Cook, you’re putting Labor first instead of the people of Western Australia,” she said.

Health has long shaped as the Labor government’s biggest weakness amid a surge in ambulance ramping inside the state’s hospitals.

Monthly ramping hours had climbed from 1000 hours under the Barnett government – which Mr Cook in opposition described as a “crisis” – to more than 6000 hours in the past year.

Mr Cook – who was health minister for most of the McGowan government – said there were “always challenges in any hospital system”.

“We all know that all hospital systems were challenged in the post-pandemic period, that was a situation that occurred right around the world,” he said.

Mr Cook also twice referred to being elected Premier 18 months ago, a fact that would have surprised the two million West Australians who woke in 2023 to find that Labor MPs had selected Mr Cook as Mark McGowan’s replacement following days of jostling between rival unions.

The tight time-frames allocated to each topic under the debate format worked in Ms Mettam’s favour, allowing her to stick to the short grabs without being dragged too deeply into detail.

No less than six times in the course of the debate, she referred to Labor inheriting “the largest boom the state has ever seen”.

Ms Mettam repeatedly refused to be drawn on whether she would stick to the commitment made ahead of the most recent state budget to freeze government fees and charges.

WA Liberal leader Libby Mettam. Picture: Facebook

Instead, she took aim at the government’s election commitment to build a street-racing circuit on riverfront land next to Perth’s Optus Stadium.

“We won’t be wasting money on race cars on the Swan,” she said.

Ms Mettam struggled when asked about her pledge to not stand in front of the Aboriginal flag at official press conferences in the event she becomes premier.

As she has throughout the campaign, she tried to resist being drawn into answering a question she didn’t want to by saying her focus was instead on health, law and order, housing and cost of living.

She also battled to answer questions about how much new public housing her government would deliver, if elected, to address WA’s housing shortage, saying only that she would increase social housing stock “by a reasonable amount”.

In her closing remarks, Ms Mettam said Labor had failed in every area that matters to ordinary Western Australians.

“On every measure, Labor have failed the people who put their trust in them for four years. Instead of putting their energy into the basic essentials that really matter, like police and hospitals, we have a focus on car racing circuits, rock concerts and a proposed new rugby team,” she said.

“Instead of lasting reforms to reduce the burden on households of government charges, we’ve unsustainable one-off sugar hits.”

Mr Cook said Labor had transformed WA from the weakest to the strongest economy in the nation since coming to power, and had more to do to build on the state’s economic success.

“WA is at the crossroads. We can either go to a chaotic and dysfunctional Liberal Party who are fighting amongst themselves, and if they’re fighting with each other, they’re not fighting for you, or a WA Labor team, a team with experience,” he said.

“Now is the time for a steady hand at the wheel. We’ll continue to make sure that our management of the economy remains strong. We’ll keep the finances strong, just like we retained our triple A credit rating and got our fair share of the GST.”

An audience poll by the host broadcaster said that Labor had won a narrow victory in the debate. While polls have consistently shown Labor on track for a comfortable re-election, the debate was far less decisive.