Western Australia’s state election is being held today, with Premier Roger Cook leading the ALP in its re-election campaign. That’s after former premier Mark McGowan retired in 2023, following nearly 30 years in state politics.
McGowan became nationally famous during the COVID lock-down years for his firm advocacy for closed interstate borders. “We cannot allow the virus to come into Western Australia from Sydney or Melbourne,” McGowan said. “The situation there is too dangerous.”
That earned McGowan 80+% approval ratings and, ultimately, in March 2021, the most one-sided election in the history of federated Australia. That year, the ALP won a tick under 70% of the two-party preferred vote and all but six seats in the parliament.
That has led to a curiosity of the 2025 election, whereby the Nationals leader, Shane Love, is the head of the opposition. The Nationals currently hold four seats and the Liberal Party just two. The parties are not in a formal coalition.
While the ALP will certainly be returned to government, the election is not without interest. That’s because it sits unusually close to the federal election, which will be held before the end of May.
In advance of the federal election, the Liberal Party will expect to make gains in outer suburban seats, where the housing affordability and interest rate squeeze has been felt the most. Since 2017, rental vacancy in Perth has dropped from 5% to below 2% and the median rent has risen from $365 per week to $660 per week. In other words, the same dynamics affecting the rest of the country are being felt in Perth also.
The Liberals will make gains in the suburbs, but can they also make gains in well-off inner-city seats? If the Liberal Party cannot bring back the Howard-era alliance of wealth and the outer suburbs, it will remain difficult for it to return to government, even if it continues to be an effective wrecking ball against ALP majorities.
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