Premier Roger Cook and Transport Minister Rita Saffioti announced a $156 million train station for Karnup on Sunday, 13 years after WA Labor first promised one. Voters in Secret Harbour go to the polls on Saturday 29 August. Labor's candidate for the seat, Georgia Tree, stood beside them and wasn't allowed to answer a single question about it.
The questions Ms Tree wasn't allowed to answer are the ones the campaign can least afford. The station was first promised in 2013 and only $10 million of the $156 million has actually been allocated. Ms Tree lives more than 60 kilometres from the seat, in a $1.4 million house she bought rather than move into Secret Harbour. And the candidate Labor is running as a local has worked in government relations for Woodside and as a senior adviser in the Albanese Government.
The station itself will go in at the corner of Paganoni and Mandurah roads. It gets a bus interchange of at least eight stands, a dedicated drop off area and more than 400 parking bays. The Liberals put the gap between Karnup and its nearest station at about 14 kilometres, the longest on Perth's rail network. They say locals bus 20 to 25 minutes to reach one.
Saffioti said passenger numbers at Warnbro and Lakelands had risen 24% over the last three years, an extra 1000 passengers a day. "That's why we're getting on with the job, investing $10m right now to finish the planning, designs and approvals needed to get to work," she said.
Only $10 million has actually been allocated, and $78 million of it depends on Canberra
The $156 million is what the Government says the station will cost. What it's actually allocated is $10 million, so the Public Transport Authority can finish planning, designs and approvals. Works are due to start by 2028 and no completion date was given.
Labor says it'll prioritise land sales in the region to fund 50% of the project, and it's asked the Commonwealth for the remaining $78 million. Canberra hasn't publicly agreed to it. The land is a 39 hectare precinct beside the station site, zoned for more than 800 homes. The Government plans to put it on the market in the last quarter of this year. The planning blueprint for the wider Karnup area allows for up to 20,000 homes.
Roger Cook says he brought the Karnup announcement forward, and Basil Zempilas says he was forced into it
Cook told 7NEWS the announcement wasn't due for the better part of a year.
"Look, we would probably have made this announcement over the next six to eight months, but, of course, we've brought that announcement early."
Opposition Leader Basil Zempilas said the timing spoke for itself. "I do know that Labor are under enormous pressure in Secret Harbour. I know that their campaign is unravelling. I know they're very desperate. I know they've been forced into this announcement today because things are going so poorly for them," he told 7NEWS.
Georgia Tree stood at the biggest announcement of the campaign and took no questions for the second day running
Tree was there for it. When 7NEWS asked to put a question to her, the request was refused and the crew was told the group had to keep moving. Reporter Jeff Perry said it was the second day in a row he hadn't been able to ask the candidate anything.
Tree left, and Cook returned to the reporters' microphones. "I'd just say, Jeff, that Georgia has been more available in this election campaign than any other candidate," he said.
Tree's only words on the station came in writing. "This is a huge moment for our community with money on the table and works to begin in 2028," she said in comments supplied to The West Australian.
Perry called the decision inexplicable on air, said it showed little faith in the candidate Labor had handpicked, and called it a gift to One Nation's Luke Herdegen.
Luke Herdegen took the questions Georgia Tree wouldn't, and the crowd cheered him through it
One Nation's candidate Luke Herdegen stayed and answered. Asked whether One Nation had put a bit of fear into Labor, Herdegen said it looked that way.
"Yeah, I certainly think that they're a little bit scared, yeah. I'm not sure why she's not answering questions or what their reasoning is behind that. But, yeah, I'm happy to stand here by myself and stand up for the community."
Put to him that Labor had been forced to pull the station announcement forward, Herdegen turned it on the people standing around him. "Does anybody here think that that announcement would have taken place without the presence of One Nation?" he said. Someone yelled "Up One Nation" out of a moving car. "Thanks, guys," Herdegen said.
Asked whether he got a lot of that, he said it was constant. "All the time. Everywhere we go. We're walking into pubs and venues, and we're getting clapped through the door. It's amazing," he said.
Labor still hasn't said why Georgia Tree can't answer questions
Start with the money. More than half the cost depends on a federal government that hasn't signed up, and the rest on selling land that hasn't gone to market. And the announcement came, on the Premier's own account, months ahead of schedule because there's a by-election on.
Then there's the question of whether she's a local. Labor's campaign material calls her "Warnbro raised", and she was. Tree was raised in Warnbro by a single father who worked night shifts as an electrician at Alcoa, and she went to Warnbro Community High and then Curtin University. Her CV then runs through Woodside, where she worked in government relations, and the office of federal Resources Minister Madeleine King, according to the Baldivis Times. 7NEWS described her as the candidate Labor handpicked.
She doesn't live there now. The West Australian reported on 13 July that Tree lives in Inglewood, and that Labor's campaign material doesn't mention where she lives. Three days later it reported she'd bought a $1.4 million house there. Tree said she wasn't prepared to pay over market value to move into Secret Harbour a year before the by-election was triggered.
Basil Zempilas promised $90 million for Karnup a week before Labor promised $156 million
The Liberals got there first. On 27 July, Zempilas committed a future Liberal government to building the station for $90 million, benchmarked against Lakelands at roughly $72 million in 2023, with construction starting in 2029. "Labor has delivered years of announcements, excuses and delays. The Liberals will deliver the station this growing community was promised," he said.
Liberal preferences have put Pauline Hanson within reach of a WA lower house seat
Secret Harbour is a safe Labor seat on a margin of nearly 12%, vacated by the retirement of Paul Papalia. 16 candidates are running and the poll is on Saturday 29 August. The Liberals have preferenced One Nation above Labor. That puts Pauline Hanson in reach of her first lower house seat in the WA Parliament, and One Nation is treating the contest as a dry run against Andrew Hastie in Canning.
Herdegen told The Sunday Times the seat was winnable. "We have to turn the sentiment and the groundswell into votes, but if that's a true indication we can absolutely win," he said. On the station, he said it had been promised for 10 years and was "a big deal down here".
Cook's pitch is that only Labor builds. "Only WA Labor has reliably delivered public transport projects for Western Australia including 23 new Metronet stations since we were elected in 2017," he said. "The only people the WA Liberals and One Nation put first are themselves. Only WA Labor will put WA first."
Works on Karnup station are due to begin by 2028. Secret Harbour votes on 29 August.
