WA Liberal party optimistic ahead of state election next year

ABC NEWS (Australia)

WA Liberal leader Libby Mettam has laid out her party's path back to government four months out from the state election. Improving the health system is top of her agenda, announcing a new policy to slash the elective surgery waitlist.

Transcript

00:00In a rally cry to party faithful, Libby Metham insists the unthinkable is within reach.

00:08I believe we can and will win government.

00:13With a well-worn strategy to get there.

00:15We stand for a better health system. We stand for stronger law and order.

00:20We stand for restoring our regions, more homes and importantly cost of living pressures for households.

00:28She promised a Liberal-led government would pay for elective surgeries to be performed in private hospitals

00:33if patients can't be seen within medically recommended times in the public system.

00:38A similar idea was trialled more than a decade ago, hampered by a stretched private health system.

00:44We've only done 16 in total and I have to say that the proposal we put forward hasn't worked.

00:50It's been revisited since with public hospitals now having struck deals with private operators

00:55for certain patients based on clinical need.

00:58The potential for an expansion welcomed by the sector,

01:01especially as private hospitals claim their funding isn't keeping pace with rising costs.

01:06If this is a way that the state government can provide meaningful support to the private hospitals

01:11so that they can keep doing what they do, then that is certainly something we would welcome.

01:16The Liberals' priorities, including in health, are all about going back to basics to get more MPs back in there.

01:22To go one step further though and win back government would require picking up dozens of seats,

01:27many more than is thought to be possible.

01:29A prediction not weighing the party down.

01:32The Liberal Party's story is far from over.

01:36Our best chapters are still yet to be written.

01:41There's little time to waste with the start of the next chapter just four months away.

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