Reconciliation body weighs in as Cook unleashes on Mettam over ‘desperate’ Aboriginal flag stance​on January 17, 2025 at 3:15 am

The state’s peak body for reconciliation has called on those across the political spectrum to embrace the significance of representative flags as a war of words erupts over Liberal leader Libby Mettam’s vow not to stand before the Aboriginal flag at official press events.

On Thursday, Mettam told The West Australian she backed and would replicate her federal counterpart Peter Dutton’s decision not to feature the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander flags at official government addresses, as has become custom under Prime Minister Anthony Albanese.

Mettam echoed Dutton’s sentiments on the issue, stating there was only one national flag.

But the comments angered West Australian Premier Roger Cook, who on Friday accused the Member for Vasse of attempting to emulate Dutton’s “tactics of sowing division and hatred” and import Canberra’s “toxic political culture”.

Cook — who is flanked by the national flag, the state flag and the Aboriginal flag at press events in Dumas House — branded her stance “sad, desperate and cynical” and said the comments abandoned decades’ worth of work to promote reconciliation.

“What a sad and desperate, cynical approach to try to attract a few miserable votes,” he said.

“Political leaders are charged with the responsibility of uniting their community, getting the community together to make sure that we can progress, and Libby is simply going about trying to bring the toxic political culture of Canberra into Western Australia.

“That’s not the way we do things here in WA. We don’t try to sow division, we don’t try and sow hatred; we try to unite our community, and this is just a sad and desperate political attempts for a few miserable votes.

“What she is actually doing is repudiating all those efforts over the last four or five decades to unite the community in an inclusive way, and reconciliation is an important part of that.”