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A furore has erupted over comments made by opposition treasury spokesman Steve Martin this morning flagging unannounced savings his party intends to make from the state budget.
While being grilled about the Liberals’ refusal to release its costings until the last week of the election period – and as hundreds of thousands of voters pre poll – Martin let slip that the costings would include savings measures.
“The full cost of our policies, which will include some savings, will be made clear in the normal time frame, which will be next week,” he said.
When pressed on what cuts he intended to make Martin dug in.
“Those decisions will be made clear to voters next week,” he said.
When asked whether public servants should be informed of intended cuts or whether they have anything to worry about Martin said he had made his position clear on the timeframe.
“Our position will be made clear in the normal timeframe, and no, they don’t,” he said.
“We’re, in fact, actually making overtime available for police, so there’ll be more police on the beat under us, those particular public servants, they’ll be very pleased that they have access to overtime.”
Treasurer Rita Saffioti pounced on the comments as proof the Liberals would need to cut infrastructure or other government spending to pay for their $6 billion in election commitments.
“We’ve been saying for weeks that they’ve got secret cuts to pay for their unsustainable election commitments. We’ve been saying that they don’t know how much their election commitments cost, that they’re hiding secret cuts, and also their refusal to tell us who is costing their election promises makes it very, very suspicious,” she said.
Saffioti rejected Martin’s call to establish an independent parliamentary budget office which could assess costings away from government eyes in the treasury.
A new marine science fund has been set up by the University of Western Australia in honour of its student, Elizabeth Pearce, who died in a Dalkeith crash earlier this month.
Pearce, 24, was about to start her masters in marine science at the university, after graduating last year and completing an internship at Woodside.
“The Elizabeth Pearce Marine Science Fund will be used to support early-career researchers based in UWA’s Oceans Institute and their affiliated Schools, and will honour Elizabeth’s passion for marine science,” the university said.
Pearce had just entered an Uber around 10pm on Saturday, February 15, when Perth obstetrician Rhys Bellinge allegedly crashed his Jaguar head-on into the ride-share vehicle while speeding and drunk.
Pearce died from her injuries, while her Uber driver, Muhammad Usman, 25, is still recovering in hospital, with the public donating more than $115,000 towards his recovery.
Bellinge, a member of one of Perth’s richest families, has been charged with manslaughter and dangerous driving causing grievous bodily harm.
The Matildas will kick off the 2026 Women’s Asian Cup at Perth Stadium, with another eight games of the tournament including two quarter-finals to also be held in the west.
The tournament’s match schedule, released today, sets out the agenda for the 21-day festival of football which will be held across Perth, the Gold Coast, and Sydney.
While the home side will play one group stage match in each city, Perth will host the opening match – complete with opening ceremony – on Sunday, March 1, 2026.
But just who the Matildas are up against will remain a mystery until July 5, when the final teams for the tournament are confirmed.
Tourism Minister Rita Saffioti said the unveiling of the schedule was “incredible news” for WA.
“We saw, the last time the Matildas were here, 59,000 people go to Perth Stadium to watch the Matildas and to support their team,” she said.
“So we know that the Western Australian public love the Matildas, and we really know that they’ll be out in force to support them.
“We have been working really closely with Football Australia, with the entire tournament, to make sure that WA is a key part of the Asian Cup.
“We know that Matildas are very much a role model for many, many young people in this state, and having them here again as part of an international tournament will, again, I think, encourage more young people to play the game and stay in the game.”
To some breaking news now.
The state government has been strong-armed into releasing the top-secret review that underpinned the overhaul of the state’s environmental protection laws, with revelations the report relied on the views of proponents, ran to 43 pages and was turned around within days.
For 13 months, the state had refused to release the snap review it commissioned in October 2023 amid a legislative overhaul aimed at fast-tracking environmental approvals.
The Cook government came under fire when it revealed the review’s 39 recommendations two months later, with environmentalists branding them “pro-industry” and accusing its authors of failing to consult them or the broader community.
Now, we have the report and journalist Jesinta Burton has just published this story explaining what is in it.
Back to politics, and Premier Roger Cook has dug in on Labor’s plan to build a new women’s and babies’ hospital next to Fiona Stanley Hospital, despite concerns about the travel time for critically ill newborns to get to Perth Children’s Hospital.
It was an issue already on the agenda today, when, during a speech to a business breakfast, Liberal leader Libby Mettam reiterated her plan to move the hospital to Nedlands, and read an email from a great-grandmother of a newborn who needed an emergency transfer from King Edward Memorial Hospital to PCH.
At a press conference earlier today announcing an election commitment for small business grants, Cook said Labor’s decision was based on advice from Infrastructure WA, which claimed developing the hospital at the QEII health complex represented “a significant risk both in terms of cost, logistics and timing”.
He wasn’t impressed by the idea that the Liberals would go back to building the hospital at QEII.
“ We know under the Liberals’ plan – they haven’t said how they’re going to implement their plan, by the way – but under their ideas, they’re going to tear up the contract, basically trash any preliminary work that’s already been undertaken … and take Western Australians through a long process of developing it at QEII,” he said.
“So you’re not going to see that hospital developed inside a decade.”
An update now on the story we brought you earlier this morning about the police search for a 69-year-old man from Carlisle who was last seen in the city yesterday morning.
And some good news too: police tracked down Marie Favory a short while ago in Highgate.
He will be taken to hospital for an assessment.
In police news, a chase through Perth’s south-eastern suburbs last week has resulted in a motorcyclist being charged after he allegedly rode at “excessive speeds” and through red lights in a bid to evade officers.
The black Yamaha was allegedly spotted travelling recklessly on Kenwick Road about 12.45am on Thursday, February 20, but when police activated their lights to pull the rider over, he allegedly obscured the number plate by bending it and sped off.
Police Air Wing was called in to track the rider as he allegedly sped and ran red lights through Wattle Grove, Lesmurdie, Carmel, and Pickering Brook, where the rider was eventually tracked down to at a property on Carinyah Road.
The 27-year-old Pickering Brook man has been charged with reckless driving to escape pursuit by police; driver of a vehicle failed to comply with a direction to stop; and used or operated an obscuring device to prevent a whole or part of a plate character being read.
His motorbike was impounded.
The man is set to appear in Armadale Magistrates Court today.
Back to that business breakfast at Crown, and Libby Mettam has shown a rare glimpse at her lighter side on stage, joking at questions around her Churchlands candidate Basil Zempilas’ leadership ambitions.
Mettam said the only people obsessed with Zempilas were Roger Cook, Rita Saffioti and John Carey.
When asked by moderator Jess Page if she could name three things she liked about Cook, Mettam said he was a decent man.
She laboured for a minute or two on points two and three before firing of a quick-witted response that drew plenty of laughs from the crowd.
“I’m sure he’s a wonderful family man, and he’d be fantastic in opposition.”
To breaking news now, and the Australian Transport Safety Bureau has just released its preliminary report into the Rottnest Island seaplane crash in January, revealing how survivors of the tragedy moved into an air pocket of the submerged cabin.
Two managed to escape through a door, and two were rescued by onlookers who smashed a window and pulled them out.
The Swan River Seaplane-run Cessna 208 plunged into the sea on January 7 at around 4pm after wobbling during take-off and nosediving into the water 600 metres offshore.
The plane had seven people onboard. The pilot, James Wong, 34, and two international tourists, aged in their 60s, died. Their bodies were retrieved from the wreckage by police divers.
In a preliminary report released this morning, details were revealed about how Wong was initially worried about flying in the strong winds, with his boss telling him not to feel any pressure to take-off, and that customers could always catch a ferry back to the mainland.
Sticking with the Libby Mettam breakfast at Crown, and the Liberal leader has addressed her party’s refusal to release its election commitment costings until the last week.
Nearly 122,000 people have already cast their vote at early polling booths. Asked whether those people were meant to trust the Liberals’ costings, Mettam said: “Well, it was their decision to vote”.
Mettam again defended their decision to not send their commitments to the WA Treasury for costing.
“All of the election commitments we have made so far have been costed, and we will provide our costings in the normal manner, in fact, in a similar manner that Mark McGowan did in opposition in just before 2017,” she said.
“We have provided our costings in terms of every election commitment that we have made, and we will be providing our costings. Next week, as has Labor in the past, when in opposition.”