Marles warns WA Labor of hubris after election wins
Inside, Marles began to insistently defend AUKUS.
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“Over time, 4,000 people will be directly employed – in union jobs – at the Henderson defense precinct, one of our country’s largest industrial sites, while there will be 10,000 jobs across the defense sector in Western Australia,” he said.
“This represents the biggest diversification we have seen in the Western Australian economy in decades.”
Outside the conference, Richardson paid tribute to former Labor senator Graham “Richo” Richardson, who died aged 76 on Saturday morning.
“Graham’s passing is a truly sad day for the Australian Labor Movement in every respect. He was a giant and hero of the Labor movement, devoted his entire life to the movement and will be greatly missed,” he said.
The Labor Party conference is where party members confirm the policy platform for the coming year and where various party groups try to give direction to elected MPs.
The morning session ended without much discussion, but as the party’s healthcare platform was being discussed, United Labor Union delegate and paramedic Tom Sullivan made choice remarks about the state’s ambulance ramp crisis, which reached record levels in September.
“It’s really easy to dismiss ambulance ramp statistics as just numbers on a graph, but you have to consider that every hour on ambulance ramps is actually a human being,” he told the conference.
“Maybe they’re left on a stretcher somewhere in pain, maybe they’re wondering if they’ve really been forgotten.
“At the end of the day, the increase is not actually inevitable, and it’s a policy choice. So we’re here to make sure that those choices put patients and employees first.”
