Health remains a key focus in the state election campaign, with both major parties pitching solutions to ease pressure on the struggling system. Labor is proposing more aged care beds to free up hospital capacity, while the Liberals are prioritising care options closer to home.
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00:00As the three leaders faced an ABC election forum, it was Liberal leader Libby Metham
00:07under the most pressure, first from a high school student.
00:11Hi, I'm a Kakadu-Kungari girl who grew up on Noongar land.
00:15So you support Peter Dunne's position of not standing in front of the Aboriginal flag,
00:21claiming Australia is a united country, yet systemically the life expectancy for Indigenous
00:26people is nine years less than other Australians.
00:29That is no disrespect to the Aboriginal flag, but we are all Western Australians and Australians,
00:36and it is simply about not being divided by race.
00:40The policies of the WA Liberal team will all be pointing to lifting people up.
00:47Then came this awkward exchange.
00:49Until this morning I thought that Ms Metham was the leader of the opposition.
00:53No she's not, she didn't have enough members in parliament.
00:56Brushed aside later in the day in Kalamunda.
01:00It's certainly a challenge in terms of the resources that we have, but I won't be distracted
01:05by the job title.
01:07She was joined by the candidate for the seat, the chief pharmacist of WA's country health
01:11service Adam Hort, to promise upgrades to the local hospital.
01:15The pair also pledging a Liberal government would allow pharmacists to prescribe more
01:19medication.
01:20We see in many jurisdictions around the world better access to healthcare at home, better
01:24access to things like this.
01:27Labor also focused on health, promising a $100 million low interest loan scheme to help
01:33private providers build an extra 500 concessional beds.
01:37We want the Commonwealth to fund more aged care beds, but they need the beds to fund.
01:42Those beds would sit alongside a trial of older adult care hubs in three suburbs.
01:47Many of the staff are already working in this area, it's about locating them together to
01:51provide a single place for older adults to go.
01:55The party's also traded barbs over public transport after the ABC revealed the timeline
02:00to upgrade the Smart Rider system to accept phones and credit cards has blown out by more
02:05than a year.
02:06The delays blamed on technical issues.