Fed: One Nation s impact in WA overestimated, says Lees

AAP General News (Australia)
02-11-2001
Fed: One Nation s impact in WA overestimated, says Lees

CANBERRA, Feb 11 AAP - One Nation's impact on yesterday's Western Australian election
was being overestimated, Australian Democrats leader Meg Lees said today.

One Nation put most sitting members last, a tactic which appears to have helped Geoff
Gallop's Labor to victory and one which they plan to repeat federally unless the major
parties are prepared to make deals on preferences.

Senator Lees said One Nation's vote had dropped about two per cent from what it polled
in the 1998 federal election in WA.

"I don't think that One Nation has had quite the influence that some are suggesting,"

she told the Seven Network.

"It seems like a lot of their voters haven't followed their how-to-vote cards.

"Obviously they're a force still to be reckoned with. They didn't disappear as some
people forecast.

"They're out there and they're attracting the people who I think feel very much left behind.

"That's very evident in rural and regional parts of Australia where we've had all this
change, deregulation, reform and people don't feel any better off at all."

Senator Lees ruled out preference deals, especially with One Nation.

"We work with other parties, such as the Greens, where there is some quite good policy
alignments, but we would never work with a party with some of the basic policies that
they have," she said.

Senator Lees said many were surprised by the strong vote for Liberals for Forests,
which was promising.

"It's pointing out yet again to a Liberal Party that they're not worried about the
environment and people are sick of it," she said.

Senator Lees conceded her party had not done well on forests in WA as it was not as
well-known on environmental issues as it was in the eastern states, losing votes to Liberals
for Forests and the Greens.

She said the party was moving beyond its role of keeping the bastards honest and was
trying to win lower-house seats as well as upper-house seats, especially in its strongest
state and her home state, South Australia.

The Democrats will contest all House of Representatives seats in this year's federal
election but would strategically target some and devote extra resources after coming close
to winning seats in 1998.

"It's just going to take breakthrough to establish ourselves in the lower house and
then we'll be able to build on that," Senator Lees said.

AAP fh/pc/sb

KEYWORD: POLLWA LEES

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