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WA election 2025: First-term MLA Scott Leary on winning the Albany seat as the Nationals candidate

Albany’s first Nationals MLA in 68 years Scott Leary is tired but “ecstatic” after winning the seat in a State election count that stretched over two weeks. Mr Leary won the indicative two-candidate preferred vote on Thursday night with 56.3 per cent to Labor incumbent Rebecca Stephens’ 43.7 per cent, marking the first time the party has held the seat in more than six decades. Leonard Hill held the seat for 20 years from 1936 when the Nats were still known as the Country Party. Speaking to the Advertiser on Friday, 13 days after election night, Mr Leary said he was relieved to have reached the end of the race. “Not knowing the result, being stretched out over a period was a little bit hard to deal with,” he said. It was a second stab at the seat for the 58-year-old who first ran as a Liberal candidate in 2021 out of “frustration” with the status quo and a desire to start “putting my money where my mouth was”. “We’d had successive elections and all these promises, and nothing delivered and from a business background, I couldn’t understand it,” he said. The financial controller and director at Albany City Motors said the Southern Ocean Surf Reef — a $13 million project more than two decades in the making — was a prime example. “All the money was in the forward estimates, it’s just that nothing had happened,” he said. “And by the time you get to build it, it’s exponentially more, and a lot of those projects cost overruns. “So I went, ‘no, this is wrong, so I’ll get involved, I think I can fix this’,” he said. Though he lost that race to Ms Stephens by 6348 votes, Mr Leary remained an active member of the Liberal Party. “Every time there was an opportunity to represent, I’d be approached by people to canvass the Liberal Party behind the scenes to fix issues,” he said. So it was a surprise when the local Liberal branch preselected city councillor and emergency doctor Thomas Brough as their candidate in August last year. Mr Leary said he was “bewildered by the decision at the time” but “never lost focus on representing Albany and for its betterment” and was soon approached by the Nationals to run as their candidate, launching a grassroots campaign that was dwarfed in ad spend by the Liberal and Labor parties. “We’re on the ground,” he said. “I’m heavily involved in a lot of community groups, and know a lot of people, so the word-of-mouth content, I didn’t have to build a brand. “Rebecca already had that being the sitting member. Tom had to spend a lot of money to build his profile. I already had that profile within Albany.” The switch in allegiance couldn’t have come at a better time for a Nationals candidate with a boundary redraw adding 3840 electors to the electorate from the Shire of Plantagenet. “It did definitely help us with the strength of the Nationals voters in that electorate,” he said. Mr Leary also welcomed his newfound autonomy to focus on “truly regionally focused” issues and step away from “metro-centric” party politics. “The Nationals are a much simpler organisation,” he said. “We don’t have the infighting or the factions or anything that the other parties suffer. “So I can walk into the meeting, I can talk to the person who’s ordering stationery, or I can go straight to Shane Love, or I can go to the State director — everybody’s accessible.” Labor, he said, was suffering from “metro Labor not understanding regional Western Australia”. Though a Federal matter, Mr Leary said the live sheep export ban in particular was raised “time and time again” as were firearm law reform and the botched Aboriginal cultural heritage laws. “It’s all legislation on the run,” he said. “It’s not done from the ground up. “It’s Labor or the policymakers dictating top down without any understanding of the ramifications for the end users.” And on a third front, the Liberals were dogged by controversy thanks to comments made by their candidate Mr Brough about issues including gun reform and the LGBTQIA+ acronym. At one point, he derailed a press conference that was supposed to be about a hospital commitment with a comment about abortion law reform that was counter to his party’s official position. “We were there to provide an alternative, to provide a difference, and I think that’s what we did,” Mr Leary said. “So I think that resonated with a lot of voters.” This played out in the primary vote, which saw a 20.9 per cent swing against Labor and an 11.3 per cent boost for the Nationals. The Liberal Party also saw a slight boost, with a 3.6 per cent swing in its favour, but the real marvel was Mario Lionetti who won 7.2 per cent of the primary vote, which Mr Leary said showed Albany is still “conservative by nature”. “Everybody’s got to stand up and listen, because it’s not the major parties anymore,” he said. “What Mario was standing for, and the platforms that he was on, is what everybody’s thinking about.” With the election now over, Mr Leary must turn his attention to preparing for his first term in the Lower House. “It’ll be a learning curve, because it’s a new industry for me so there’ll obviously be idiosyncrasies to come across, but I’m a quick study and already know the right people,” he said. One of those people is Ms Stephens who he hopes to work with to make sure Labor delivers on its millions of dollars in promises to Albany. “They’ve given us the money,” he said. “So that’s where my business background will come into its own, to be able to get those projects started and on the ground. “No use starting it in three-and-a-half years time, it starts Monday.” Mr Leary praised Ms Stephens for her work ethic and for being Albany’s first female MLA. “She deserves the accolade for what she’s actually achieved for us,” he said. Mr Leary also thanked the community and his “unbelievable” volunteers. To those who voted for him — and those who didn’t — he had a simple message. “It doesn’t matter which end of the spectrum that you’re at, we’re here to represent everybody,” he said

The West Australian exclusiveWA election 2025: First-term MLA Scott Leary on winning the Albany seat as the Nationals candidate

exclusive
WA election 2025: First-term MLA Scott Leary on winning the Albany seat as the Nationals candidate