Bill blasted after campaign bus fails to reach regions

Bill Shorten’s “festival of WA” has been criticised by O’Connor MP Rick Wilson after the Federal Opposition leader failed to leave Perth.

Mr Shorten and his Federal shadow cabinet visited Perth from March 19-21, when he appeared in six marginal Perth seats to round up support ahead of the May Federal Election.

However, Mr Shorten failed to visit any of the State’s three regional seats — areas which make up 20 per cent of WA’s population and 95 per cent of its land — prompting criticism from Mr Wilson.

Mr Wilson said visiting regional WA would have given the Opposition leader the chance to answer questions about Labor’s election policies.

“It’s disappointing that Mr Shorten didn’t visit Albany to discuss the impact his double-taxing of franking credits would have on self-funded retirees,” he said.

“It would have been worthwhile for him to ... hear about the impact the Labor Party policy of scrapping the live sheep trade will have on the small towns and rural communities across the Great Southern.”

In an earlier statement, Mr Shorten played down the impact of scrapping franking credits — a tax benefit which he said 8 per cent of people benefited from and cost the Commonwealth $8 billion a year.

The ALP has pledged to end live exports of sheep to the Middle East during the northern hemisphere’s summer if elected, and to “phase out all live sheep exports over time”.