Western Australia has always entertained a fantasy of secession. And if the past six months are anything to go by, that dream may come true.
At the beginning of 2021, in a distant time I think of as the ‘Pandemic Pause’, when lockdowns were off and most of the country was able to move around freely, I was fortunate enough to visit every single Australian state and territory as part of my work as a travel writer.WA Premier Mark McGowan sure knows how to close a border. Picture: Paul Kane/Getty Images for Cricket Australia.
And WA’s premier Mark McGowan has announced he has every intention of keeping his state just as isolated as they were back then, even when it reaches the magic 80 per cent fully vaccinated number that other states and territories say will end lockdowns and hard borders, under the Commonwealth’s agreed four-phase plan.
But maybe ice-cold isolation is exactly what WA wants. The state has always harboured a fond fantasy of leaving the rest of the country and striking out on its own. In 1933, it held a referendum to decide whether to secede from the rest of Australia. Alarmingly, its citizens voted to do exactly that, although the plan ultimately failed. Secession talk has rumbled ever since, including a spike since the pandemic which led to the formation of the pro-secession WAxit Party.
“I love living my best life in our safe bubble!” wrote one West Australian on social media in response to Premier McGowan’s ‘we’re never coming out from under the covers’ declaration. “We need a tough guy now more than ever; we have to stand up and be counted!” cried another.
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