Nationals know how west was won

Grylls liked the look of Labor's proposal because he believed the pork-barrelling opportunities for regional electorates during the next four years would have helped the Nationals expand its voting base in the state's north. What such an analysis neglects to understand is that the Nationals would have been in partnership with the major party delivering the slush fund which also holds the northern seats they hoped to appeal to.

Grylls also wanted to send a strong message to soft Labor voters and the Liberal Party that the Nationals are truly independent, again as a way of broadening the party's appeal.

That has not happened. The Nationals have done what is in their best interests, given the conservative make-up of its voting base. But Carpenter's offer would have delivered more money and more autonomy for regional WA.

In a prickly moment at his press conference yesterday, Grylls was asked if a call by federal Nationals leader Warren Truss imploring him to back the Liberals influenced his decision. "Absolutely not", was Grylls's reply. That was one in the eye for his federal colleague. It seems Brendan Nelson is not the only leader in the federal Coalition who lacks authority.

Despite not going with the larger offer for the regions, Grylls is to be congratulated for the outcome he has achieved. He has put the Liberal Party on notice that the Nationals will not be taken for granted and he has secured a Royalties for Regions plan that will see hundreds of millions of extra dollars pumped into the bush each year.

The quality of services and infrastructure in the WA regions will improve as a result and the Nationals will be able to take full credit for it.

Grylls did so well out of this election that his Nationals colleagues around the country should think seriously about following a similar game plan from opposition.

For a start it would help the party to be identified as something other than the poor cousin of the Liberal Party. And it just might help stave off the rise of country independents who are slowly diminishing the Nationals' share of the vote, most recently in Mark Vaile's old seat of Lyne.

One irony of the election is that while the Greens significantly increased their vote and representation, they have lost the balance of power in the upper house and with it any influence they had.

In the meantime Barnett has to find a way to convince marginal seat voters in urban areas that they have not been dudded by his preparedness to shift resources to regional communities.

Reminding them that Labor would have spent twice as much may well be his starting point.