Dr David Honey MLA, Leader of the WA Liberals and Shadow Minister for Energy, has once again criticised Energy Minister Bill Johnston for further power outages.
This morning’s outages come after the weekends State-wide power loss throughout the metro and regional areas, adding to Blackout Bill’s Summer of Blackouts.
Dr Honey said the continued outages are now an unfortunate reality of living under WA Labor.
“We have now had three days in a row of power outages due to separate factors, none of which were overly extreme conditions.
“This morning’s outages, as described by Western Power’s Executive Manager of Asset Operations, Sam Barbaro, affected 40,000 homes last night due to insulator sparking trip outs from the rain.
“Particularly near the coastal areas, where sea salt builds up on machinery, regular maintenance is needed.
“We are obviously not seeing this, and it would lead one to wonder if Western Power is suffering under the same labour shortage the rest of our State is experiencing.
“These outages will still unfortunately keep happening due to the poor management, maintenance and as I’ve mentioned in the past, underinvestment in the grid system.
“If heat followed by a little rain can cause this much damage, the system is broken,” said Dr Honey.
Dr Honey said Minister Johnston must stop the deflection with his inquiry and answer to his customers.
“We should not be seeing power outages at the frequency they are occurring at present.
“As I’ve said, the Minister does not need this inquiry to begin fixing the problems right now.
“I once again ask Minister Johnston to break his silence and act,” said Dr Honey.
