This article is more than 1 year old

This article is more than 1 year old

Western Australia’s Labor conference has turned chaotic after a large number of delegates walked out during a Welcome to the Country ceremony and tribute to the former Labor prime minister Bob Hawke.

It was reported a large portion of the crowd heckled Perth MP Patrick Gorman and the WA Labor president, Carolyn Smith, before storming out of the complex.

Delegates of unions from Labor’s right faction told the ABC they walked out because of the left faction trying to disqualify a delegate from the Maritime Union of Australia. They said it had nothing to do with the ceremony or the tribute.

Others attendees at the conference told the ABC the behaviour was “disgraceful” and “outrageous”.

Those who walked out of the convention are believed to be from the Maritime Union of WA, Construction, Forestry, Maritime, Mining and Energy Union and the Shop Distributive and Allied Employees Association. Right faction delegates reportedly shouted “shame” and “bullshit” as they left the conference floor.

CFMEU WA (@CFMEUWA) The 'Chicken' Wing of the WA Labor Party just tried to tell a poperly credentialed union delegate to State Conference that he was not welcome. Shame on every one of them.

Smith apologised to the Indigenous Australians giving the Welcome to Country.

“I hope I never again see a WA Labor conference that – as our elders, our Noongar elders, are coming on to stage to welcome us – that people are … leaving the room,” she said.

“On behalf of our party, I apologise that that happened and again reinforce that that was not anything to do with you.”

The WA premier, Mark McGowan, was left to deliver his speech in front of a half-empty auditorium because of the protest.

The federal Labor leader, Anthony Albanese, is expected to speak to the conference on Sunday.

On Saturday, Albanese addressed the the opening of Labor’s state conference in Queensland, which had a more sedate tone ahead of anticipated contentious debates about climate change, proposed anti-protester laws and integrity issues plaguing the state government.

The Palaszczuk government announced this week, ahead of the conference, that it would introduce new laws giving police greater powers to deal with “extremist” climate change protesters. Some unionists, including from industrial left unions, are understood to have raised concerns that anti-protest laws go firmly against party tradition.

“It’s a slippery slope that we don’t even realise we’re on,” one delegate told Guardian Australia. “If a Labor government brings this sort of thing in, then what’s to stop the next Tory government doing the same thing to stop Labor day marches, because they don’t like us?”

Queensland was Albanese’s first stop on his so-called listening tour shortly after the party’s unexpected electoral loss in May under former Labor leader Bill Shorten. He promised the conference he would visit the state at least once a month.

Albanese said at the conference: “[The Coalition] are a third-term government with no sense of purpose other than to continue acting like an opposition in exile.

“They claim Queensland is their turf, and in May it was. But we know that is temporary.”

The Queensland conference was held as Morrison marked his first year as prime minister. Albanese said that, 12 months on, economic growth had been downgraded below trend, consumer demand was weak, wages were stagnating, productivity was going backwards, household debt was at record levels and a record number of people were experiencing mortgage stress.

“They just don’t have a plan for the economy, they don’t have a plan for social justice, they don’t have a plan for climate change or the environment,” he said. “They don’t have a plan for anything except negative politics. And that’s why I am confident that we can turn this around.”

On Friday, when questioned about the anniversary of his leadership, Morrison said: “Frankly, anniversaries I find quite narcissistic, so I tend to not to engage in that sort of self-assessment.

“I have a simple task and that is to continue to make Australia stronger, for Australians to be in charge of their own future, for Australians to have their aspiration rewarded, and for them to be able to make the choices they want to make for their lives and their futures.”