West Australian Premier Colin Barnett says his party fought a fairly lacklustre and aloof federal election campaign that didn't resonate with the average Australian.
Mr Barnett said he thought the Liberals would win "reasonably comfortably but it didn't happen".
"The length of the campaign was a factor - people didn't really engage even right up to the end. I think people didn't like the fact that the election was brought on early," the Liberal leader told 6PR radio on Thursday.
"The Medicare scare by Bill Shorten I think did effect people.
"But it was overall a fairly lacklustre campaign.
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"I think there needed to be more policies, more issues that related to people directly in their daily life, and it perhaps could be seen in retrospect as a fairly aloof sort of campaign.
"Someone said to me it was a bit like fighting a campaign in Vaucluse instead of the outer suburbs of Australian cities."
Financially stressed voters were worried about their jobs and mortgages "and people tend to vote against a government when they're in trouble", Mr Barnett said.
He said minor parties benefited from protest votes from disenchanted people.
"There was an element of protest in this election campaign and we're seeing that in America with the Trump campaign, we saw it in the Brexit vote in the UK - sort of a rejection of politics is there," he said.
