at the state level the party continued to grow in strength in the mining and pastoral region, having won its first elected member of the modern era there in 2008 when wendy duncan won a seat in the legislative council. in 2009 vince catania, the mla for north west, defected to the nationals in support of their regional policies. at the 2013 state election the party won seven legislative assembly seats in total, its largest total in over forty years, including three in the mining and pastoral region. duncan successfully moved from the legislative council to the legislative assembly, winning the lower house seat of kalgoorlie for the first time in the nationals' history. fellow goldfields resident dave grills won a seat in the multi-member mining and pastoral region upper house electorate, along with jacqui boydell. although the liberals won a majority in their own right, barnett kept the nationals in his government. according to abc election analyst antony green, barnett would have been forced to keep the nationals in his cabinet in any event. as mentioned above, even after the 2008 electoral reforms, the legislative council still has a significant rural overweighting. green argued that the malapportionment in the legislative council all but forces a liberal premier to seek national support in order to govern, even when the liberals have enough support in the legislative assembly to govern alone.