ALTHOUGH no date has been announced for the next federal election, Steve Anger has already announced he will seek to win Flinders for The New Liberals.
Mr Anger, of Rosebud, will need to defeat sitting Liberal MP Greg Hunt, who is the minister for health and aged in the Scott Morrison-led government.
Mr Hunt has held Flinders since being elected in 2001 and managed to fend off eight other candidates to win the 2019 election.
He now holds the seat with a two candidate preferred majority of 11.28 per cent, 1.37 per cent less than his win in the previous election.
Mr Anger says the term the “forgotten people” has never been more pertinent and relevant in Australian politics.
“The government, the bureaucracy, the corporations and the cyber dictatorship have forgotten humanity and lost sight of community values and individual needs. While spruiking platitudes, they simply seek power as an end in itself,” he said.
He was standing for The New Liberals because he believed the party “can work with our communities to redress the neglect of the last few decades and bring a thoughtful and caring approach to politics”.
“A country that invests in its citizen’s education, health and welfare while taking the urgent action needed for the environment will always succeed.”
Mr Anger said he was one of five children brought up by a single mother.
Having left school at 15 and worked in forestry and the railways, he eventually returned to study and became a lawyer.
“I have worked for social justice in industrial relations with government, and as a barrister, in criminal justice and refugee law,” he said.
Mr Anger describes The New liberals as “a progressive new party seeking to appeal to true small l Liberals and [Liberal party founder Sir Robert] Menzies’ “forgotten people”.
He has “lived off and on” the peninsula for the past 20 years and made it his permanent home earlier this year.
“I believe the current political parties are letting us down in so many areas and the parliament needs a fresh approach not dominated by career politicians,” Mr Anger said.
“In particular, they have let us down on initiatives to combat climate change and combat threats to our environment.
“Allied to this is the abandonment of small business and the great role that they can play in new emerging alternative energies and commercial practices.”
The New Liberals website lists 37 policies, including animal welfare, arts, Australia Day, a bill of rights, climate change, domestic violence, full employment and job guarantee, law, national anthem (keep the tune but change lyrics), parliamentary salaries (cut by 20 per cent), political donations (allow, but ban “major political advertising” during election campaigns), tax (force corporations to “pay their fair share”) and water management (including phasing out water intensive crops).
The website states: “We are not politicians. Most members of The New Liberals would never have entered politics, unless they were driven to do so, by the yawning nothingness offered by the other parties.”
First published in the Southern Peninsula News – 15 June 2021
