Rear Window

Senate’s Transparency Warrior flings the invisibility cloak

Former independent senator Rex Patrick has turned the FOI game into a tidy earner, lodging documents for corporates while shielding identities.

Mark Di StefanoColumnist

Oct 19, 2023 – 4.28pm

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As a beclowned Heath Ledger once said, if you’re good at something, never do it for free.

Which brings us to Rex Patrick, the former independent senator from South Australia. Patrick found himself wandering the halls of parliament in 2017, parachuted in by a retiring Nick Xenophon. Rex tried to get re-elected last year, but received just 2 per cent in the free settler state.

Mark Di Stefano is Rear Window columnist, based in the Sydney newsroom. He previously worked at BuzzFeed, the Financial Times and The Information before joining the Financial Review as a media and tech correspondent.