Federal LNP MP for Moncrieff Angie Bell opens up on her sexuality ahead of election
While the starting gun for the federal election is yet to fire, Moncrieff MP Angie Bell is ready to race and opens up on her sexuality and why she fights for everyone in the community.
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Angie Bell is on her marks.
While the starting gun is yet to officially sound, the LNP Member for Moncrieff is race-ready for the federal election.
“No alcohol for me,” she smiles, sipping from a glass of sparkling mineral water at the Mermaid Beach Surf Life Saving Club.
“I just feel clearer, lighter, quicker and more responsive without it. I’m feeling fit, but this campaign is a marathon.”
While the 56-year-old has plenty of experience on the hustings, having served six years now as the Moncrieff MP, she’s racing against more than the usual suspects this time.
Indeed, while Labor is yet to name a nominee for this central Gold Coast seat, which extends from Miami to the Spit and west through Nerang, Highland Park and Worongary, independent Nicole Arrowsmith recently launched her campaign, supported by crowd-funding and Climate 200.
But sitting at the oceanfront windows of Mermaid Beach SLSC, where Ms Bell earned her bronze medallion in 2014 and remains a staunch supporter, she doesn’t break a sweat when considering her opposition.
Considering she holds her seat with an 11.19 per cent margin, that’s understandable.
Yet both Ms Arrowsmith and McPherson Independent candidate Erchana Murray-Bartlett have suggested that the Gold Coast perhaps does not receive its fair share of federal attention because it’s the home of such safe conservative seats.
“I understand that argument, but I don’t necessarily think it’s true,” said Ms Bell.
“If you look at what we delivered under the last Coalition government to the Gold Coast versus what Labor has delivered in the last three years, there was so much more under a Coalition government.
“I love this community and I advocate strongly for it. The first time I ran I think there were nine people on the ticket, the second time I think there were 10. Maybe this time there will be 11 or 12, but I think Gold Coasters understand that the only way they will be delivered a better economy and lower prices and lower inflation is through the Coalition. We have to get back to basics, not excessive spending.”
However, Ms Bell said she was proud of the $350 million spent on the Gold Coast during her last term in government, particularly the $267 million spent on light rail stage three.
Now with stage four axed from the federal funding priority list, Ms Bell said the light rail extension would be a primary concern.
“The State Government is doing a 100-day review and is taking a close look at that,” she said.
“I think community consultation is key, the people of McPherson deserve to have their say and I don’t think they were consulted enough by the last state government.
“But this does affect the people of Moncrieff as well, we need connectivity (from Burleigh to the airport), it’s just which way it goes.
“That is not up to the federal government, it’s a state government decision, the federal government funds projects. Light rail stage 3 was funded by local, state and federal governments, we came together to fund that and hopefully when this is done, we’ll all be able to get to work much quicker.”
While an interest rate cut was announced on Tuesday, Ms Bell said it was not nearly enough to provide relief for Gold Coast residents.
She said she was seeing real pain in the community not just from the cost of living crisis, but also the cost of doing business.
“There is so much financial stress in Moncrieff right now, I was at the GP in Miami and there was an elderly gentleman in front of me paying for his appointment with an Afterpay card, that really rang alarm bells.
“Families are really struggling and food security is an issue, even students at some of the private schools are going to school with empty lunch boxes. Parents have to choose between rent and the mortgage or food, it’s heartbreaking.
“I’ve been working closely with the Moncrieff Community Cabinet, which is made up of faith leaders, not-for-profits, charities and multicultural organisations who gather every quarter, and we’ve been trying to help those most in need.
“Families are hurting at different levels depending on their income, but we’re also hearing about those families who are calling themselves the working poor, and that includes those who are affected by the cost of doing business.
“Small businesses are struggling with overheads, between the price of rent and electricity costs and the cost increases from suppliers, it’s its own crisis.
“I was with a business just a couple of weeks ago who said their electricity bill had gone from $50,000 to $100,000. How do you pay that?”
Given President Trump’s threat to slap 25 per cent tariffs on Australian steel and aluminium, Ms Bell said she believed the Coalition was best placed to negotiate with the American leader because of their previous experience during his first presidency.
However, with Trump’s support of Russian leader Vladimir Putin described as ‘dangerous’, Trump’s right-hand man Elon Musk giving an alleged Nazi salute during a post-inauguration celebration, and Vice President JD Vance refusing to meet with the German chancellor and instead meeting with far-right extremist group AfD, it’s a very different US administration from 2016.
Ms Bell said she had not seen footage of Musk’s alleged salute and was more focused on Australian domestic issues, but with neo-Nazis posing for photos on a Victorian beach just this week, and Ms Bell herself stating a ‘terrible rise of anti-semitism across Australia’, will the Coalition call out bad behaviour from our American allies?
“In Peter Dutton we have a strong, decisive leader and David Coleman, the shadow minister for foreign affairs and former immigration minister under Scott Morrison, is very experienced. I have full confidence in them that they can find a path between a rock and a hard place.
“It’s important to recognise that we are not America, we are in a centre major mainstream party and Peter Dutton is not a mini-Trump.
“We live in the best country and there is a basic difference between our democracy and that of America. We are not a republic, we are a Westminster system which means for the laws to change it needs to go through the parliament, both houses, whereas in the US the president can sign an order and that goes into law.
“We are protected from extremism through compulsory voting and from extreme leaders through our parliamentary system.
“There will always be people on the fringes, on the right and the left, but you need to govern for the majority - and that’s in the centre.”
Coming from a family of factory workers in a low socio-economic suburb of Adelaide, South Australia, perhaps it’s surprising Ms Bell found her political home in the LNP, but she said the idea of reward for effort resonated with her.
She said that ethos fuelled her own professional life, at first working in retail sales, before travelling to every Australian state and territory as a workplace trainer and assessor and retail consultant for leading brands, with her journey eventually taking her to Griffith University Gold Coast Business School as a mature aged student.
“I’m from Elizabeth, which is a very low socio-economic suburb, a very working-class background. My family has three generations who worked at the General Motors and Holden factories, and my mother was a machinist at Levi Strauss.
“We lived in housing built for workers and we were well aware of the troubles in areas like that such as substance abuse and domestic violence.
“I was the first person in my family to finish high school, let alone attend university, but it was being selected as a Rotary International Scholar to Denmark that really changed my life.
“Rotary taught me to always say yes to an opportunity, and that’s what I say to students at every school I visit in Moncrieff.
“I think that’s what I have in common with so many in the Gold Coast community, this is a city built on people who aren’t afraid of an opportunity and who have worked hard to build something, to build a business, to build an empire.”
Also a talented saxophonist, it was when Ms Bell was on the Gold Coast for an Australian Music Association trade show at what was then Jupiter’s Casino she was introduced to Ros Franklin, now her partner of 20 years.
In 2019, Ms Bell became the first openly gay woman to represent a major party in the House of Representatives and is still one of the relatively few female representatives in her party, less than one in three Coalition parliamentarians are women.
While this unique position has never defined her, it certainly informs her role as a community representative.
“My gender, my sexuality, my job, none of that defines who I am, but it’s all part of who I am,” she said.
“When I visit schools I always tell students it’s okay to be who you are, you don’t have to fit a mould, you don’t have to apologise for who you are, just work towards being the best person you can be - whatever that means to you.
“In my instance, I suppose I could have advocated for LGBTIQ+ as a career, but I wanted to do something that was broader for my community.
“I want to help others and work towards paying it forward. Supporting the LGBTIQ+ community is part of that, but I want to be a fulsome representative for everyone, even those who didn’t vote for me … I’m still their representative.
“I have had some wins for local LGBTIQ+ initiatives. Just recently I met with Cameron Caldwell to help a group in Arundel get continued funding. They were in his electorate but came to me, for obvious reasons, and we were able to get the Assistant Minister for Health to sign off on that funding so they can continue to meet. It’s those small wins along the way that are really important.
“But I will go into bat for anyone in my community - the Islamic community, the Indian community, all are constituents of Moncrieff that I work for.”
As for her role as a female representative, Ms Bell said while she was not a fan of quotas, politics was a tough game for women.
As a stepmother to four now-adult children, she said the demands of the job on young parents, especially mothers, could be a barrier to entry.
“It’s definitely harder for women in politics. I think you do have to have a super-supportive partner. I have to admit that if I had my own children and I was solely responsible, that entering politics would be that much more difficult. ,” she said.
“However, there are lots of women in politics who are making it work, including in the Liberal National Party, but the more support we can provide the better.
“Gender equality is a tough one because the traditional roles were that women raise children and men go to work, if you want to change that we need a system that can help and that includes child care.
“I went to two child care services in Broadbeach Waters and Ashmore a few months ago and one had a 400-strong waiting list and the other a 200-strong waiting list.
“If parents can’t find child care, how can they enter or re-enter the workforce?
“Having more women representatives in government is a great ambition, but we have to make it practical.”
After three years in opposition, Ms Bell said she was ready to get back in government.
She’s on her marks to make her mark.
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Originally published as Federal LNP MP for Moncrieff Angie Bell opens up on her sexuality ahead of election
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