Federal election 2022: Australia’s quirkiest candidates revealed
From an ex-pro wrestler to a high-profile criminal lawyer who wants to legalise cannabis, anti-vaxxers and slave labour claims, we’ve rounded up the nation’s quirkiest candidates and their wildest pitches.
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A terrorist attack survivor, a bloke offering $20,000 handouts, a lifelong anarchist and others advocating everything from nuclear power and national service to bringing down the Chinese Communist Party.
This year’s political hopefuls vying for votes this weekend are an eclectic and controversial bunch.
We’ve rounded up the wildest candidates from right across the country...
Candidate claims Australians will be forced into slave labour
A South Australian federal election candidate has taken to social media to claim Australians are on the brink of being sent to forced labour camps.
Suzanne Waters, the United Australia candidate for Grey which spans 92 per cent of the state, said the election was “a choice between freedom and communism” before comparing the country’s future to the system of the Gulag.
The Gulag was a series of forced labour camps and prisons set up in Soviet Russia from the 1920s to the mid-1950s through which it is believed 18 million people passed and between 1.2 and 1.8 million died as a result of their incarceration.
Independent defends wild Facebook abortion rant
After an expletive-ridden Facebook rant hit the news, a federal election candidate in regional South Australia has taken to social media again, defending her claims there is an illegal market for aborted foetuses.
Maddy Fry, who is contesting the seat of Barker as an independent, took to Facebook on Thursday in response to The Advertiser’s coverage of her extraordinary tirade.
Ms Fry told her supporters her election bid was “not about being elected” but rather a platform to “raise awareness”.
“The thing is, most people when asked what they’re looking for in a candidate, they say someone who’s willing to speak up in parliament, who isn’t scared to go against the grain, someone who won’t toe a party line,” she said.
“I think my video ... proved I tick all those boxes.”
Stood down science teacher joins anti-vax party
A former Toowoomba science teacher who was stood down over his stance on the state’s vaccine mandate is a controversial candidate in this weekend’s federal election.
Ryan Otto, who was involved in local anti-mandate protests and joined the Convoy to Canberra earlier this year, will represent the Australian Federation Party in Groom.
Mr Otto said he had only decided to run two days before nominations closed, but was drawn first on the ballot sheet during the random selection process on Friday.
The 25-year-old said while his policy platform would be created based on local polling of the community — an essential selling point by the party — he was supportive of environmentalism and animal rights and the national “freedom” movement.
According to the AFP’s website, the party is fiercely against the vaccine mandates and what it calls Australia’s “top-down” political system.
The AFP also states it “opposes precepts that undermine individual responsibility and character development”, while also claiming the country’s existing representatives “behave like unaccountable Marxist dictatorships”.
Anti-vax doctors take a stab at politics
An anti-vax doctor who lost his job for refusing the Covid jab in Tasmania will be campaigning for the seat of Franklin as the One Nation candidate at this weekend’s Federal election.
Dr Hindley was a GP for 34 years before having his licence suspended by the medical board over, he claims, the conspiracy theories he shared on his Facebook page.
Dr Hindley, now Mr Hindley, has expressed views online and in-person describing Covid-19 as a bioweapon deliberately unleashed on the public.
Conspiracy theorist throws hat in the ring
Holocaust denial, anti-vaccine misinformation, and an extensive list of conspiracy theories are being disseminated by a Tasmanian political campaign director.
Norm Vanderfeen is the campaign director for Braddon independent candidate Craig Garland, who also espouses anti-vax views.
Mr Garland told The Mercury that he believed Covid-19 vaccinations caused his mother-in-law’s shingles and heart palpitations as well as his aunty’s death by heart attack.
“Who is looking after these people that are being adversely affected by having to take this vaccine?” Mr Garland said.
Criminal lawyer becomes Legalise Cannabis advocate
A high-profile Noosa criminal defence lawyer has thrown his name in to represent the Legalise Cannabis Australia Party.
Bernie Bradley said 30 years spent dealing first-hand with clients on drug-related charges and the devastating consequences they could have had prompted his unlikely nomination.
The 52-year-old solicitor said he was “fed up” with minor drug use convictions up-ending lives and livelihoods especially in cases where cannabis had been used to ease pain for chronic medical conditions.
Mr Bradley was also rallying against the impacts of roadside drug testing for cannabis and mandatory disqualification.
“These tests are overly sensitive and provide no indication of the level of cannabis in a person’s bloodstream or whether their driving was in any way impaired.” Mr Bradley said.
Ex-wrestler tackles political issues
Independent candidate in the seat of Casey in Victoria, Craig Cole describes himself as a youth worker, disability care worker, motivational speaker, and retired pro wrestler.
With endorsement from far-right extremist group Australia One, the former Warzone Wrestling star is campaigning to “restore your sovereign rights and put an end to the increasing government control in our lives”.
UAP candidate slams defence for becoming ‘irrelevant’
Benjamin Britton, the United Australia Party’s candidate in Cunningham, has hit back at the Defence Force for saying it was wrong to misrepresent the ADF as endorsing his candidacy.
Mr Britton’s use of military attire in political advertising was criticised by Australia Defence Association executive director Neil James in an article by The Guardian.
Mr James said it was “wrong” and that no matter “how proud he is about his service, it’s wrong to misrepresent the ADF as endorsing his candidacy”.
Mr Britton made an astonishing riposte to the “ex-top brass” and said the reason he ran aligns with many veterans and refused to condemn the protests that boiled over onto Melbourne’s Shrine of Remembrance in September, 2021.
“They are everything wrong with defence. The ADA is a lobby group that’s become irrelevant in the defence community,” he said.
Political hopeful to face trial over intimidation charges
An independent candidate for Eden Monaro will face trial after allegedly intimidating a woman at the Cooma Rural Fire Service headquarters.
The Canberra Star can reveal Nimmitabel man Andrew Evan Thaler has been charged with intimidation and remaining in a building with intent to commit an indictable offence.
Police allege on February 23, 2018 Mr Thaler intimidated a woman at the Cooma RFS headquarters at Polo Flat.
In Queanbeyan District Court on Monday, Justice Robyn Tupman said during the alleged incident Mr Thaler repeatedly told a staff member “I’m not leaving until you give me the burn-off certificate”.
Cryptic independent’s bizarre anti-media strategy
A mysterious political wannabe is taking a peculiar approach to his campaign in an attempt to reach the House of Representatives.
The self-proclaimed “true independent” Stuart Howe is running for the electorate of Parkes, the largest geographical seat in NSW, but the man who references experience working in the “banking sector” has dodged multiple media requests.
Mr Howe has rejected three invitations to speak with NewsLocal reporters as well as knocking back ACM’s Dubbo masthead The Daily Liberal and stand-alone newspapers The Gilgandra Weekly and The Cobar Weekly.
Independent launches bid to give every Aussie $20k
Every non-incarcerated adult Australian citizen would be handed $20,000 from the Federal Government under a radical policy a St Albans Park based federal election candidate is taking to the May 21 poll.
Independent senate candidate Paul Ross, 57, said a Universal Survival Income would apply to all citizens living in Australia.
It would be funded by doubling the Goods and Services Tax to 20 per cent and lifting the number of goods and services it’s applied to from 60 to 100 per cent.
“If all citizens get $20,000... you can deregulate the Labor market. So there’s no more argument about minimum wages; they don’t exist. If people want to work they can work, they are not under survival income,” Mr Ross, who holds a Bachelor of Economics and a Masters of Arts (International Studies), said.
The secret agent on a mission
Victorian independent senate candidate James Bond, 41, is “on a secret mission to infiltrate the Australian government and save the world before it’s too late”.
Bond launched his mysterious campaign via YouTube in early April and has since used various social media to promote a tax on Baby Boomers and the hashtag ‘#voteouttheboomers’.
According to his online profiles, Bond is an entrepreneur with qualifications including a PhD in geography and legal studies from the University of Melbourne.
His tongue-in-cheek style has so far failed to gain traction, with only about 100 followers across his TikTok, Facebook, YouTube, and Instagram accounts.
The ‘vegan soldier’
Animal Justice Party candidate in the Victorian seat of Isaacs, Alix Livingstone, is campaign director at Kindness Project, an organisation that seeks to “assist the dismantling of the animal industrial complex through advocating for all those it harms; humans, non-human animals and the planet alike”.
Also known online as ‘Alix the Vegan’, the 20-something has made headlines for trespass of piggeries, chook sheds, beef farms, and lamb sales.
Teenager runs for office
Max Martucci, 18, says he doesn’t want a career in politics but that progress in his preferred career in science, technology, and astronomy is “almost impossible” in Australia’s present political climate.
Running for TNL in the Victorian seat of Hawke, Martucci believes “constant progress is how we survive” and that TNL “doesn’t subscribe to the neoliberal belief that has inhibited any serious progress in society for years”.
The snake-catcher
Independent for Hawke in Victoria, Jarrod Bingham is no stranger to politics, having served as a Moorabool councillor and run for the federal seat of Gorton in 2019.
But he is arguably more famous for his work as a snake catcher, with videos of his ‘Reptile Relocations’ getting worldwide attention.
Bingham states on his Facebook profile that he is “a local, an active community member who believes we have been missing out for far too long”.
See the full list of quirky Victorian candidates HERE.
Originally published as Federal election 2022: Australia’s quirkiest candidates revealed
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