Larry Anthony bows out of Nats role

Former Howard government minister and lobbyist firm director Larry Anthony will not stand again as federal Nationals president.

National Party president Larry Anthony arriving at Parliament House in Canberra.

Former Howard government minister and lobbyist Larry ­Anthony will not stand again as federal Nationals president.

Mr Anthony has served in the job since 2015, after being elected in defiance of his Queensland party leaders who tried to block his appointment because he was a lobbyist.

A Nationals MP for the electorate of Richmond in northern NSW between 1996 and 2004, Mr Anthony served as minister for community services and minister for children and youth affairs in the Howard government.

After he left politics, he became founding director and owner of SAS Group, a lobbying and communications firm. When he ­became federal Nationals president, he said he would retain his stake in the company but not personally be involved in lobbying.  Mr Anthony will not stand again for president at the Nationals’ federal conference next month as there is a six-year time limit on the role.

He said his replacement was “in the hands of the party delegates” but his preferred successor was Kay Hull, a former federal Nationals MP for the NSW seat of Riverina between 1998 and 2010.

“She is highly respected across the party, the parliament, and rural Australia,” Mr Anthony said.

Ms Hull, if elected, would be the fourth female president of the Nationals. In 1981, Shirley McKerrow became the first woman elected federal president of any Australian political party.

The federal president of the Nationals automatically takes a seat on the powerful Queensland Liberal National Party executive.

An LNP spokesman said: “Larry was a successful president and in his time helped us hold all of the LNP seats that sit in the ­Nationals partyroom in Canberra through two elections, 2016 and 2019”.

The Weekend Australian reported last year that Mr Anthony — who also advises political rival Clive Palmer — had been sitting in on federal Nationals partyroom meetings where government business was discussed.

As the owner of a lobbyist firm, his dual role caused consternation among some Nationals parliamentarians, with one senior MP describing the situation as “unsavoury”.

At the time, Mr Anthony said he had acted “totally in the highest propriety in this role, for a very long time, in a lot of conflicting ­issues within the party”.

SAS Group co-owner Malcolm Cole quit the LNP state executive in July after federal and state MPs criticised the apparent “conflict” between his influential party role and working for Mr Palmer and other clients.