Toowoomba council elections: ‘Anti-woke’ candidate, LNP member Nathan Essex tries to explain campaign slogan amid corflute controversy

A regional Queensland local government candidate running with inflammatory corflutes has accused the council of ‘embracing’ a woke agenda, but could not name a policy or decision to support his claim.

A conservative Toowoomba council candidate running on an “anti-woke” slogan has tried to explain to potential voters what the term actually means.

Truck driver, LNP member and independent contender for council Nathan Essex has courted controversy in recent weeks with his corflutes urging residents to “Say NO to WOKE” at the local government elections on March 16.

The slogan is also the name of his team, which includes fellow LNP member Adam Carney.

Mr Essex’s advertising was picked up by users on Facebook, Reddit and X (formerly known as Twitter), leading to both praise and derision from different circles.

“So what does ‘woke’ mean, stuff you don’t understand?” one person wrote on Mr Essex’s page.

“Hopefully we at last have someone who is willing to stand up to the woke who are destroying this country,” another person added.

Toowoomba candidate Nathan Essex's signs on X.

While “woke” has a number of broad definitions, the word has been colloquially used as a pejorative synonym for progressive topics, ideas, concepts or policies.

Mr Essex accused Toowoomba Regional Council of “embracing” a woke agenda, but did not point to a single policy or vote as an example when asked directly about it.

Instead, he said the TRC had “lost touch with residents” and gone away from its core business of roads, rates and rubbish.

“The Toowoomba region is not a woke region! Why should the council be embracing it,” Mr Essex said in a written response to questions.

“Being woke is being out of touch with Middle Australia, reality and common sense values, (while) neglecting the needs and priorities of a healthy functional society.

“Residents are concerned that the council is focused on the wrong priorities — they have lost touch with residents.

“What needs to be the fundamentals are roads, rates and rubbish.”

Toowoomba Regional Council candidate Nathan Essex. Picture by Syd Owen

Mr Essex did signal his opposition to the council’s future plans for a new administration building to replace the hodgepodge of tenancies and old sites council staff are currently using across the CBD.

He also attacked the council’s recent vote for a moratorium on gas exploration in the Toowoomba region, based on concerns about CSG activity’s impacts on groundwater.

“We do not think the council should be wasting $85m on a new office in the middle of a cost of living crisis,” Mr Essex said.

“That is not going to provide any increased water capacity.

“We also do not believe council should be prohibiting gas, (we want) the moratorium lifted when it is crucial to the local economy.”

Neither idea was cited in response to questions about how the council was “woke”.

When asked about how he would try to “fix” the impending financial woes related to the $270m Cressbrook Dam upgrade, Mr Essex seemed to both question the need for council to own its dams while also calling for the construction of new ones.

“We will make sure this (situation) will not happen again as councillors,” he said.

“I ask the question why does the council own a dam, if we are unable to maintain it.

Why own it?

“We also want to build new dams!”

Mr Essex declined phone interview requests, citing the constraints of his job.

While the group is not endorsed by the LNP, one of Mr Essex’s endorsees on his Electoral Commission Queensland nomination is president of the party’s Groom federal divisional council Isaac Moody.