New Sturt MP Claire Clutterham has kicked off her parliamentary career promising to deliver on her election promises
A freshly minted MP with a truckload of promises to fulfil will be using her legal background to push state pollies to get trucks off key city roads.
Hot cross buns in bed started Claire Clutterham’s first day in her parliamentary job but the new Sturt MP touted as ministerial material now has a truckload of promises on her plate.
The commercial lawyer turned the marginal seat of Sturt into Labor red for the first time in 53 years on the weekend and said first on the job list was her campaign promise to deliver an urgent care clinic to Adelaide’s east.
There was also the federal Labor budget promise to spend $525m on getting trucks off Cross Rd and Portrush Rd – that needs her to win a 50:50 funding agreement from the state government in its looming June budget.
After 20 years working as a lawyer, including in more recent years for naval shipbuilder ASC and Boeing Defence Australia, Ms Clutterham, 43, expected her years in courtrooms working through commercial dispute resolution would stand her in good stead.
“We’re going to deliver the promises (for Sturt),” she said, adding that it was the Labor Party telling voters what it “would do next” that managed to cut through on election day.
In particular a “phenomenal investment in education” was important in the seat of Sturt that stretched through Norwood, Myrtle Bank, Marden and Campbelltown, covering seven local councils.
She demolished sitting Liberal member James Stevens 0.5 per cent margin with latest counting showing a two-party preferred seven per cent swing.
Ms Clutterham lives in Joslin with her husband Ben Pudney, step daughter Niamh, 10, and two ragdoll cats Brooke and Taylor who were named after star characters in the Bold and the Beautiful television show “my Nanna used to watch”.
She has also worked as a lawyer in the United Arab Emirates and Hong Kong, and said her pink and red campaign colours were chosen by her step daughter.
Labor’s policies helped lift vote numbers for women, according to Ms Clutterham who said her own interactions “resonated with other professional women and women raising families”.
It was during her time serving as Norwood, Payneham and St Peters councillor that Ms Clutterham was recruited by Labor’s top senate winner Marielle Smith.
Ms Smith popped the candidacy question 13 months ago “at St Peter’s Bakehouse that became our unofficial headquarters” and described Ms Clutterham as “extraordinary” and that she “saw the impact she had”.
“Claire absolutely has the capacity to make a huge contribution in Canberra. I have no doubt at all that she will go very far and make our movement proud,” she said.
Ms Clutterham has a particular interest in defence and was also committed to Australia better addressing the “scourge of domestic violence”.
She intends taking a positive approach to the national stage saying she grew up with a giving-to-community ethic growing up in the Riverland, attending Henley High and inspired by her parents Mike and Trisha Clutterham, who now live in Grange.
Along with being a local councillor Ms Clutterham has coached Niamh’s netball team and umpired netball for Walkerville Cats.
Her close-knit family celebrated a win with her sister, Lisa Clutterham who flew into Adelaide from Canberra where she works for the Defence Department on Monday.
“I’ve been a lawyer for 20 years, I’ve spent a lot of time in the courtroom and in my experience hostility just doesn’t work. It was all about positivity and kindness in the Sturt campaign,” Ms Clutterham said.
SA Labor powerbroker and federal trade minister Don Farrell was at St Therese’s primary school with Ms Clutterham’s father when the seat of Sturt was last won by the Labor Party.
He praised the incoming MP saying “It was a magnificent campaign that she ran”.
All the candidates in the Sturt electorate – former sitting Liberal James Stevens, Greens Katie McCusker and Teal Verity Cooper – all agreed to run a positive campaign.
Ms Clutterham said Mr Stevens called her at about 8.30pm election night to concede when he “wished me well, and I wished him well”.
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Originally published as New Sturt MP Claire Clutterham has kicked off her parliamentary career promising to deliver on her election promises
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