Ronan Lee
Ronan Lee | |
|---|---|
 | |
| In office 2001–2009 | |
| Constituency | Indooroopilly |
| Personal details | |
| Born | 4 January 1976 Drogheda, Co. Louth, Ireland |
| Political party | Labor (2001-08) Greens (2008-09) |
Ronan Lee (born 4 January 1976) was a Greens member of the Queensland State Parliament and represented the seat of Indooroopilly since he was first elected as an Australian Labor Party member in 2001. Lee joined the Queensland Greens in 2008 citing the Bligh Government's inaction on climate change and environment protection.[1]. Since leaving Parliament in 2009 Lee has lived in Tasmania and run his environmental communications business.
Parliamentary career
In 2001, Lee obtained preselection for the seat of Indooroopilly and surprised many by defeating former Queensland Liberal Leader and then Attorney General Denver Beanland in the state elections that year. The surprise result was mainly due to two factors: the huge margin that re-elected the Beattie Labor Government and the strong grass-roots campaign employed by Lee.
In 2004, Lee was re-elected to his seat. In 2006, he won a third parliamentary term when he defeated the Liberal Party's Peter Turner. Once again, Green preferences were crucial to Lee securing his seat.
Defection to the Greens
After the 2006 elections, Lee was promoted to Parliamentary Secretary to the Attorney-General, and was seen by some as an indication that he was in line for a cabinet position and had previously served as Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Main Roads and Local Government and the Minister for Communities, Disability Services, Aboriginal and Torries Strait Islander Partnerships, Seniors and Youth.[2]. However, in 2008 he surprised everyone by announcing that he had resigned from the ALP and was going to contest Indooroopilly as the endorsed candidate for the Greens.
Lee was labelled a strange fit by some political commentators [3] for the Greens as a result of his social conservative views on abortion and the use of embryonic stem cells in research [4][5][6]. The Greens have consistently supported reproductive freedom and embryonic stem cell research.
Lee subsequently lost the seat of Indooroopilly to the Liberal National Party's Scott Emerson at the March 21 2009 election with Emerson taking 44.45 per cent of the vote; the ALP's Sarah Warner 26.54 per cent; and Lee 25.93 per cent.[7]. A factor in Lee's loss was the fact that his defection split the left-of-centre vote between the Greens and the ALP. Despite Lee's defection a "sweetheart preference deal" was developed with the Queensland Labor Party[8], under which Labor preferences were supposed to be delivered to Lee in return for Greens' preferences in 14 key Labor seats. For Lee, this failed to gain any electoral ground as Labor beat him on the primary vote. Therefore Labor's preferences were not distributed.
Other
Lee is well known for his advocacy of public and active transport such as light rail, walking and cycling. He was in support of people eating less meat because of the environmental impacts associated with this.
References
- ^ Lion, Patrick; Wardill, Steven (2008-10-06). "Blow to Anna Bligh as Ronan Lee quits Labor for Greens". Retrieved 2008-10-06.
- ^ Template:Www.parliament.qld.gov.au
- ^ "Ronan Lee and the Greens, strange bedfellows indeed". 2008-10-06. Retrieved 2008-10-29.
- ^ Queensland Parliamentary Debates, Legislative Assembly, 21 Feb 2002, p. 320
- ^ Queensland Parliamentary Debates, Legislative Assembly, 11 Mar 2003, p. 447
- ^ Queensland Parliamentary Debates, Legislative Assembly, 10 Oct 2007, pp. 3420-3422
- ^ "2009 State General Election - Indooroopilly - District Summary". Retrieved 2009-08-30.
- ^ "Sweetheart deal to support the Greens' Ronan Lee". 2009-03-12. Retrieved 2010-03-14.