Julian Leeser (Berowra, Liberal Party, Shadow Attorney-General) Share this | Hansard source

I'm honoured to have been elected again as the member for Berowra to serve in this parliament as the representative of the community I love. The election campaign in Berowra this time was very different to previous campaigns, and one of the key reasons for that was the redistribution that occurred at the end of last year. That redistribution saw Berowra lose the Hills Shire parts of West Pennant Hills and Carlingford. I want to thank the people of West Pennant Hills and Carlingford, whom I have had the privilege to represent since my original election to the House in 2016. I enjoyed working with them on improvements to telco in their area, on supporting the local schools and on delivering local road projects.

This election, the redistribution was quite radical and, for the first time, a member for Berowra represents the entirety of the Hornsby shire. That involved the suburbs of Waitara and North Epping coming into Hornsby and those parts of Hornsby, Normanhurst and Asquith which I previously had not represented becoming part of the Berowra electorate. It is very good to have the Hornsby shire represented by one member of parliament. It means that, alongside the very good state members that are in the Hornsby shire, I can work very closely with my good friend the mayor of Hornsby, Warren Wardell, to deliver outcomes for our electorate.

As well as North Epping, we took on Epping from Bennelong. Epping is in the Parramatta council area. It has traditionally been a more Labor voting area, and was so even in the time when John Howard represented Epping. I want to pay particular tribute to John Howard and John Alexander, who represented Epping and North Epping previously for our party. Both of them came campaigning with me at this election, and both of them gave me good advice on representing the people of Epping.

I'm looking forward to representing these areas. As I've been out and about talking to local sporting groups, the civic trust and some of the church groups, doorknocking in these areas and getting to know these communities better, it's been a great privilege to find some of the challenges. In particular, I'm looking forward to representing more of the business community in Hornsby and Waitara and to being a strong voice for them, as I have been for other parts of my electorate. In the context of the last federal election campaign, I think that, perhaps, too little attention has been paid to the effect of the redistribution on the result and the way in which, particularly in New South Wales, that changed the composition of a number of our electorates, making them naturally less safe than they previously had been. It also affected how the seats fell more broadly.

I also want to take this opportunity to put on record my thanks to the former leader of our party Peter Dutton. There have been lots of unfair reflections on Peter since the election. I want to state on the record that, even when Peter and I had disagreements, which we did from time to time, he was always thoroughly decent to deal with. He always treated me with great respect. On two of the most important issues facing our country and the world today—the dreadful rise in antisemitism in Australia and standing with our Western liberal democratic ally and security, the State of Israel—Peter Dutton showed magnificent leadership, and for that he will never ever be forgotten. I want to thank him for his service and his leadership.

I also want to acknowledge his staff, in particular Alex Dalgleish, who was his chief of staff, with whom I always had good relationships—even when, famously, I took a very different position on the referendum on the Voice to Parliament, I continued to have a very warm relationship with Alex—and Michelle Hutchinson, who was his principal legal adviser. They were the two people I dealt with. Even when I was drafting private members' bills or doing work, I always benefited from their support and help. I also want to acknowledge my friend Andrew Hirst, the federal director of the Liberal Party. Being a party official is a thankless task, but Andrew does that job with great distinction.

As a party, we are now in a period when we need to reflect on the reasons why we lost nationally and what we can do to bring ourselves back and prepare ourselves to be a government that, in the future, is based on basic Liberal principles and is in touch, particularly with the concerns of families in the suburbs. If we are constantly thinking about how we can make life better for young families in the suburbs, particularly around housing, education and the needs and challenges of raising families, I think that is a good foundation upon which to anchor ourselves. They and the many people who, springing from those communities, are engaged in small business are, in some respects, the forgotten people of the present era. We need to remind people not just of the economic benefit of being involved in small business but of the moral benefit. Putting forward sacrifice, offering to employ people, creating opportunities for people and aspiring to a better future for your family—that is fundamentally what our party has always been about.

I particularly want to take this opportunity to thank some of the people without whom I would not be here. I want to note in particular my wonderful conference president, Michael McAuley. Michael is a tremendous person, a barrister, a former president of the Saint Thomas More Society, a bioethicist. As is said repeatedly in my community, he's either the actual godfather or the metaphorical godfather to about half of the electorate. He did a wonderful job running my conference. It is a very cohesive and diverse conference in terms of political opinion. Michael is warmly respected. Michael follows in the footsteps of Senator Maria Kovacic, who was my previous conference president before she went to the Senate, and Matt Cross, who is now the state member for Davidson. I just want to quash all rumours; I don't think Michael is going to seek election to public office. He is a wonderful friend and wise counsellor, and he is hugely respected across my community. I lean very heavily on Michael for advice and counsel, and he has been wonderful to me.

I want to thank the other members of the conference executive, including Warren Waddell and Helen McNamee, who've served as vice-presidents of the conference. Warren, of course, has now become the mayor of Hornsby, and he is doing a wonderful job. For the first time in a very long time, we have a mayor who understands the people who live and work on the other side of the Galston Gorge, and who has a traditional farming background. Warren is a fifth-generation farmer in our community. I want to also acknowledge the outstanding work of my conference secretary, Tom Green. Tom's political skills are second to none. I was very lucky to have Tom run my campaign alongside Tracey Shute. Tom has walked this journey with me for many, many years before I was a member of parliament, so a particular thanks to Tom.

Tracey Shute also led my office across most of the last term. It was a unique term with many challenges. I think, in some respects, I lived more than three years of a political life in the three years of the last term. Tracey did a phenomenal job keeping our team focused, assisting me to best represent the people of Berowra. She dealt with a major office restructure and an office refit, me being in and out of the shadow cabinet, the big referendum and all of the events that have occurred since October 7 and the enormous projection that that put onto our office—people not only from our electorate but from around the country calling in to the office to offer support or seek succour. Tracey and the team did a wonderful job.

I want to acknowledge the other people who worked in my office. I want to disabuse people; I haven't had a big staff turnover, and I don't have a huge army of people working for me, but I have a lot of part-time people that have worked for me, and I want to acknowledge everyone's contribution. I want to particularly acknowledge Lisa Forrest and Karolina Pulczynski. Karolina particularly has been with me for the entirety of the term and has helped serve our wonderful constituents. Clayton Hopper is my media adviser. Lisa has taken over as office manager. Ava Davidson has been my EA. Also Noah McCarthy, Natalie Yeoman, Eliza Brown, Zach Tang, Lach and Josh Dale, Charlie Stephenson.

In the earlier part of the term, I was honoured to have Paul Ritchie work with me. Paul is one of the heroes of the Liberal Party. He has been an extraordinary storyteller, writer and speechwriter for four leaders of our party at the state and federal level, and I was hugely fortunate to have him work with me, with his great, good counsel and wise judgement and experience. I want to acknowledge Liat Granot and Graham Bannerman, who worked with me as shadow attorney and has come back again to work with me again. Also Anna Coote, Emma Rogers, the wonderful Annette McHugh, Ross Macdonald, Tracey Barrowcliff, Sarah Greenbaum—and mazel tov to Sarah on the birth of Ella—Rowena Bennett, Winnie Le, Jemima Collins, David Mitchell and Aaron Fawcett.

In addition to my hardworking team, there were the wonderful members of the blue crew who helped to ensure I was elected, and I want thank all the people who participated in the various aspects of the campaign, and in particular the people who led the major efforts for the election: Stephen O'Doherty, Georgina Kelly, Peter Brook, Keith and Joanne Anderson, Neil Gleeson and Sreeni Pillamarri, who did a terrific job at the various prepoll locations. Graham Bateman flawlessly ran our train station operation. Phil Hare, despite the personal challenges in his own family, continued to coordinate our street stalls.

I want to thank everyone who came and was involved in the wonderful super Saturday and super Sunday of doorknocking that has become a feature of the Berowra campaigns and, in particular, the Young Liberals from the Hornsby-Berowra Young Liberals and also the Young Liberals from Mitchell conference who came to assist as well. We doorknocked hundreds and hundreds of homes in the more densely populated areas of the electorate on those days. I want to thank Vinay Mann, who led the phone canvassing operation. I'm only able to be the member for Berowra because of the wonderful work of my supporters in the Blue Crew.

One of the things that I especially focused on for the election campaign was a number of commitments that I want to see made to different organisations in my community that are crying out for infrastructure upgrades. I'm probably the least sporting person in the parliament, but I've ended up—

I hear my friend the member for Barker have a chuckle at that, because it's almost certainly true. But one of things I have prided myself on is supporting the sporting communities, because the sporting communities are the hub of our community more broadly. If we had been elected, it would have been such a good thing for our community because our sporting communities have some of the worst infrastructure in the entire state, if not the country. I want to say to the sporting communities: when we make commitments, I will continue to fight for you to get upgrades—the upgrades you so strongly deserve—across the term.

I was proud to stand with the North Epping Rangers and the North Epping Bulls to seek upgrades for the clubhouse at North Epping Oval. Those are wonderful clubs whose sports include cricket, netball and football, among others, and they are the absolute hub of that community. It was wonderful to be able do something with the North Epping community, and I'm going to continue to do so. Similarly, the Berowra Football Club is desperate for new facilities, particularly to accommodate the expansion for female players in both football and cricket. An upgrade of the changing facilities is 40 years overdue.

For two elections now, I have fought alongside the West Pennant Hills-Cherrybrook Football Club to improve facilities at Campbell Park, including a Campbell Park clubhouse upgrade. They need an oval upgrade; I can't remember a worse winter season in terms of the amount of rain than the two winters that we've had. The difficulty is in going back onto the 'Campbell Park swimming pool', as it sometimes looks, rather than the Campbell Park Oval.

I want to acknowledge the wonderful work at Normanhurst of the Normanhurst Eagles and the Normanhurst and Warrawee cricket clubs. These are spectacular soccer and cricket clubs. Again, they have a clubhouse from the seventies. It's not DDA compliant. The doors to the change rooms are often missing. On one occasion, I went down there and one of the glass windows to the change rooms was smashed in. These are great clubs, and great clubs deserve great facilities, so I will continue to fight for them.

They were the major projects. There are a number of smaller projects that I have encouraged my state and council colleagues to help back so we can try to deliver some of their facilities earlier than after the next election, should we win. The first one is the Hawkesbury River Dragons, who are looking for an upgrade to their storage facilities at Brooklyn. They are a wonderful dragon boat club, and I enjoyed so much spending time with them. They are the best of what a sporting club is all about. The Dangar Island Bowling Club, where there is a great hub for live music in my electorate, needs a place where they can have a permanent stage and facilities to keep them dry and keep them safe. Warrah Disability Services is an organisation that runs a Steiner school for people with disability and uses agricultural pursuits to improve and enhance the lives of people with disability. They were looking to get an upgrade for some of their livestock management to enable them to use livestock and agricultural education to assist students and to get them all the opportunities that they are looking for.

The Hills District Netball Association, Hornsby Ku-ring-gai Basketball Association and Hornsby PCYC all need security upgrades. I would have loved to have seen them, and I will continue to fight for them to get better access to CCTV and better access to better lighting at their areas—particularly the Hornsby District Netball Association. I've been very concerned about girls that are going to netball training, because of unsavoury people hanging around there, not being safe when they go to use the toilets. We need to ensure people can go to those facilities very safely. Funding for the Hillside RFS to improve their telecommunications continues to be a battle I'm fighting. People who've seen me in the parliament over the last nine years have seen how hard I've fought for and delivered better telecommunications for our electorate. The Wisemans Ferry Community Men's Shed has done a wonderful job attracting local people to come and see Wisemans Ferry, one of the original Macquarie towns—they want to create a more meaningful experience for people there. The Asquith Scout Hall needs new toilet facilities, and, again, from opposition we will continue to fight for these things.

I want to say something about Epping because of two particular challenges that Epping and North Epping face. The first is traffic. For too long, the fact that there have been Hornsby Council in North Epping and Parramatta Council in Epping and that the two councils do not talk to each other has been to the disadvantage of the people of Epping and North Epping. Everyone in Epping and North Epping talks to me about how bad the traffic is. As the government—the state government particularly—rams more people in there as the new towers are built, we're not getting new parking spaces or roads. That's why I fought hard to create a traffic study—the first since 2018 and the first since those towers have started going up—to try and work out whether we have the best configuration of traffic flows across Epping and North Epping. Everyone acknowledges the problem, but no-one agrees on the solution, and that's why we need to get a traffic study happening there.

Secondly—and I've said it on a few occasions since the election—the parking situation in Epping is dire. People are not able to get to the doctor or to the shops, businesses are missing out on customers who need to use their services and facilities, and the quality of life for the people of Epping and North Epping just isn't what it should be for one of the most livable and beautiful areas of Sydney. As we see more tower blocks proposed for Epping and North Epping, the state government has this bizarre idea—and I want to be bipartisan about it; it was the same bizarre idea that the state government had when we were in government—that somehow, if you live in an apartment building and you're close to a train station, you don't need parking or not every unit needs parking. I think that is a ridiculous idea. All that does is add to already parked-out streets. What is desperately needed in Epping and North Epping, particularly in the Epping town centre, is an increase in parking. Parramatta Council has had some plans on exhibition for changes to the traffic movement and to the streetscape of the Epping town centre, and they are doing something with the car park there—but I think we desperately need to deliver more public car parking for Epping. Epping will continue to be a difficult and dysfunctional centre if the parking issues are not addressed, whether it means the council and the state government negotiating with the landholders such that, as they develop their new sites, they need to set aside some provision for public car parking, or whether something is done with the council-owned land to improve parking. We just cannot keep having a situation where one of the busiest areas of Sydney—a fundamental transport interchange, an area where people are coming to live because of its great lifestyle and its proximity to the centre of the Metro, the centre of travel to the north and south of Sydney—is inadequately served by parking. Epping is a wonderful area, and it could be so much more wonderful, but we've got to get the traffic and parking under control.

As I said, going forward as a party, we need to look to the future with fresh perspectives. Australians rejected what we took to the last election. They've rejected the way we've conducted ourselves as a party, and they've rejected the politics of the past. I want to give Australians a chance to elect a coalition government at the next election—one that represents them, one that represents the people of my electorate—with a clear plan to tackle cost of living, to stand with families and to support some of the most vulnerable people, who too often fall through the cracks. We need a strong plan to keep Australia safe from the hateful unrest in our streets. I cannot remember a time when we have seen the level of lawlessness in our country that there is today. We need our police officers to enforce the law, and we need a government that takes the security of our cities seriously and always puts it first. I want to restore security to our streets. I want to restore to young Australians the hope of homeownership. I want to support our young people, support our Indigenous people and preserve the beautiful areas not just of our country but of my electorate; and I am honoured to have been chosen yet again to serve the wonderful people of Berowra.

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