Martin Hamilton-Smith | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Leader of the Opposition in South Australia | |
| In office 12 April 2007 – 8 July 2009 | |
| Premier | Mike Rann |
| Deputy | Vickie Chapman Isobel Redmond |
| Preceded by | Iain Evans |
| Succeeded by | Isobel Redmond |
| Minister for Investment and Trade | |
| In office 27 May 2014 – 17 January 2018 | |
| Premier | Jay Weatherill |
| Preceded by | Susan Close (as Minister for Manufacturing, Innovation and Trade) |
| Minister for Small Business | |
| In office 19 January 2016 – 17 January 2018 | |
| Premier | Jay Weatherill |
| Preceded by | Tom Koutsantonis |
| Minister for Defence and Space Industries | |
| In office 27 May 2014 – 17 January 2018 | |
| Premier | Jay Weatherill |
| Preceded by | Jack Snelling |
| Minister for Health Industries | |
| In office 18 September 2017 – 18 January 2018 | |
| Premier | Jay Weatherill |
| Preceded by | Office created |
| Minister for Veterans' Affairs | |
| In office 27 May 2014 – 18 January 2018 | |
| Premier | Jay Weatherill |
| Preceded by | Zoe Bettison |
| Leader of the South Australian Liberal Party | |
| In office 12 April 2007 – 8 July 2009 | |
| Deputy | Vickie Chapman Isobel Redmond |
| Preceded by | Iain Evans |
| Succeeded by | Isobel Redmond |
| Deputy Leader of the South Australian Liberal Party | |
| In office 30 March 2010 – 6 April 2010 | |
| Leader | Isobel Redmond |
| Preceded by | Steven Griffiths |
| Succeeded by | Mitch Williams |
| Minister for Innovation | |
| In office 4 December 2001 – 5 March 2002 | |
| Premier | Rob Kerin |
| Preceded by | none (created)[1] |
| Succeeded by | none (abolished)[2] |
| Minister for Tourism | |
| In office 4 December 2001 – 5 March 2002 | |
| Premier | Rob Kerin |
| Preceded by | Rob Kerin[1] |
| Succeeded by | Mike Rann[2] |
| Member of theSouth Australian Parliament forWaite | |
| In office 11 October 1997 – 17 March 2018 | |
| Preceded by | Stephen Baker |
| Succeeded by | Sam Duluk |
| Personal details | |
| Born | Martin Leslie James Hamilton-Smith (1953-12-01)1 December 1953 (age 72) Adelaide, South Australia |
| Party | Liberal Party of Australia (SA) (1997–2014) Independent (2014–2018) |
| Spouse | Stavroula Raptis |
| Alma mater | Royal Military College, Duntroon University of New South Wales University of Adelaide |
| Website | MartinHamilton-Smith.com.au |
| Military service | |
| Allegiance | Australia |
| Branch/service | Australian Army |
| Years of service | 1971–1995 |
| Rank | Lieutenant Colonel |
| Commands | Australian contingent of the Multinational Force and Observers 1st Commando Regiment |
| Battles/wars | Second Malayan Emergency |
Martin Leslie James Hamilton-Smith (born 1 December 1953) is a former Australian politician and army officer who represented theSouth Australian House of Assembly seat ofWaite from the1997 election until his retirement in 2018. First elected as a candidate for theLiberal Party, Hamilton-Smith was the state parliamentary leader of the Liberal Party and theLeader of the Opposition in South Australia from 2007 to 2009, and a Minister in theKerin Liberal government from 2001 to 2002.
He became anindependent two months after the2014 election. He served as the Minister for Investment and Trade, Minister for Defence Industries and Minister for Veterans' Affairs in theWeatherillLaborcabinet from May 2014 until January 2018 and Minister for Space Industries and Minister for Health Industries from September 2017 until January 2018.
Hamilton-Smith announced on 6 January 2018 that he would not seek re-election in the2018 election.[3]
Graduated from Marion High School with a scholarship to attend theRoyal Military College, Duntroon in 1971. Completed a Bachelor of Arts (University of NSW) while at Duntroon. Master of Arts (History) from the University of NSW in 1985 with a focus on Australia's relations with the United States of America and South East Asia. Graduated from Army Command and Staff College in 1988 (Graduate Diploma in Management Studies). Master of Business Administration (Advanced) atUniversity of Adelaide in 2002 while serving as a Member of Parliament. Awarded the 1999 Baron Partner's Prize in Strategic Management.[4]
Graduated from Royal Military College as an officer in theAustralian Army in 1975. Served in 6th Battalion of the Royal Australian Regiment and theAustralian Special Air Service Regiment (SASR). He commanded Australia's first counter-terrorist assault force in the SAS in 1980. He saw service in Malaysia and as commanding officer of the 1st Commando Regiment based in Sydney. In 1993 he was posted as commanding officer of the Australian contingent in the 11 nationMultinational Force and Observers (MFO) in Sinai, Egypt, also serving as Assistant Chief of the 3,200-man force which monitors the peace agreement between Israel and Egypt from Gaza to the Gulf of Aqaba.[5][6]
Hamilton-Smith left the Army in 1995 to build a property development, investment and private child care centre business which had been first established in 1989. The family business employed around 125 staff at six business sites in two states, South Australia and New South Wales, and involved the construction of new facilities and the trading operation of the enterprises. Hamilton-Smith became President of a South Australian-based childcare association and National Secretary of the Australian Confederation of Childcare and editor of the ACCC national magazine from 1995 to 1997. These bodies represented the small business sector of childcare before federal and state parliaments.[7]
Hamilton-Smith first wonWaite in the1997 election by six percent against theDemocrats on atwo-candidate basis. Ahead of the election, he ran forLiberal preselection in Waite as a non-factionally-aligned conservative, defeating bothRobert Lawson from the moderate faction and Hugh Martin from the conservative faction. Previous Waite MPStephen Baker, from the moderate faction, resigned two months prior to the election which was seen as a result of losing the deputy leadership after the coup of leaderDean Brown from the moderate faction, byJohn Olsen from the conservative faction. The preselection victory of Hamilton-Smith prompted Brown to complain of interference by federal conservative faction MPsNick Minchin,Grant Chapman, andAndrew Southcott.[8][9]
At the2002 election whenRannLabor came to power, Hamilton-Smith retained his seat by twelve percent against Labor on 2PP, and by four percent at the2006 election. Hamilton-Smith was promoted by Premier John Olsen into the position of Cabinet Secretary on 5 October 2001 and was later elevated into Cabinet as the Innovation and Tourism minister in theKerin Liberal government from December 2001 to March 2002.[10]
In October 2005, he moved to challenge then Liberal leaderRob Kerin, but later withdrew his challenge.[11] On 11 April 2007, Hamilton-Smith formally challenged then Liberal leaderIain Evans, and was successful with 13 votes to 10 for the Liberal leadership.[12] On 19 April 2007, he announced a re-shuffle of the opposition front bench.[13]
Under his leadership,polling by Newspoll saw the Liberals go from 29 to 40 per cent on the primary vote, and from 39 to 50 per cent on the two party preferred vote. The Preferred Premier rating saw Hamilton-Smith start on 21 per cent, seven points higher than his predecessor, to a high of 30 per cent, with Rann falling from a high of 64, to 48 per cent. However, Newspoll saw Labor back in a winning position on 54 to 46 in late 2008, and then 56 to 44 in early 2009 along with a widening gap in the Preferred Premier rating. During the 50-50 polling,The Sunday Mail polling suggested that whilst there had been large swings away from the government in country areas, support was holding relatively firm at 2006 election levels in the metropolitan areas.[14] However, this did not play out at the2009 Frome state by-election sparked by the parliamentary resignation of former PremierRob Kerin, which saw a rare two-party swing from the opposition to the government, and resulted inindependentGeoff Brock taking the seat from the Liberals on preferences.[15][16][17]
Hamilton-Smith accused Labor of accepting split donations from theChurch of Scientology based on information sent to the Liberal Opposition that was subsequently found to have been forged.[18] This controversy coupled with the Frome by-election and continued poor polling, saw Liberal MPs openly talk of a leadership change, with a high chance of a leadership spill likely, prior to the2010 state election.[19][20][21][22][23][24][25][26] Two days later, Hamilton-Smith announced a spill of the leadership and deputy leadership, with a ballot taking place on Saturday 4 July 2009.[27][28] Williams,Isobel Redmond, andIain Evans ruled out contesting the ballot, with Hamilton-Smith and his moderate deputyVickie Chapman the only contenders.[29] Hamilton-Smith defeated Chapman in the leadership spill, 11 votes to 10, with one MP abstaining. At first, Hamilton-Smith immediately announced he would stand down, which would have delivered the leadership to Chapman. Hamilton-Smith announced a second leadership ballot to be held on Wednesday 8 July. On Monday 6 July, Hamilton-Smith confirmed he would not be running for the leadership. Contenders for the leadership were Chapman, Redmond, and Williams. Hamilton-Smith and his supporters backed Redmond.[30][31] Redmond won the leadership spill on 8 July 2009, 13 votes to 9 against Chapman.[32]
On 30 March 2010, Hamilton-Smith was elected deputy leader of SA Liberals to replaceSteven Griffiths in a party-room vote, defeating Iain Evans 10 votes to 8. He once again defeated Evans in a leadership position in a rematch between the two former leaders.
Hamilton-Smith nominated for the position of South Australian Liberal parliamentary leader, withSteven Marshall as deputy leader after Hamilton-Smith declared a leadership spill againstIsobel Redmond andMitch Williams.[33] A party room ballot occurred on 23 October 2012, Redmond retained the leadership by one vote, however Marshall was elected to the deputy leadership.[34]
Redmond resigned on 31 January 2013. Hamilton-Smith chose to support Steven Marshall who was elected leader unopposed. Hamilton-Smith was appointed Shadow Minister for Economic and Regional Development, Mineral Resources and Energy, Manufacturing, Industry and Trade, and Defence Industries in the subsequent reshuffle.[35]
The2014 election resulted in ahung parliament with 23Labor seats, 22 Liberal seats, and twoindependents. Thebalance of power was held bycrossbench independentsGeoff Brock andBob Such. Such did not indicate who he would support in aminority government before he was diagnosed and hospitalised with abrain tumour and took medical leave. With 24 seats required to govern, Brock backed Labor. He accepted thecabinet positions of Minister for Regional Development and Minister for State and Government Local Relations. Brock agreed to support the Labor government onconfidence and supply while retaining the right to otherwise vote onconscience.[36]
On 27 May 2014, more than two months after the election, in a media conference with South Australian Labor PremierJay Weatherill, Hamilton-Smith announced his decision to resign from the South Australian Liberal Party to become an "Independent Liberal" MP, and to join the Labor cabinet as the Minister for Trade, Defence Industries and Veterans' Affairs. Though his vote was not crucial to the government, he agreed to support the Laborminority government onconfidence and supply while retaining the right to otherwise vote onconscience, stating that South Australian business needed a stable parliament.[37][38]
AnAdvertiser poll of 350Waite voters was conducted a few days after Hamilton-Smith's announcement. On the question of "should there be a by-election in Waite", 43 percent said no, 41 percent said yes. On the question of "do you feel betrayed by his decision", 46 percent said no, 42 percent said yes.[39]
Labor unexpectedly won the2014 Fisher by-election by five votes, following a 7.3 percent swing, which gave themmajority government. Despite that, the Weatherill government kept Brock and Hamilton-Smith in cabinet, giving it a 26 to 21 parliamentary majority.[40]
Hamilton-Smith was appointed to the ministerial portfolio of small business in 2016. In September 2017, he was appointed minister with responsibilities for space industries and health industries. Major achievements over four years as a minister included helping to retain $90 billion worth of submarine and shipbuilding work in SA,[41] establishing Investment Attraction South Australia,[42] construction of the Centenary of ANZAC Memorial Walk along Kintor Avenue,[43] hosting the International Space and Astronautical Congress in Adelaide as Australia's first space industries minister,[44] and improving communication of small business through the establishment of a small business roundtable.
While serving as Leader of the Liberal Opposition, Hamilton-Smith led the debate to move football from West Lakes to the city, resulting in the redevelopment ofAdelaide Oval.[45]
On 6 January 2018, Hamilton-Smith announced that he would retire at the2018 state election and resigned from theWeatherill Ministry on 17 January 2018.[46]
| Political offices | ||
|---|---|---|
| Preceded by | Leader of the Opposition in South Australia 2007–2009 | Succeeded by |
| Preceded by | DeputyLeader of the Opposition in South Australia 2010 | Succeeded by |
| Preceded by | Minister for Defence Industries 2014–2017 | Continues as Minister for Defence and Space Industries |
| Preceded by | Minister for Veterans' Affairs 2014–2018 | Succeeded by |
| Previously as Minister for Defence Industries | Minister for Defence and Space Industries 2017–2018 | |
| Preceded by | Minister for Investment and Trade 2014–2018 | Succeeded by |
| Preceded by | Minister for Health Industries 2017–2018 | |
| Preceded by | Minister for Small Business 2016–2018 | Succeeded by |
| South Australian House of Assembly | ||
| Preceded by | Member forWaite 1997–2018 | Succeeded by |
| Party political offices | ||
| Preceded by | Leader of theLiberal Party of Australia (South Australian Division) 2007–2009 | Succeeded by |