In the lead to the 2025 Federal Election on May 3, Jacqui Lambie Network South Australian Senate candidate Rex Patrick visited the South East.


On his whirlwind tour of the region last week, Mr Patrick visited the Mount Gambier and District Saleyards, the Mount Gambier Regional Airport, Tenison Woods College and Timberlink, met with local disability advocates and took part in the weekly Mount Gambier Parkrun.


The “transparency warrior” is back fighting for a Senate seat after serving Senator for South Australia from 2017 to 2022 to fill a casual vacancy caused by the resignation of Nick Xenophon.


“I did leave the Senate and I have been involved in transparency related work which is about holding the government to account,” Senator Patrick said.


“I do not think things are getting better in Canberra. I am worried South Australia; and I have seen it; does not have an independent voice in the Senate.”


In October 2024, Grant District Council reapplied for $7.4m through round two of the Growing Regions Program for the Mount Gambier Districts Livestock Exchange 2030 Transformation Project after an unsuccessful round one application – but was again denied funding.
In December last year, Member for Barker Tony Pasin committed the Liberal Party to a funding commitment of $7.5m to support the project if the Coalition Federal Government is elected at the upcoming federal election.


Senator Patrick said it was “uncomprehendable” the current government cannot find $7m to fund the Mount Gambier and Districts Saleyards Transformation Project which he described as a “vital piece of infrastructure”.


He said he would put pressure on the Labor Government to support the project and the Liberal Government to keep their funding promise.


“Politics is fundamentally about pressure and I have already told the (Grant District) council that what they should do now is go to Labor who has not supported this and just let them know that Rex is fully behind this and they ought to make an election commitment otherwise they’ll be advising all people across the region that Rex is the right person to vote for in the Senate,” he said.


“That is about using that pressure before that election and that is often the time where citizens have the most power.


“If we end up with a Labor Government in the Senate we can still do things and I am not suggesting for a moment the Liberals will back down on their promise but if it goes the other way, I will be there to hold them to account for any promises they have made so either way I end up being an insurance policy in South Australia and that is the benefit of having independents.


“We do need to have independents who can simply deal with issues on the merits. Jacquie (Lambie) will 100% be behind us and we can use our influence in the Senate to get a good outcome for Mount Gambier.


“As part of working with government [on the crossbench] they’ll ask you ‘what is important to you’ and this will be on my list of things that are important.”


Mr Patrick said the Mount Gambier Regional Airport will have to implement mandatory security screening over the next 12 months which could see tickets rise around $90.


“When that occurs the council will then have to pay for two shifts of security screening workers and putting aside the $1.5m they have to put aside for security equipment, they are going to have to spend more than $300,000 a year and they have to recover that and where they recover that from is passengers,” he said.


“The projection is the price of an air ticket in Mount Gambier will go up by $90 per person, that is massive.


“When I was in the Senate last time I moved a dis-allowance to stop all this from happening and that brought pressure to bear and the then Liberal Government committed to paying that.


“Airports are the lifeblood of regional towns and people in Canberra do not seem to understand the effect that this will have.


“This is a national security issue not a local council issue so what I am intending to do; and I have talked to Jacqui about this; is to have a bill that basically says we are going to collect a fee off every passenger and it is going to be the same fee across the country.


“So instead of people in Sydney paying 70c per flight, which is what they pay approximately now, they might have to pay 90c or a $1.”