Peter Strong has always supported community. Particularly through his advocacy for small business people - they are the backbone of good solid communities. They impact on us all - our jobs, our access to products, our diversity, our workers, their families & the consumer. They are important to community sport and charities.
Vote for transparency and community.
A well-known voice in a different space
23 years is too long to be in power. It isn’t natural.
Vote for a quality Strong independent.
Get some oomph and imagination back into Canberra.
What can our public service do without tired political interference:
Professional administration
Genuine consultation
Evidence-based decision-making
Open transparent fit-for-purpose communications.
My vision for Canberra …
Canberra is my home. The real Canberra - not the one the national media lampoons.
It should be a place of excellence for families, for sporting people, the arts, education, health and business. We still rate high in many of those areas but no doubt we are slowly falling below the high level at which we should always be.
That is what a long period without new voices creates - a slow relentless decline. We can turn that around with a strong cross-bench of talented, honest independents.
I’ve got the experience with the economy, policy development, government budgeting processes and politics to get Canberra going back into the black.
Why vote for me? Why am I standing?
I have been asked to run as an independent in the last four ACT elections. I was too busy in those times to take those opportunities.
But last year (2023) when I saw what was happening at Campbell Primary School - where the kids and parents, and the teachers were paying the price for poor government - I thought now is the time to stand.
Also and importantly, during my work career I started at the community level through my time in the Commonwealth Employment Service - the CES. Then I ended up working at the national level in Canberra at ‘Central Office’. Then I worked internationally with the World Bank in Central Asia and Turkey and the UN in China. Then I continued to work on national issues as the head of a peak industry association - COSBOA.
But now I have finished my stint at the national level, I can get back to what I value the most, my own community - Canberra.
It’s where I live, where my sons spent most of their schooling, where my daughter got her PhD and played in a soccer team I coached.
I have the experience, the attitude and energy to make things happen. And if I have to I will relentlessly annoy people in power who have lost their way.
We can do better
For more information on the 2024 ACT Legislative Assembly Election go to Elections ACT at https://www.elections.act.gov.au
Small Business Folk - provide jobs, support sports teams, assist charities and they sit on the boards found in their communities. They provide help in times of crisis, They provide essential services and make our communities differ from each other - they make things interesting. Some people will travel past one suburb to get a pastry from the next suburb - and vice versa. Small businesses are individuals.
I have also supported regulators in their pursuit of the few bad business people.
In the end the great regulator of small businesses are the customers. A bad business has no customers.
Governments should not be the cause of business failures. The ACT has one of the highest rates of small business closures in the country. That affects us all - our jobs, our access to products, our diversity. It impacts on the self-employed and their families and customers. Let’s fix this.
“There is a crack in everything, that’s how the light gets in.” - Leonard Cohen
Once, when I owned a bookshop, the Lord of the Rings movies were doing big things.
My shop referred to the big shopping centre in Canberra as ‘Mall-dor’. (For those of you not LOTR fans that is a reference to Mordor where evil things happen.) Apt name.
‘"One mall to rule them all, one mall to find them, one mall to bring them all and in the darkness bore them silly while screwing over small business people.”