Greens candidate for Tangney Thor Kerr will use the federal election campaign to highlight issues affecting indigenous people, cuts to arts funding and the impact of Roe 8 on the environment.
Dr Kerr, a Curtin University media and cultural studies lecturer, joined the Greens on the eve of the Iraq war in 2003 because it was ‘such a bad idea’.
“I felt that the only party that would represent a no vote to the war would be the Greens,” he said.
Disappointment with Dennis Jensen, the former Liberal member for Tangney who is now running as an independent, spurred him to run as a candidate in the July 2 election.
Dr Kerr was shocked by comments Mr Jensen made about Aboriginal Australians and wants to improve the standard politicians are held to.
“Part of my research deals with the issue of criminalisation of Aboriginal people in the media,” he said.
“I was shocked when Dennis Jensen made his second last major speech in Parliament in which he supported the closure of Aboriginal people’s communities.
“When another Greens member called me up and said will you stand against this guy because we really need to socialise your research because our politicians shouldn’t be speaking this way in the 21st century.
“I’ve entered this election to raise critical awareness about some of the problems we have in government.
“Those problems became obvious earlier this week when (Immigration Minister) Peter Dutton made his comments about asylum seekers being illiterate and innumerate and at the same time stealing people’s jobs.
“In the past a minister would have had to apologise or resign but that doesn’t happen anymore.”
Dr Kerr said the reduction of arts funding was the wrong move in the face of the mining and resources sector downturn.
“There’s not really any support for young creative people coming from the Federal Government,” he said.
“That’s worrying as we move into an age that requires a lot of creativity because we can’t rely on mining to pay the bills anymore, we have to be very creative and find new forms of entrepreneurship.”
He supported the abolition of the Roe 8 project, investment in renewable technology and would advocate policies that improved the health of the state’s waterways.
