ARARAT resident Bernard Quince has announced his intention to run as an independent candidate in November\u2019s election, but admits he can\u2019t win.<\/p>\n
Mr Quince \u2013 a former school teacher and passionate regular letter writer to the Advocate \u2013 says he has a simple reason for standing as a candidate in the Ripon electorate.<\/p>\n
\u201cI know I won’t win. I can’t win. I don’t have a budget, a following or policies. Hell, I don’t even have faith in myself.<\/p>\n
\u201cBut if I don’t stand, I can’t criticise others for not standing,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
\u201cAn election is not about winning or losing. This is where democracy has been corrupted. An election is about a population choosing the best candidate to serve them.<\/p>\n
\u201cOver the last few years we\u2019ve seen all of these movements pop up. The anti-vaxers, the BLMs, the sovereign citizens and I figure if I\u2019m going to be calling them out I\u2019ve got to be doing it from a position where as a nobody I can put in my $200 and be on the front line,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
The Ripon electorate is set to face another hotly contested election in November, with boundary changes making it a notional Labor seat.<\/p>\n
Mr Quince said his preferences could be crucial to the outcome.<\/p>\n
\u201cI don\u2019t think we are well represented. Go back to Joe Helper and now Louise Staley, they\u2019re about representing their party ahead of their electorates,\u201d Mr Quince said.<\/p>\n
\u201cI would like to encourage 50 other independents to stand, we all go for 2% each and throw the two coalitions out,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
\u201cI know I am doing the right thing.\u201d<\/p>\n
According to the Victorian Electoral Commission, the redrawn Ripon electorate is a Labor seat with a 2.8% margin.<\/p>\n
Mr Quince is the third candidate to emerge for November\u2019s election behind incumbent Louise Staley and Labor\u2019s Martha Haylett.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
ARARAT resident Bernard Quince has announced his intention to run as an independent candidate in November\u2019s election, but admits he can\u2019t win.
\nMr Quince \u2013 a former school teacher and passionate regular letter writer to the Advocate \u2013 says he has a simple reason for standing as a candidate in the Ripon electorate.
\n\u201cI know I won’t win. I can’t win. I don’t have a budget, a following or policies. Hell, I don’t even have faith in myself.
\n\u201cBut if I don’t stand, I can’t criticise others for not standing,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":1432,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"none","_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"coauthors":[31],"class_list":["post-1441","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news"],"acf":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/theadvocate.net.au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/08\/IMG_8090-6-scaled.jpg?fit=1707%2C2560&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[],"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pdqUu4-nf","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/theadvocate.net.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1441","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/theadvocate.net.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/theadvocate.net.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theadvocate.net.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theadvocate.net.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1441"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/theadvocate.net.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1441\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theadvocate.net.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1432"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/theadvocate.net.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1441"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theadvocate.net.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1441"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theadvocate.net.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1441"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theadvocate.net.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=1441"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}