Rhett Burnie
THE Liberal Party has named former Yea resident Cindy McLeish as their new candidate for this month’s state election.
Ms McLeish, who currently lives in the inner Melbourne suburb of Elsternwick, replaces Mike Laker, who quit the race for the must-win seat just over a week ago.
He was reported to be suffering from stress.
Speaking in Kilmore on Friday, Ms McLeish said she expected the next three weeks to be ‘tough’, but was confident she could snatch the seat from current sitting Labor MP Ben Hardman.
She said she was also looking forward to meeting people from the electorate.
“I’ll be getting out there and getting to know people and listening to them,” she said.
And she wasted no time in getting stuck into Mr Hardman, saying he had neglected the electorate over the past 11 years.
“They (voters) want someone that will do more than just write letters,” Ms McLeish said.
Ms McLeish said she was aware of several contentious issues in the electorate.
She said the call for a road bypass of Kilmore and Wallan was a need, not a want, and reaffirmed that an elected Baillieu government would spend $130 million on a bypass of both towns.
Bushfire recovery remained an important issue for the region and infrastructure improvements were needed across the electorate, she said.
“There is huge growth, infrastructure needs to be fixed,” she said.
Ms McLeish is also a supporter of Plug The Pipe – the anti north-south pipeline group which remains dedicated to shutting down the controversial pipeline.
