It’s a disgrace. The people that were involved in putting the man in as our candidate should already have resigned. I bet they haven't.  

Can I ask this question? What if the Labor candidate had won? Where would that have left the electorate? I wonder if Derryn Hinch or Pauline Hanson have a friend we could have borrowed. Well consider, it couldn’t have got much sillier. I say “don’t worry about the clowns, they’re already here”.

Recently Pauline Hanson was singled out on social media for receiving $1.2 million of taxpayer money. She responded angrily. In The Area News of July 8 I was singled out for being in line to receive just under $10,000.

The Australian Electoral Commission (AEC) will be processing votes  - which will not come to me -  well into next week so critics might soon be pleased that the only transaction between the AEC and me will be the $1000 which I had to send to them just for the privilege of contesting the election.

Whether I receive funds or do not, I will be spending the next two years trying to arrange public debate with Adrian Piccoli, Paul Toole (Minister for Local Government), Troy Grant (Deputy Premier and NSW leader of the Nationals) and Niall Blair (Minister for Primary Industries and Water).

Meanwhile I will be spending the next three years trying to arrange public debates with Sussan Ley, Barnaby Joyce and Fiona Nash. 

All the while I will be trying to make constructive contact with ‘the establishment’ and mainstream media.

Whether I get funds or not I will be doing my best to print volume two of Is Australia a True Democracy? which tells of the huge difficulties I had in trying unsuccessfully to establish my right to debate with federal member Sussan Ley. Then I want to publish volume three which describes the enormous obstacles I have faced from July 3, including today and for the next few months.

The book The Failure of the Australian Establishment is well under way. The book which I hoped would never go to print is Will Australia Become the White Trash of Asia? The last four words are already on the draft “I told you so”.

When a seemly insignificant perennial independent candidate of two elections has not been able to debate with a member for two years would he be hypocritical to write an optimistic book about the future of the country he once loved? 

Creating regional jobs by maximising economic benefits of effective water policy needs to be a focus of the new Federal Government.

There were significant steps forward during the life of the Abbott/Turnbull Government. We now need to ensure the momentum continues.

This needs to start with re-appointment of Deputy Prime Minister Barnaby Joyce to the important agriculture and water portfolios.

Water policy is a very complex issue and we believe Mr Joyce has increased his understanding of these complexities since ‘water’ was added to his responsibilities.

We need stability so he can start implementing some of the initiatives which have been discussed in recent times, including recommendations from the Senate Inquiry into the Murray-Darling Basin Plan, which was tabled in Parliament earlier this year.

I hope Mr Joyce will work with the region’s agriculture groups, as well as Member for Farrer Sussan Ley, to iron out some of the flaws in the basin plan, including those identified in the Senate Inquiry.

We are at a critical stage in the plan’s implementation and it is important to have continuity of political personnel who have gained an appreciation that some aspects of the plan simply must be adjusted. We do not want to have to start this education process again with a new minister.

During the election campaign Ms Ley acknowledged “no-one knows our creeks and rivers as well as the locals”, adding “no amount of consultants… will be able to out-do existing local knowledge. She promised to ensure “that my colleagues around the Cabinet table are fully aware of the vital importance of irrigated agriculture as a driver of jobs and growth”.