Patrick "Pat" Comben AM (born 3 May 1950) is a former Australian politician. He was born in Weymouth in

Dorset Dorset ( ; archaically: Dorsetshire , ) is a county in South West England on the English Channel coast. The ceremonial county comprises the unitary authority areas of Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole and Dorset (unitary authority), Dors ...

and was raised on the

Isle of Portland An isle is an island, land surrounded by water. The term is very common in British English. However, there is no clear agreement on what makes an island an isle or its difference, so they are considered synonyms. Isle may refer to: Geography * Is ...

, Dorset, attending the Portland Secondary Modern School. Leaving school at 16 he migrated by himself to Australia where worked initially as a farm hand, labourer and stockman. Attending night school as a mature aged student, he matriculated and attended the University of Queensland studying law and government, eventually graduating with a

Bachelor of Arts Bachelor of arts (BA or AB; from the Latin ', ', or ') is a bachelor's degree awarded for an undergraduate program in the arts, or, in some cases, other disciplines. A Bachelor of Arts degree course is generally completed in three or four years ...

. In 1983 Comben was elected to the Queensland Legislative Assembly as the Labor member for Windsor. In 1986 he was appointed Opposition Spokesperson on the Environment, Administrative Services and Corrective Services; in 1987 he was moved to Health and Environment, with Conservation added in 1988. When the

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Labor government came to power in 1989 he was appointed Minister for Environment and Heritage, and in 1992 he was promoted to Minister for Education. The electorate of Windsor was abolished in the 1992 redistribution and Comben transferred to Kedron in 1992, retiring from parliament in 1995. On 26 January 2008 he was made a

Member of the Order of Australia The Order of Australia is an honour that recognises Australian citizens and other persons for outstanding achievement and service. It was established on 14 February 1975 by Elizabeth II, Queen of Australia, on the advice of the Australian Gove ...

. In 1999 he was ordained by Archbishop

Peter Hollingworth Peter John Hollingworth (born 10 April 1935) is an Australian retired Anglican bishop. Engaged in social work for several decades, he served as the archbishop of the Anglican Diocese of Brisbane in Queensland for 11 years from 1989 and was the ...

as an honorary deacon of the Anglican Church, and sat on Clarence Valley Council from 2008 to 2012. When Comben was registrar of the

Grafton, New South Wales Grafton ( Bundjalung-Yugambeh: Gumbin Gir) is a city in the Northern Rivers region of the Australian state of New South Wales. It is located on the Clarence River, approximately by road north-northeast of the state capital Sydney. The closest m ...

diocese In Ecclesiastical polity, church governance, a diocese or bishopric is the ecclesiastical district under the jurisdiction of a bishop. History In the later organization of the Roman Empire, the increasingly subdivided Roman province, pro ...

in the 2000s, he was central to handling a group claim from people who had suffered abuse in a

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Anglican children's home in Lismore, New South Wales. It was alleged at a November 2013 session of the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse that Comben had been more concerned about the finances of the diocese than the welfare of the many people who had been abused. Appearing at a subsequent session of the commission, Comben said he had recently signed papers relinquishing holy orders because "some members of the church were trying to rewrite history". He told the commission that he took the stance he did because he thought the lawyer for the claimants was bullying, and because others in the diocese told him there had never been any problems at the home. He now realised that the approach he took was wrong. In July 2015, the Professional Standards Board of the Anglican church stripped Mr Comben of his holy orders. In a statement, it says “Under church law, there is no avenue of appeal.’’

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Comben, Pat 1950 births Living people Members of the Queensland Legislative Assembly Australian Labor Party members of the Parliament of Queensland