Kenneth Desmond O'Dowd (born 30 June 1950) is an Australian former politician. He was a member of the

House of Representatives House of Representatives is the name of legislative bodies in many countries and sub-national entities. In many countries, the House of Representatives is the lower house of a bicameral legislature, with the corresponding upper house often ...

from 2010 to 2022, representing the

Division of Flynn The Division of Flynn is an Australian electoral division in the state of Queensland. It stretches along the Pacific coast from north of Bundaberg to south of Rockhampton, comprising Gladstone. Since 2022 its MP has been Colin Boyce of t ...

for the

National Party National Party or Nationalist Party may refer to: Active parties * National Party of Australia, commonly known as ''The Nationals'' * Bangladesh: ** Bangladesh Nationalist Party ** Jatiya Party (Ershad) a.k.a. ''National Party (Ershad)'' * Californ ...

Early life

O'Dowd was born in

Gladstone William Ewart Gladstone ( ; 29 December 1809 – 19 May 1898) was a British politican, starting as Conservative MP for Newark and later becoming the leader of the Liberal Party (UK), Liberal Party. In a career lasting over 60 years, he ...

, Queensland. He grew up on his parents' farm in Bracewell, Mount Larcom. O'Dowd was educated at Bracewell State School, Mount Larcom High School and

Rockhampton Grammar School The Rockhampton Grammar School is an independent, co-educational, non-denominational, day and boarding school located in The Range, Rockhampton, Queensland, Australia catering to students from Early Learning through to Year 12. History The sch ...

. While still at school O'Dowd worked on his parents' farm, neighbours' farms, as a contract milker, on the railways as a fettler, on flying gangs, and on the construction of railway lines. O'Dowd has two children and four grandchildren.

Career

O'Dowd became a payroll clerk at Queensland Aluminium Limited (QAL) Gladstone. From 1970 to 1978 he worked on the construction of the Bougainville Copper Mine in New Guinea. In 1978, he worked at the Gladstone seaport terminal within the fuel industry, until establishing his own

Mobil Mobil Oil Corporation, now known as just Mobil, is a petroleum brand owned and operated by American oil and gas corporation ExxonMobil, formerly known as Exxon, which took its current name after history of ExxonMobil#merger, it and Mobil merge ...

fuel distributorship in

Emerald Emerald is a gemstone and a variety of the mineral beryl (Be3Al2(SiO3)6) colored green by trace amounts of chromium or sometimes vanadium.Hurlbut, Cornelius S. Jr., and Kammerling, Robert C. (1991). ''Gemology'', John Wiley & Sons, New York ...

in 1981, which he sold in 1988. He became partner of a Shell distributorship in 1988, which was sold ten years later. In 1998, O'Dowd bought and renovated a Rockhampton pub, renaming it O'Dowd's Irish Pub, which he sold in 2004. From 1998, onwards he operated Busteed Building Supplies.

Political career

O'Dowd contested the Division of Flynn for the Liberal National Party at the 2010 Federal election and won the seat from Labor's one term incumbent

Chris Trevor Chris Allan Trevor (born 23 June 1961) is an Australian politician. He was an Australian Labor Party member of the Australian House of Representatives, representing the Division of Flynn from 2007 to 2010. He had previously narrowly lost a cont ...

. He continued to hold the seat in the

2013 2013 was the first year since 1987 to contain four unique digits (a span of 26 years). 2013 was designated as: *International Year of Water Cooperation *International Year of Quinoa Events January * January 5 – 2013 Craig, Alask ...

2016 2016 was designated as: * International Year of Pulses by the sixty-eighth session of the United Nations General Assembly. * International Year of Global Understanding (IYGU) by the International Council for Science (ICSU), the Internationa ...

and

2019 This was the year in which the first known human case of COVID-19 was documented, preceding COVID-19 pandemic, the pandemic which was declared by the World Health Organization the following year. Up to that point, 2019 had been described as ...

federal elections. O'Dowd supports building HELE coal fired power stations, inland rail (such as the controversial

Toowoomba Wellcamp Airport Toowoomba Wellcamp Airport (IATA: WTB, ICAO: YBWW, formerly Brisbane West Wellcamp Airport) is an airport in Wellcamp, west from the CBD of Toowoomba, Queensland, Australia. The airport and an associated aviation and business park is the br ...

to Gladstone link), and opening up more agricultural land. In November 2020, O'Dowd announced he would not contest the next election. O'Dowd is a member of Parliamentary Friends of Palestine. He has stated on several occasions that Israel is perpetrating a form of apartheid upon Palestinians. O'Dowd has disputed the

scientific consensus on climate change There is a nearly unanimous scientific consensus that the Earth has been consistently warming since the start of the Industrial Revolution, that the rate of recent warming is largely unprecedented, and that this warming is mainly the result o ...

, denying that

climate change Present-day climate change includes both global warming—the ongoing increase in Global surface temperature, global average temperature—and its wider effects on Earth's climate system. Climate variability and change, Climate change in ...

is caused by humanity.

External links

Ken O'Dowd official website

APH profile
* Search or browse

Hansard ''Hansard'' is the transcripts of parliamentary debates in Britain and many Commonwealth of Nations, Commonwealth countries. It is named after Thomas Curson Hansard (1776–1833), a London printer and publisher, who was the first official printe ...

fo
Ken O'Dowd
at OpenAustralia.org

References

1950 births Living people Members of the Australian House of Representatives for Flynn Members of the Australian House of Representatives Liberal National Party of Queensland members of the Parliament of Australia People educated at Rockhampton Grammar School Australian MPs 2010–2013 Australian MPs 2013–2016 Australian MPs 2016–2019 Australian MPs 2019–2022 {{Australia-LiberalNational-politician-stub