Martin Hamilton-Smith

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Leader of the Opposition (SA)
Martin Hamilton-Smith

Incumbent
Assumed office 12 April 2007
Deputy	Vickie Chapman
Preceded by	Iain Evans
Member for Waite
Incumbent
Assumed office 11 October 1997
Preceded by	Stephen Baker

Nationality	Australian
Political party	Liberal Party of Australia

Martin Leslie James Hamilton-Smith, MP, is the current parliamentary leader of the South Australian division of the Liberal Party of Australia, the Leader of the Opposition in South Australia, and member for the electoral district of Waite in the House of Assembly.

1 Early life
2 Parliament
3 References
4 See also
5 External links

[edit] Early life

Graduating from Royal Military College, Duntroon as an Officer in the Australian Army, he then went on to begin a career in the Australian Special Air Service Regiment for many years. He specialised in counter-terrorism and spent many years in the UK commanding one of the first counter-terrorism units. He toured in the middle east while part of the SASR and then took command of the 1st Commando regiment until his retirement in early 1992.^{[citation needed]}

[edit] Parliament

Hamilton-Smith first won Waite in the 1997 election, by six percent against the Democrats on a two party preferred (2PP) basis. In 2002 when Rann Labor came to power, he retained the seat by twelve percent against Labor on 2PP, and by four percent in 2006.

Hamilton-Smith was the Innovation and Tourism minister in the Kerin Liberal government from December 2001 to March 2002 when his party lost government. In October 2005, he moved to challenge then Liberal leader Rob Kerin, but later withdrew his challenge.^[1] On 11 April 2007, Hamilton-Smith formally challenged then Liberal leader Iain Evans, and was successful with 13 votes to 10 for the Liberal leadership.^[2]

On 19 April 2007, he announced a re-shuffle of the opposition front bench.^[3]