This Saturday 13 April, 4pm to 6pm, Smith’s Alternative would like to invite the public to one of Canberra’s first candidate debates for this year’s federal election. The Q&A will be moderated by Canberra journalist and, co-founder of the RiotACT, John Griffiths. We’d like to invite Canberra’s media, and we’re happy to announce the following candidates will be taking part:

Liberal:                       Mina Zaki
Independent:              Anthony Pesec
Labor:                         Alicia Payne
Progressives:             Robert Knight and Therese Faulkner 
Greens:                       Tim Hollo and Penny Kyburz
Independent:              Nick Houston
Liberal Democrats:    (Declined)    

Given Steven Bailey’s political position in Canberra, he has withdrawn from the debate due to any perception of a conflict of interest in his assistance to Smith’s in organising this event.

Smith’s hosts an event of this type during every election. The last person to be the Moderator was Walkley Award Winner Charlotte Harper in 2016. Although Michael Moore and Genevieve Jacobs were happy to take the role this year, both will unfortunately not be in Canberra.      

As many parties as possible have been invited, and each party has been afforded a maximum of two representatives – this does not mean that parties with two representatives will be given more time to speak. Parties and candidates that practice hate speech have not been invited.

We ask the audience to be respectful to all participants, and the event will be live-streamed. We hope to see you there!

For any queries please contact: Nigel McRae on: 0401 084 773