37 Facts About David Leyonhjelm

David Ean Leyonhjelm is an Australian former politician.

David Leyonhjelm was a Senator for New South Wales, representing the Liberal Democratic Party from 2014 to 2019.

David Leyonhjelm resigned from the Senate in March 2019 to stand for the Legislative Council at the 2019 New South Wales state election, but failed to be elected.

David Leyonhjelm writes columns for several Australian publications, with a concentration on rural issues.

David Leyonhjelm was born in Nhill in the Wimmera, in western Victoria and was raised in Heywood, on the dairy farm of his parents Bryan and Jean Leyonhjelm.

David Leyonhjelm was the oldest of four children, and as a teenager trapped rabbits and worked in a shoe shop to help support his family.

David Leyonhjelm later won a scholarship to study veterinary science at the University of Melbourne, studying alongside Denis Napthine, a future Premier of Victoria.

David Leyonhjelm has since completed Bachelor of Laws and Master of Business Administration degrees at Macquarie University.

In 1989, David Leyonhjelm was a founding director of Baron Strategic Services, an agribusiness consultancy firm with which he remains involved.

David Leyonhjelm later served as director of the federally funded Gene Technology Information Unit, which was established by the Keating government to offer "accurate and unbiased advice about the new gene technologies".

Also a former secretary of the Farm Writers' Association of New South Wales, David Leyonhjelm had a column in Rural Business magazine for 20 years.

David Leyonhjelm wrote a column, "Agribuzz", for Fairfax Rural Media, and for "Business Spectator" and writes regularly in The Australian Financial Review.

Politically, David Leyonhjelm was a member of Young Labor during the 1970s with the goal of ending compulsory military conscription.

David Leyonhjelm later joined the Liberal Party, but resigned his membership in 1996 in protest against the stricter firearm laws introduced by John Howard.

David Leyonhjelm had been a member of the Shooters Party since 1992, and was chair for a period of five years.

In 2005, after leaving the Shooters Party, David Leyonhjelm became involved with the Liberal Democratic Party, which then contested the New South Wales elections as the Outdoor Recreation Party.

Confusion with the Liberal Party of Australia and other similarly-named parties was thought to have played a part, with a writer in The Age suggesting David Leyonhjelm was "probably the only senator elected because people mistook his party for another".

David Leyonhjelm assumed his seat on 1 July 2014, and was sworn in on 7 July, making his maiden speech during the same week.

In November 2014, David Leyonhjelm introduced as a private member's bill a Freedom to Marry Bill, which would allow same-sex marriage.

David Leyonhjelm was criticised following the 2014 Sydney hostage crisis when he argued that Australians should be allowed greater access to weapons for self defence.

David Leyonhjelm has been a vocal opponent of laws designed to reduce the consumption of cigarettes, and has accepted $55,000 in donations from tobacco company Philip Morris.

David Leyonhjelm submitted a private member's bill to the Senate to repeal the ban on territories legalising euthanasia.

Day has since resigned from the Senate, but David Leyonhjelm has stated he intends to form a new voting bloc with his successor from Family First, as well as Cory Bernardi from the Australian Conservatives.

David Leyonhjelm has since formed a bloc with Bernardi, United Australia Party Senator Brian Burston and independent Senator Fraser Anning, who left One Nation and has since been expelled from Katter's Australian Party.

David Leyonhjelm subsequently told women's rights activist Melinda Tankard Reist to "STFU" when she accused him of hypocrisy.

David Leyonhjelm wanted the government-funded age pension payment to be viewed as welfare and not an entitlement for taxpayers once they reach a certain age.

When challenged, David Leyonhjelm pointed to an interview in which he claimed Hanson-Young accused all men of being rapists, although this was rejected by the senator.

On 7 January 2019, David Leyonhjelm announced that he intended to quit federal politics to contest the 2019 New South Wales state election on 23 March 2019.

David Leyonhjelm resigned from the Australian Senate on 1 March 2019.

David Leyonhjelm was the second Senator since the 2016 election to resign from Federal Parliament to contest a state election, following Nick Xenophon's unsuccessful run at the 2018 South Australian state election.

The judge ruled that David Leyonhjelm had acted with malice and intended to publicly shame Hanson-Young.

David Leyonhjelm was due to pay Senator Hanson-Young's legal costs and the associated settlement by the end of 2019 but chose not to do so as he was appealing against the defamation decision, partly on the ground of the implied constitutional freedom of political communication.

In July 2020, David Leyonhjelm expressed dismay at the Australian public's response to increased use of governmental power during the Covid-19 pandemic, describing Australians as "sheeple".

David Leyonhjelm has been described as a "libertarian purist" who wants government "wound back to a minimal role in society".

David Leyonhjelm's election has been associated with a rise in the popularity of libertarian and classical liberal ideas in Australia, with one commentator suggesting his election might "spark a libertarian renaissance [in Australia]".

David Leyonhjelm has been described as the newly elected senator with "perhaps the most clearly articulated and consistent views".

Notably, David Leyonhjelm has proposed charging a fee for permanent residency in Australia as a way of discouraging people smuggling.