Christopher Gulaptis is an Australian politician who was a member of the

New South Wales Legislative Assembly The New South Wales Legislative Assembly is the lower of the two houses of the Parliament of New South Wales, an Australian state. The upper house is the New South Wales Legislative Council. Both the Assembly and Council sit at Parliament House ...

. He represented Clarence for The Nationals from the 2011 by-election until his retirement in March 2023.

Background and early career

Greek Greek may refer to: Anything of, from, or related to Greece, a country in Southern Europe: *Greeks, an ethnic group *Greek language, a branch of the Indo-European language family **Proto-Greek language, the assumed last common ancestor of all kno ...

background, Gulaptis was born in

Perth, Western Australia Perth () is the list of Australian capital cities, capital city of Western Australia. It is the list of cities in Australia by population, fourth-most-populous city in Australia, with a population of over 2.3 million within Greater Perth . The ...

, and graduated with a degree in applied science from the

Western Australian Institute of Technology Curtin University (previously Curtin University of Technology and Western Australian Institute of Technology) is an Australian public research university based in Bentley, Perth, Western Australia. It is named after John Curtin, Prime Minister ...

(now Curtin University) and commenced practice as a

surveyor Surveying or land surveying is the technique, profession, art, and science of determining the terrestrial two-dimensional or three-dimensional positions of points and the distances and angles between them. These points are usually on the ...

. He moved to Clarence Valley in New South Wales in 1980, and was a councillor on Maclean Shire Council, where he also served as mayor. His service as a councillor ceased when all five local government councils in the Clarence Valley were amalgamated into one council, the

Clarence Valley Council Clarence Valley Council is a local government area in the Northern Rivers region of New South Wales, Australia. The council services an area of and draws its name from the Clarence River, which flows through most of the council area. The area ...

. Gulaptis successfully stood at the first Clarence Valley local government election in 2005 and served as one of nine councillors. He unsuccessfully stood for mayor of the new council in March and September 2005 and September 2006 and resigned as a councillor in 2008.

Parliamentary career

Gulaptis contested the seat of

Page Page most commonly refers to: * Page (paper), one side of a leaf of paper, as in a book Page, PAGE, pages, or paging may also refer to: Roles * Page (assistance occupation), a professional occupation * Page (servant), traditionally a young m ...

at the 2007 federal election. Although capturing the majority of primary votes, he lost to the

Labor Labour or labor may refer to: * Childbirth, the delivery of a baby * Labour (human activity), or work ** Manual labour, physical work ** Wage labour, a socioeconomic relationship between a worker and an employer ** Organized labour and the labour ...

candidate,

Janelle Saffin Janelle Anne Saffin (born 1 November 1954) is an Australian politician and a member of the Labor Party. She has been the Member for Lismore in the New South Wales Legislative Assembly since 23 March 2019. She was the Member for Page in the Aus ...

, after distribution of preferences. Gulaptis retained his Lower Clarence residence but took employment in Queensland in the interim, and returned to the Clarence Valley when he was pre-selected as Nationals candidate in the Clarence by-election. Following the Australian greyhound racing live baiting scandal and the decision by the Baird government to ban greyhound racing NSW from 1 July 2017, legislation was introduced into the NSW Legislative Assembly and Gulaptis

crossed the floor In some parliamentary systems (e.g., in Canada and the United Kingdom), politicians are said to cross the floor if they formally change their political affiliation to a political party different from the one they were initially elected under. I ...

to vote against the government. At the time of the vote Gulaptis was the Parliamentary Secretary for the North Coast; however, the following day he was informed that was no longer a parliamentary secretary.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Gulaptis, Christopher Year of birth missing (living people) National Party of Australia members of the Parliament of New South Wales Living people Members of the New South Wales Legislative Assembly Politicians from Perth, Western Australia Curtin University alumni Australian people of Greek descent 21st-century Australian politicians