James Richard Small (22 September 1933 – 29 October 2021) was an Australian politician. He was 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 ...

member for

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in 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 ...

from 1985 to 1999. Small was born at Bondi in

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. He was educated at

Deniliquin Deniliquin () is a town in the western Riverina region of south-western New South Wales, Australia, close to the border with Victoria. It is the largest town in the Edward River Council local government area. Deniliquin is located at the inte ...

and underwent

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1954–56. He became a bank clerk and then primary producer, and married Judith on 15 October 1955 (they had four children: two sons and two daughters). He was active in the local community and in the local branch of the Country Party for many years. In 1984, following the resignation of the member for the local state seat of

Tim Fischer Timothy Andrew Fischer (3 May 1946 – 22 August 2019) was an Australian politician and diplomat who served as leader of the National Party of Australia, National Party from 1990 to 1999. He was the tenth Deputy Prime Minister of Australia, d ...

, to contest the federal seat of

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, Small was selected as the Nationals' candidate for the by-election. He was elected without difficulty, defeating his only opponent,

independent Independent or Independents may refer to: Arts, entertainment, and media Artist groups * Independents (artist group), a group of modernist painters based in Pennsylvania, United States * Independentes (English: Independents), a Portuguese artist ...

candidate Ray Brooks, with a 12.96% margin. He held the seat easily until 1999, when it was combined with the solid

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seat of

Broken Hill Broken Hill is a city in the Far West (New South Wales), far west region of outback New South Wales, Australia. An inland mining city, it is near the border with South Australia on the crossing of the Barrier Highway (A32) and the Silver City Hi ...

to create the new seat of Murray-Darling, a marginal National seat. In the event, both Small and Broken Hill MP Bill Beckroge retired, and the seat was won by Labor. Small retired for a number of years on his property in Deniliquin and died aged 88 after health complications on 29 October 2021.

References

1933 births 2021 deaths National Party of Australia members of the Parliament of New South Wales Members of the New South Wales Legislative Assembly Politicians from Sydney {{Australia-National-politician-stub