Sang Nguyen
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Sang Minh Nguyen (born January 1, 1960) is an Australian politician. He has been an Australian Labor Party member of the Victorian Legislative Council since 1996, representing Melbourne West Province.
Nguyen was born in the Vietnamese town of Long Xuyen. He began high school in Saigon (now Ho Chi Minh City), but fled Vietnam as a refugee with the fall of the city to the Communists and the end of the Vietnam War. After securing refugee status in Australia and spending a brief stint studying at Greythorn High School, he completed his secondary studies at Swinburne TAFE in 1980.
He became involved in a series of positions related to helping the community, working as a mathematics teacher at the Collingwood Education Centre from 1983 to 1984 and as a youth worker at the Ecumenical Migration Centre from 1985 to 1987. In 1988, Nguyen stood for a seat on his local council, the City of Richmond, and was subsequently elected. He later went on to serve as the city's mayor during 1991 and 1992, and continued to serve as a councillor until 1994. During this period, he also became involved with the trade union movement, serving as a Migrant Liaison Officer for the National Union of Workers from 1989 to 1993.
In 1993, Nguyen took up a position as a staffer working for then federal Minister for Foreign Affairs Gareth Evans. He worked with the Minister for three years before winning pre-selection to contest the safe Labor Legislative Council seat of Melbourne West Province at the 1996 election. Nguyen easily saw off a challenge from left-wing social welfare campaigner Les Twentyman, who ran as an independent, Twentyman's vote dropped dramatically from an earlier unsuccessful 1992 bid, and Nguyen was easily elected. As a member of parliament, he served on the Family and Community Development Committee from 1996 to 1999 and has often been a spokesperson for the Vietnamese community in the chamber and elsewhere.
Reports emerged on March 15, 2006, suggesting that Martin Pakula, who had unsuccessfully tried to unseat former federal Labor leader Simon Crean in a preselection challenge earlier in the month, would be elected instead of Nguyen. These reports were later confirmed. Although Nguyen was keen to recontest the seat he was not selected by the National Executive.
