Fiona Patten is leader of the Australian Sex Party and a former sex worker.[1] She is also the CEO of the Eros Association.[2]
"Sex is deeply rooted in the lives of all Australians. It is relevant to hundreds of pieces of legislation made around the country. If you're sick of being preached at by wowser and chauvinistic politicians, join the Australian Sex Party. We're positive about sex."[3]
Patten states on the party's website that she is related to Jessie Street, was "good mates" with Don Chipp, and was once on trial for Contempt of Parliament for threatening to "out" National Party politicians.[4]
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In 1992, Patten contested the second election for representation in the multi-member single consistency Australian Capital Territory Legislative Assembly on a ticket called the Hare-Clark Independence Party with sitting member, Craig Duby. Both Duby and Patten were unsuccessful in being elected.[5]
Patten contested the seat of Higgins in Victoria at the 2009 by-election. She received over 3 percent of the vote, placing her 4th out of 10 candidates. Her campaign was based on opposing Greens candidate Clive Hamilton's proposal for an ISP-level Internet filter which would block access to websites containing RC-rated content—that is, legal material which is banned from sale, trade or public exhibition due to its extreme nature.
Patten remains a prominent critic of the proposal. She appeared in the Four Corners episode "Access Denied" arguing that it would include blocking access to adult films such as Pirates—refused classification because of a technicality—that do not depict sexual violence, are extremely popular overseas and are available for download on dozens of websites.[6] According to research mentioned in the episode, it is unviable for the filter to block access to more than a thousand or so individual web pages.
The party contested six of 150 House of Representatives seats and all states and territories (except Tasmania and the Australian Capital Territory) in the Senate at the 2010 federal election. Receiving more than 250,000 first preferences, the party won 2.04 percent of the national Senate vote.[7] After the major parties and the Australian Greens, the Sex Party during the vote count were "neck and neck" with the Family First Party for the fourth place in the national Senate vote.[8] The party "outpolled several more prominent minor parties and came within about 10,000 votes of Family First for the Senate in Victoria".[9] After the party's first federal election contest, Patten claimed that the Sex Party was "now the major minor party in Australian politics":
We’ve polled better than the Greens did in their first federal election and believe that our vision of Australia as the most socially progressive country in the world is equal to the Greens environmental messages of 20 years ago.[10]
Whilst the Sex Party did not win any seats, their preferences were substantially beneficial to the Greens who won a Senate seat in every state for the first time.[11][12]
Patten contested the Northern Metropolitan Region in the Victorian Legislative Council at the 2010 Victorian state election.[13]