Peter King (Australian politician)

Peter Edward King (born 29 June 1952), Australian politician, was a Liberal Party of Australia member of the Australian House of Representatives from November 2001 to October 2004, representing the seat of Wentworth, New South Wales. He was born in Bingara, New South Wales, and was educated at the Shore School, Sydney University, where he resided at St. Paul's College, and Oxford University, where he gained an MA. He was Rhodes Scholar for New South Wales in 1975.

King was a barrister before entering politics. He was a Judicial Member of the Administrative Decisions Tribunal of NSW 1995-2001 and Chair of the Australian Heritage Commission 1998-2001 and of the World Heritage Commission 2000-01. He is the author of Limitation of Liability in Australian Maritime Law (1991). He was a member of the Woollahra Municipal Council and was Mayor 1990-91. He was NSW State President of the Liberal Party 1989-92.

In 2003, after only two years in the federal Parliament, King was challenged for his Liberal endorsement in Wentworth by Malcolm Turnbull, a wealthy merchant banker, Federal Treasurer of the Liberal Party and former head of the Australian Republican Movement. After a prolonged and very acrimonious campaign, Turnbull won Liberal endorsement for the 2004 election. King ran as an independent and received 18% of the primary vote.^[1] For running against a preselected Liberal party member, King was banned from the Liberal Party for ten years. His wife Fiona, daughter of former National Party leader Ian Sinclair, was banned for five years.^[2]

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