Paul Osborne

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Paul Osborne bigraphy, stories - Australian rugby league player and politician

Paul Osborne : biography

30 September 1966 –

Paul Anthony Osborne (born 30 December 1966) is an Australian former professional rugby league footballer, administrator and politician. He played first-grade rugby league for the St George Dragons and Canberra Raiders before serving as a member of the Australian Capital Territory Legislative Assembly from 1995 until 2001. He was the chief executive officer of the Parramatta Eels in the National Rugby League from 2009 to 2011.

Political career

Osborne was elected to the ACT Legislative Assembly as an independent representative for the electorate of Brindabella in 1995 on a socially conservative platform. Prior to the 1998 general election, Osborne formed a group called the Osborne Independents Group and ran two candidates in each of the three seats. Osborne was re-elected and Dave Rugendyke, a former police officer, was a seat in the Assembly, representing Ginninderra. The Osborne Independent Group ran on a strong pro-life ticket with stated objectives of blocking both euthanasia legislation and legislation to decriminalise abortion. However, on taking up his seat in the Assembly, Rugendyke chose not to sit with Osborne, but sat as an independent in the Assembly. Less than a year later, at the request of the party, the ACT Electoral Commission deregistered the Osborne Independent Group on 15 February 1999. Osborne and Rugendyke sat in the Assembly as independents from that date.

In 1995, with the support of Osborne and Michael Moore, another independent, Liberal leader, Kate Carnell, formed a minority government. Moore later went on to serve as an independent Minister for Health in the Carnell-led government. In 1998, with support of Rugendyke, Osborne introduced an anti-abortion bill, requiring that more information be provided to women considering the procedure and that there be a 72-hour cooling-off period. His move was vehmently but unsuccessfully opposed by the Health Minister, Moore. The Bill, while consistent with Osborne’s Catholic beliefs, damaged his popularity among the suburban voters who had been his chief supporters. (Abortion was decriminalised and the legislation repealed in 2002).

Osborne voted against the 2000 budget in a successful attempt to stop the opening of a supervised injecting room. Although the injecting room had the support of a majority of the Assembly members, Osborne’s support was needed to approve the funding in the budget. A new budget without funding for the injecting room was presented to the Assembly soon after and it passed with Osborne’s support.

In late 2000, Labor gave notice of an intention to move a no confidence vote against Carnell over the Bruce Stadium affair. The Assembly adjourned for seven days and, despite her attempts to secure support from Osborne, Carnell was forced to resign as Chief Minister before the vote was put to the Assembly. She was replaced by Gary Humphries. Osborne had a crucial role in determining Carnell’s future, initially proposing an early election (which was outside the provisions of the ACT Constitution) to resolve the lack of confidence in Carnell.

In 2001, Osborne and Rugendyke defended their respective seats, but this time, on separate tickets. Both were not re-elected.

In July 2004 the Canberra Times claimed that he was considering running for that year’s ACT election with the Liberal Party, but it did not run. He worked as community-relations officer for the Raiders for a time after leaving politics.

Background

Osborne grew up in Hurlstone Park, New South Wales and was educated at Christian Brothers’ High School, Lewisham. He was formerly a police detective. He is married to Sally and they have 9 children.

Life after politics

In 2005, he was appointed as the CEO of the National Rugby League’s Player Manager Accreditation Program. He was also a match day commentator on the ABC’s rugby league coverage.

In October 2008 he took 6 NRL Players, Nathan Hindmarsh, Justin Poore, Todd Payten, Jared Hickey, Jared Warea-Hargreaves and Todd Carney to Rwanda to work in the Village of Hope for Hope Rwanda. They worked in the village building houses for widows and orphans. They visited the famed Mountain Gorillas and News Limited and Fox Sports had extended coverage of the trip. All the players reported how much the trip had affected them and how far the country had come since the 1994 Genocide. He returned in 2009 with 6 Parramatta Eels Players, Justin Poore, Joel Reddy, Matthew Keating, Joe Galavou, Tim Mannah and Joe Paulo. They worked in the same village and also made the trip to the border of Rwanda and the Congo at the Volcanoes National Park to visit the Mountain Gorillas.