This Quick Guide provides information about Australian federal,
state and territory parliamentarians who have publicly identified as LGBTIQ+
while in office.
For the purposes of this paper, ‘LGBTIQ+ parliamentarian’ refers to a member of parliament (MP) who has publicly
identified as lesbian, gay, bisexual, trans, intersex, queer or with another
minority sexual orientation or gender identity either before or during their time in office.
This Quick Guide lists the name, party, chamber,
state/electorate, dates in office, and significant firsts. This information is
compiled from a range of sources including the Commonwealth Parliamentary Handbook,
Australian state and territory parliaments’ websites, political party and
parliamentarians’ websites, biographies and statements by parliamentarians.
We are grateful to the state and territory parliamentary
libraries for their assistance in compiling this Quick Guide.
While every effort has been made to ensure the accuracy of
this Quick Guide, it cannot be guaranteed to be comprehensive.
Party and chamber abbreviations
| AD Australian Democrats |
| AJP Animal Justice Party |
| ALP Australian Labor Party |
| DFD Dignity for Disability |
| DIG Dignity Party Incorporated (formerly
Dignity for Disability) |
| GRN Australian Greens (and state/territory
Greens parties) |
| IND Independent |
| LIB Liberal Party of Australia |
| LNP Liberal National Party (Qld) |
| Chambers |
| HA House of Assembly |
| LA Legislative Assembly |
| LC Legislative Council |
| Reps House of Representatives |
LGBTIQ+ representation in
Australian parliaments
Current representation
There are currently 32 LGBTIQ+ MPs in Australian parliaments
(3.8% of all federal, state and territory parliamentarians).
As a proportion, the Australian Capital Territory (ACT)
Legislative Assembly has the highest representation of LGBTIQ+ MPs in Australia
at 16%. Tasmania and Queensland currently have no LGBTIQ+ state MPs.
Table 1: Current number of
LGBTIQ+ parliamentarians in Australia, by parliament
| Parliament |
Total MPs (no.) |
Current LGBTIQ+ MPs (no.) |
Current LGBTIQ+ MPs (%)* |
| ACT |
25 |
4 |
16.0% |
| WA |
95 |
6 |
6.3% |
| NSW |
135 |
6 |
4.4% |
| NT |
25 |
1 |
4.0% |
| Victoria |
128 |
5 |
3.9% |
| Federal |
226# |
8 |
3.5% |
| SA |
69 |
2 |
2.9% |
| Queensland |
93 |
0 |
0.0% |
| Tasmania |
40 |
0 |
0.0% |
| Australia (total) |
836 |
32 |
3.8% |
Source: Compiled by the
Australian Parliamentary Library.
*Percentages are rounded.
#There are usually 227 parliamentarians, however the seat of Fadden
(House of Representatives) is currently vacant.
Note: The ACT, NT and Queensland are unicameral parliaments.
Australian federal parliament
Significant firsts
Bob Brown (GRN, Tas) is the first member of federal
Parliament (and any Australian parliament) to publicly identify as LGBTIQ+.
After his service in state parliament, he was elected to the Australian Senate
in 1996, representing the Australian Greens.
He ‘came out’ publicly in June 1976, on the ABC’s This
Day Tonight. At the time, homosexuality was still criminalised in Tasmania.
In his memoir, Optimism:
reflections on a life of action, Bob Brown noted (p. 47):
By the time I was a teenager the death penalty for male
homosexual acts had been abolished in Australia, but long jail sentences and
lifelong humiliation were the order of the day.
Brown is also the first openly LGBTIQ+ party leader in
Australia, serving as leader of the Tasmanian Greens from 1989 to 1993, and
later the Australian Greens from 2005 to 2012.
Penny Wong (ALP, SA) is the first openly LGBTIQ+
woman in the Senate, elected in 2002. She also became the first minister and
Cabinet minister in the Australian Government to publicly identify as LGBTIQ+
when appointed as Minister for Climate Change and Water in 2007.
Trent Zimmerman (LIB, North Sydney) is the first
openly LGBTIQ+ member of the House of Representatives, elected in 2015. During
his first
speech to parliament on 2 March 2016, Zimmerman stated:
I hope that my election to this place will, in a small way,
send a message of hope: that your sexuality should not and need not be a
barrier, that you can be gay and even be a member of the Australian Parliament.
Kerryn Phelps (IND, Wentworth) is the first openly
LGBTIQ+ woman in the House of Representatives, elected in a 2018 by-election.
Table 2: List of LGBTIQ+
federal parliamentarians
Source: Compiled by the
Parliamentary Library.
*Selected under Section 15 of the Australian
Constitution in the
Senate or at a by-election in the House of Representatives.
^Senate dates are derived from the date the Senate terms started/ended, rather
than the date the person was elected.
Note: retired parliamentarians are listed
as ‘resigned’.
Australian
state/territory parliaments
Significant
firsts
Bob Brown (IND; GRN, Denison) became the first openly
LGBTIQ+ parliamentarian in Australia when he was elected as an Independent to
the Tasmanian House of Assembly for Denison on 4 January 1983.
Giz Watson (GRN; North Metropolitan) became the first
openly LGBTIQ+ female parliamentarian in Australia when she was elected to the
WA Legislative Council for North Metropolitan Region on
14 December 1996.
Andrew Barr (ALP, Molonglo; Kurrajong) is the first
and only Australian head of government to publicly identify as LGBTIQ+. He has
been Chief Minister of the ACT since 11 December 2014.
Chanston ‘Chansey’ Paech (ALP, Namatjira; Gwoja) is
the first openly LGBTIQ+ Indigenous parliamentarian in Australia (descendent of
the Arrernte and Gurindiji peoples). In his first speech to the NT Legislative
Assembly on 18 October 2016, he stated:
I am a Centralian man. I am the nation’s first openly-gay
Indigenous parliamentarian. I am eternally proud of who I am and where I come
from. I own it and wear it with pride. I am young; I am gay; I am black, a
true-blue Territorian.
Table 3: List of state and territory LGBTIQ+ parliamentarians, by
state/territory
Source: Compiled by the
Parliamentary Library.
*By-election or selected to fill a casual vacancy, including via a
recount/countback.
Note 1: retired parliamentarians are listed as ‘resigned’.
Note 2: The ACT, NT and Queensland are unicameral parliaments.
Note 3: Queensland has not had any publicly LGBTIQ+ member of state parliament.