David Pocock
David Willmer Pocock (born 23 April 1988) is an Australian politician and former professional rugby union player. Raised in Gweru, Zimbabwe, Pocock moved to Australia as a teenager and played for the Australia national rugby team. He played primarily at openside flanker, and was vice captain of the Brumbies in Super Rugby. After his retirement, Pocock worked as a conservationist and social justice advocate. In the 2022 Australian federal election, Pocock ran as an independent candidate for one of the Australian Capital Territory's two Senate seats. He defeated Liberal incumbent senator Zed Seselja, ending the two major parties' duopoly on the ACT's Senate delegation which had been in place since the ACT was granted Senate representation in 1975.
For other people named David Pocock, see David Pocock (disambiguation).
David Pocock
- Australian
- Zimbabwean (until 2022)[3][4]
- South African (until 2022)[3]
1.83 m (6 ft 0 in)[5]
103 kg (227 lb)[5]
Team
Team
Team
Early life[edit]
Pocock was born on 23 April 1988 in Messina, South Africa.[6] He is the oldest of three sons born to Jane (née Ferguson) and Andy Pocock. He spent his first year on a citrus estate, "Denlynian", in Beitbridge, Zimbabwe, which was bought by his grandfather Ian Ferguson in the 1960s and ultimately employed up to 300 people.[7] He was born in South Africa at the hospital nearest to his parents' home which was in Zimbabwe.[1]
When Pocock was a child, his parents moved north to Gweru and joined his paternal grandfather and uncle on a 2,800-hectare (6,900-acre) mixed farm, growing vegetables and flowers for export and also running cattle. He attended Midlands Christian College where he began playing rugby. In 2000, following Robert Mugabe's seizure of white-owned farms in Zimbabwe, Pocock's parents applied to immigrate to Australia. They were soon given a notice of compulsory acquisition requiring them to vacate their property within 90 days, after which they stayed in a family holiday home in Port Alfred, South Africa, for eight months. They received Australian visas in 2002 and settled in Brisbane.[8]
Pocock was educated at the Anglican Church Grammar School in Brisbane. In 2005, he played in the school's undefeated premiership-winning 1st XV alongside future Australia teammate Quade Cooper. That same year, he was selected to play in the Australian Schoolboys team.[9]
Political career[edit]
In December 2021, Pocock announced he would be running as a candidate for the Senate, representing the Australian Capital Territory (ACT) in the forthcoming federal election.[32] In an interview on Television New Zealand's Q+A with Jack Tame in May,[33] Pocock explained his reasons for running for the Australian Senate as an independent candidate and how he hoped to bring a socially progressive voice to the Senate and reform the integrity monitoring process for politicians in parliament. He prosecuted an agenda to tackle corruption in government and political advertising laws, as well as campaigns to increase Australia's expenditure on renewable energy and restore the rights of territories to legislate on euthanasia.[34][35] Pocock was declared elected by the Australian Electoral Commission on 14 June 2022, thereby winning the second of the two ACT seats and unseating incumbent Liberal Senator Zed Seselja to become the first non-Labor or Liberal candidate to be elected as a Senator for the ACT, and the second non-Labor or Liberal person elected to represent the ACT at the federal level (after Lewis Nott, who was MP for the ACT in 1949–1951).[36][37]
In July 2022, Pocock opposed the Labor government's defunding of the Australian Building and Construction Commission but reversed his position to vote in favour of abolishing the ABCC in November 2022.[38]
In November 2022, Pocock successfully negotiated an amendment to create the "Economic Inclusion Advisory Committee", which would publish yearly recommendations on the adequacy of welfare payments two weeks before each federal budget, in exchange for passing Labor's changes to industrial relations reforms.[39][40] Ahead of the 2023 Australian federal budget, Pocock agreed with the committee's recommendation for a substantial increase to the JobSeeker Payment as a first priority, and criticised the Labor government for not "do[ing] more to protect the most vulnerable."[41]
Pocock is the Independent ACT Whip for the Australian Senate.[6]
David Pocock
Personal life[edit]
Pocock is married to Emma Palandri.
Together with Luke O’Keefe, he ran a not-for-profit organisation, Eightytwenty Vision, that aims "to support maternal health, food and water security" in Zimbabwe.[46] Registration of this charity with the Australian Charities and Not-for-profits Commission was voluntarily revoked in 2018.[47]