Navigation path
Mr Steve Wettenhall
Parliamentary Secretary for Tourism
Member for Barron River
Mr Wettenhall was first elected as Member for Barron River in the Queensland State Parliament at the 2006 election. He is now in his second term serving the constituents of Barron River and in March 2009 he was appointed Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Tourism.
Mr Wettenhall has served as a member of the Regional Queensland Council reporting to the Minister for Communities. In this role he is an ex-officio member of the FNQ Regional Disability Council, a ministerial advisory body, and has also chaired the FNQ Ministerial Regional Community Forums.
He has been a Deputy Speaker and member of the Parliamentary Legal, Constitutional and Administrative Review Committee (LCARC) and sat on various Parliamentary Committees, most recently the Investigation into Altruistic Surrogacy Committee.
Mr Wettenhall continues to work tirelessly to improve local services including increasing police numbers, improving health services and public transport, and protecting the environment with initiatives such as the FNQ 2035 Plan.
He obtained his Bachelor of Arts and Laws at Monash University, Victoria, and undertook his practical legal training as an articled clerk with a Melbourne law firm specialising in criminal defence. He was admitted as a barrister and solicitor of the Supreme Court of Victoria in 1990.
Upon moving to Cairns Mr Wettenhall established his own legal firm in 1993 and for the next 13 years he specialised in criminal defence advocacy. His firm expanded and accepted instructions in a wide variety of matters including criminal injuries compensation and discrimination and employment cases. He also represented indigenous clients in Cape York and was retained periodically by Aboriginal legal services in the Torres Strait, Gulf of Carpentaria, Mt Isa and Cairns to represent their clients.
Mr Wettenhall is a founding and honorary life member of the Cairns Community Legal Centre where he served on the committee for several years including three as president. During this time the service expanded to include specialist disability discrimination and consumer rights services. The community legal centre provided the foundation for the establishment in Cairns of the Environmental Defender’s Office of North Queensland and the North Queensland Women’s Legal Service
Mr Wettenhall takes a very strong and active interest in environment and conservation issues. He has served two terms as President of the Cairns and Far North Environment Centre (CAFNEC). He is a keen bushwalker, camper, fisher, bird watcher and gardener.
The Barron River Electorate
Barron River is part of the rapidly-growing Cairns region and consists of some northern Cairns suburbs, the beach communities north to Wangetti Beach and west to include Kuranda and surrounds.
The major industries are small business, tourism, service industries and sugar.
Last updated 12 May 2009