Clark MP Helen Burnet has quit the Tasmanian Greens to sit in state parliament’s lower house as an independent, saying it is necessary to be as “effective as possible” in her role.<\/p>\n
Ms Burnet, who has been a member of parliament for less than two years, said “this is not a decision that has been made in haste”.<\/p>\n
“I know this will be disappointing for some and perhaps not unexpected for others,” she said.<\/p>\n
“I resign from the Greens with the clear intention of being more effective, accountable and heard on matters that are important to our state and the community of Clark.”<\/p>\n
Her departure from the Greens leaves them with four MPs in Tasmania’s lower house, and one upper house member.<\/p>\n
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Ms Burnet (far right) was first elected to the Tasmanian parliament as part of the Greens contingent in the 2024 state election.\u00a0 (ABC News: Jonny McNee)<\/p>\n
‘Blindsided us’, Greens leader says<\/p>\n
In a statement, Greens leader Rosalie Woodruff said Ms Burnet’s decision was “deeply disappointing”.<\/p>\n
“To be honest, it has blindsided us.<\/p>\n
“Until today, Helen had not indicated this was something she was considering. It’s still unclear exactly what motivated her decision.<\/p>\n
Dr Woodruff said the party acknowledged it “will also be a big shock to the many people who put their faith in, and placed their vote with, Helen as a Green MP, only six months ago at the state election”.<\/p>\n
“There will be many members, supporters, volunteers and voters who feel let down today.\u00a0<\/p>\n
“I want to reassure every one of them that the time they gave, their hard work and passion, and the trust they gave us, is not in vain.<\/p>\n
“The Greens’ team will go on, and continue to fight for this island and its people.”Loading…<\/p>\n
Ms Burnet thanked Greens party members and volunteers, acknowledging the decision “would not sit well with many of you”.<\/p>\n
“While I will make my voice heard in a different way, my beliefs and values remain the same,” she said.<\/p>\n
Burnet ‘frustrated’ by airtime for constituent issues<\/p>\n
Ms Burnet said quitting the Greens was necessary to be able to “amplify” the concerns of her electorate, including about the cost of living, public transport, the stadium and water quality.<\/p>\n
Asked why she could not advocate for those concerns within the party, she said she had been raising her concerns with Dr Woodruff since before last year’s state election.<\/p>\n
“I’ve been frustrated about not being able to get my voice heard on those matters,” she said.<\/p>\n
Ms Burnet says her intention is to become “more effective, accountable and heard on matters that are important to our state”. (ABC News: Ebony ten Broeke)<\/p>\n
Pressed on what she had wanted the Greens to do to keep her on side, she said there were issues she wanted to bring to the parliament with a “much louder” voice.<\/p>\n
Ms Burnet said she would not be doing any deals with the government, and that she had told the premier she would be applying the same scrutiny as she had previously.<\/p>\n
Former deputy mayor turned state politician<\/p>\n
At the 2025 state election she was the fifth member to win a seat in Clark, re-elected with 0.56 quotas on first preferences.<\/p>\n
Previously, she was Hobart’s Deputy Mayor for seven years, and spent 19 years serving on the council.<\/p>\n
She grew up in the South Australian town of Hahndorf and moved to Tasmania in 1994. She has a background as an allied health worker.<\/p>\n
She remains the deputy speaker of the lower house.<\/p>\n
Federally, two senators have quit the Greens in recent years \u2014 with Dorinda Cox moving to Labor following last year’s election, and Lidia Thorpe sitting as an independent since 2023.<\/p>\n
Last year, South Australian MLC Tammy Franks left the Greens to sit in the state’s upper house as an independent.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Clark MP Helen Burnet has quit the Tasmanian Greens to sit in state parliament’s lower house as an…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":389798,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[5871,64,63,7167,26359,21503,3786,4271,208756,12804,61572,44,9801,84,2177,2801],"class_list":["post-389797","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-australia","tag-announcement","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-clark","tag-decision","tag-future","tag-government","tag-greens","tag-helen-burnet","tag-hobart","tag-mp","tag-news","tag-parliament","tag-politics","tag-state","tag-tasmania"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/389797","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=389797"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/389797\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/389798"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=389797"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=389797"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=389797"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}