John Day (Australian politician)

The Hon. John Howard Dadley Day MLA (born 24 December 1955) is the current Member for Kalamunda in the Western Australian Legislative Assembly. He was elected to the 34th Parliament in 1993 and has been re-elected at every state election since.

Early life

Day was born on 24 December 1955 in Middle Swan, Western Australia. His father who survived the Second Battle of El Alamein died when Day was 17 years old.

Attending Guildford Grammar School Day later completed a degree, a Bachelor of Dental Science at the University of Western Australia then went on to work at the Perth Dental Hospital as well as other clinical situations including Canning Vale Prison.

He later set up a private practice with his sister Elizabeth working in such places as Wundowie, Glen Forrest and Beverley.

Parliament

Winning preselection for Darling Range following the retirement of sitting member Ian Thompson, Day won the seat in the 1993 state election. He has successfully held the seat in the 1996, 2001 and 2005 state elections. In the 2001 state election, Day came very close to losing the seat after an 18.8% swing against him and only won by 137 votes by the time all votes were counted. Day fared much better in the 2005 election when he gained a 10.1% swing and held the seat by a margin of 3.1%.

In 2007 as a result of an Electoral Distribution under the Electoral Act 1907 (WA) all electoral boundaries in Western Australia were redrawn. The electoral district of Darling Range was redrawn and a new Electoral district of Kalamunda was created containing a large portion of the previous Electoral district of Darling Range.

In the 2008 State General Election on 6 September, John Day was elected to Kalamunda.

On 23 September 2008 the Governor of Western Australia appointed John Day as the Minister for Planning and as the Minister for Culture and the Arts. He was also the Minister for Environment and Minister for Water from 22 November to 14 December 2010, having temporarily taken over Donna Faragher's portfolios; since the latter date, he has been Minister for Science and Innovation.