Rosa Therese Lee Long is a former member of the Legislative Assembly of Queensland representing the electorate of Tablelands in Northern Queensland, Australia for the One Nation Party. Lee Long served three consecutive terms in office between 2001 and 2009, making her One Nation's longest-serving politician. Prior to the 2009 Queensland state election, the electorate of Tablelands was abolished, and much of its territory was merged with neighbouring Charters Towers to form the new seat of Dalrymple. Lee Long contested the new electorate against Shane Knuth, the Liberal National member for Charters Towers. However, the new seat contained more of Knuth's territory than Lee Long's, and Lee Long took only 44 percent of the two-party vote to Knuth's 55 percent. Lee Long was the mayor of the Tablelands Region from April 2012 until March 2016.
Personal life
Lee Long was born in Atherton, Queensland, and has three daughters. Lee Long is a widow, and her late husband was of Chinese descent, a fact that aroused considerable interest given One Nation's strong anti-immigration stance.
Lee Long was elected to the Legislative Assembly of Queenslandin 2001 to represent the seat of Tablelands. Tablelands had before 1998 been a safe seat for the National Party, but fell at the 1998 election to Shaun Nelson of the One Nation Party. Lee Long was a campaign worker for Nelson during this election. Nelson subsequently left the party in 1999 amid internal tensions, and recontested the seat at the 2001 election as an independent, losing out to Lee Long. By this point, support for the One Nation party had sharply declined from the party's high point, and Lee Long was one of only three One Nation MPs in the Legislative Assembly. In her inaugural address to parliament, Lee Long attacked globalisation and the Government's policy of privatisation, blaming them for a decline in the agricultural and mining industries in her electorate. She was a member of the Legal, Constitutional and Administrative Review Committee from 11 October 2006, and a member of the Estimates Committee in both 2006 and 2008. She also served on the Members' Ethics and Parliamentary Privileges Committee from 18 March 2004 to 15 August 2006, the Scrutiny of Legislation Committee, and the Select Committee on Travelsafe.
Political views
Despite the disintegration of the One Nation Party and Pauline Hanson's departure to form a new party, Pauline's United Australia Party, in a television interview leading up to the 2006 state election, Lee Long stated that she still agreed with Hanson's policies, saying "Pauline Hanson was right back then, she's right now, and we have to continue the fight".
