Eric James Ellis is a former Australia

Australia

Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...

n politician.

Born in Sydney

Sydney

Sydney is the most populous city in Australia and the state capital of New South Wales. Sydney is located on Australia's south-east coast of the Tasman Sea. As of June 2010, the greater metropolitan area had an approximate population of 4.6 million people...

, New South Wales

New South Wales

New South Wales is a state of :Australia, located in the east of the country. It is bordered by Queensland, Victoria and South Australia to the north, south and west respectively. To the east, the state is bordered by the Tasman Sea, which forms part of the Pacific Ocean. New South Wales...

, he was a pharmaceutical wholesaler on the South Coast before entering politics. Ellis had also represented Australia in ten pin bowling, and had served in the 3rd Battalion

3rd Battalion, Royal Australian Regiment

3rd Battalion, The Royal Australian Regiment is a parachute infantry battalion of the Australian Army, based in Sydney. 3 RAR was initially formed in 1945 as the 67th Battalion and has seen active service in Japan, Korea, Malaya, South Vietnam, East Timor, the Solomon Islands, Afghanistan and Iraq...

 of the Royal Australian Regiment

Royal Australian Regiment

The Royal Australian Regiment is the parent regiment for regular infantry battalions of the Australian Army and is the senior infantry regiment of the Royal Australian Infantry Corps...

 Regular Army. In 1990, he joined the Liberal Party

Liberal Party of Australia

The Liberal Party of Australia is an Australian political party.Founded a year after the 1943 federal election to replace the United Australia Party, the centre-right Liberal Party typically competes with the centre-left Australian Labor Party for political office...

.

In 1995, when the sitting independent

Independent (politician)

In politics, an independent or non-party politician is an individual not affiliated to any political party. Independents may hold a centrist viewpoint between those of major political parties, a viewpoint more extreme than any major party, or they may have a viewpoint based on issues that they do...

 member for South Coast

Electoral district of South Coast

South Coast is an electoral district of the Legislative Assembly in the Australian state of New South Wales. It is represented by Shelley Hancock of the Liberal Party of Australia.-Members for South Coast:-Election results:...

 in the New South Wales Legislative Assembly

New South Wales Legislative Assembly

The Legislative Assembly, or lower house, is one of the two chambers of the Parliament of New South Wales, an Australian state. The other chamber is the Legislative Council. Both the Assembly and Council sit at Parliament House in the state capital, Sydney...

, John Hatton

John Hatton

John Edward Hatton AO is former Australian politician, and an National Trust of Australia nominated Australian Living Treasure. He was the independent member of the New South Wales State parliament "lower house" for to the seat of South Coast from 1973 to 1995...

, retired, Ellis was elected to the seat as the Liberal candidate. He held the seat until 1999, when he was defeated by Labor

Australian Labor Party

The Australian Labor Party is an Australian political party. It has been the governing party of the Commonwealth of Australia since the 2007 federal election. Julia Gillard is the party's federal parliamentary leader and Prime Minister of Australia...

 candidate Wayne Smith

Wayne Smith (politician)

Wayne Douglas Smith was an Australian politician. He was an Australian Labor Party member of the New South Wales Legislative Assembly from 1999 to 2003, representing the electorate of South Coast. He was the only incumbent ALP member to lose his seat at the 2003 state election.Smith was born in...

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