Tell me about yourself.

I was born in Narrandera and spent most of my formative years in Wagga. I spent 11 years in Melbourne and three or four overseas, living in parts of Europe. Then I did some farming at Ganmain, mostly during the millennial drought. I'm a tradesman, a plasterer, and highly interested in politics.

Where does in the political interest come from?

I remember sitting on the wooden floor of a house in Mount Austin as a boy watching Gough Whitlam being dismissed. It stuck in my mind. I didn't realise it was a major political moment in history, but it's something I always remember.

I just got interested and have been interested in politics for most of my life.

Why the United Australia Party?

I stood as an independent last time. I had $3000 and ran myself ragged. I'm running myself ragged now and that's with a campaign behind me.

If had $100 grand in the bank to throw away, I probably would do it again, but I was approached by someone who was a member of the party and I looked at the policies, and thought 'well that sort of sits well with me. Very economically progressive, but there's also economical nationalism which I believe in'. I don't believe we should turn our back on the world, but I certainly think we should really start looking after our country and our countrymen a bit more, particularly our pensioners and our youth.

Clive Palmer is quite a controversial character. What sort of reception are you getting from voters?

It's been good. I just think the media itself is concentrating on the Clive Palmer side of it and they're concentrating on the personalities of the leaders, but the reality is. I'm a candidate who's a fair dinkum candidate who knows what it's like to struggle. I know I've got calluses on my hands at the end of the day and I know these other blokes don't.

Not that I think their jobs are any less than mine, but I know what it's like to do that, then go home, have a meal on the table, do the shopping, put on the washing, do the ironing.

You've got a big electorate to cover. What are people telling you the issues are?

A lot of people are saying they are sick of the current MP entirely, others are saying the cost of living is really bad.

You've got the pensioners coming in and they are just really battling. They are really, really suffering and the government insults them with $75 for the year. That's why we are saying we need to lift them - just slightly above the poverty line - with $150 a week, as that's how far behind they are.

What would you change, if elected, in Riverina?

What needs to change is more connection with the member. I would like to regularly - let's say once a month - go down not just in Wagga, but in other areas Forbes, Parkes, Cowra and all these other places, go to one of the local hotels or clubs and send out invites via social media so you're not getting the paper waste and come and talk to me.

What's happening is that we're not getting politicians talking to people. Politicians are dictating and imposing what they think is well for people.

And nationally?

On a national level, we have 17 days worth of liquid fuel. In this country, we don't refine fuels. We have a massive water crisis. We haven't built a significant dam since 1970.

We have a housing bubble looming. We are looking to repel the bail-in laws to protect people's bank deposits.

We want to set up a sovereign wealth fund to start putting Australia's superannuation into productive agriculture and infrastructure that we own.

We've sold everything off, so we are looking at the ports issue.

I say to voters here, with the Labor party likely to win this election, they need to turn this seat to myself because I will step in and we could have this seat in a very powerful position in a tight parliament.

We have the spectre of inheritance tax. The Labor party says it's not happening, but it's a bit like Julia Gillard saying she wouldn't bring the carbon tax in and she still did. If it wasn't for Clive Palmer, we would still have it.

That doesn't mean to say we don't believe in climate change either, or we do or we don't. It's just a matter that we think we need clean energy. We believe we need nuclear energy, hydroelectricity and renewable energy to be used at source such as homes and light industrial.

We also are obviously still supportive of coal because Australia coal is highly efficient. So if we shut down coal too quickly and before the rest of the world transitions - we blow apart our coal industry and lose a lot of jobs and at the end of the day, others will go and get the dirtier coal and emit more.

We do understand that coal will inevitably become a thing of the past, but that's not going to happen in the next decade.

You've taken on a big task in that you're taking on the Deputy Prime Minister. What do you think your chances are?

People are saying he was very bombastic in saying he was very safe.

The fact of the matter is he is sitting on a 56.5 per cent primary vote, so he only has to lose 6.6 per cent of that to go under into preference zone. I believe we can get him to preferences this election.