00:00Yeah, look, really sad situation that we don't have our former candidate running anymore
00:18for Port Macquarie. In very simple terms, Dr. Young was not endorsed by the Central
00:23Executive at a meeting the other night. There are things that I gather he has mentioned
00:28in a statement he's released, which I won't be talking about. And the job now is to actually
00:34find the candidate for Port Macquarie that can represent the New South Wales Nationals
00:38and win the seat. There's been a series of issues raised that I wasn't comfortable with
00:43the candidate having to deal with in the public eye. And I wasn't comfortable with the party
00:49having to deal with from a political perspective in the future. And everyone on Central Executive
00:54agreed the best way forward was to allow Dr. Young some space to do his own thing
00:59and figure things out, not put him in the public eye. And therefore he was not endorsed
01:04as the candidate. It's not embarrassing at all. It's a matter of what happened. It's
01:09life. We're all human beings. No one came here hoping something would go wrong. To try
01:14and suggest it's embarrassing is ridiculous, quite frankly. It is unfortunate is what it
01:19is. Every single MP who came here was here for the right reason. And that was to support
01:24the candidate and make sure he felt like he had support. Now things change. Life changes.
01:30Every day something can be thrown up. That's what's happened in this circumstance. It's
01:34terribly unfortunate that it has. But it's no one's fault. It just happened. And we now
01:40wish him all the best. We move on. We will have a candidate that will represent Port
01:45Macquarie in the best possible way. And we are here to win the seat of Port Macquarie.
01:49The reality is you never want this sort of thing to happen. No one wants a candidate
01:54to then not be the candidate anymore. It's not the first time it's ever happened. It's
01:58not the last time it'll ever happen. There's been very famous candidates who've left mid-interview
02:03on radio. It's not the first time it's happened. Doesn't mean it's a comfortable thing. Doesn't
02:08mean it's my preference. But at the end of the day we move forward and we make sure we
02:14represent Port Macquarie the best we can.
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