Tom Kenyon
| Tom Kenyon | |
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| Member of the South Australian Parliament for Newland |
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Assumed office 18 March 2006 |
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| Personal details | |
| Born |
Thomas Richard Kenyon 26 February 1972 |
| Political party | Australian Labor Party (SA) |
Thomas Richard "Tom" Kenyon (born 26 February 1972) is an Australian politician representing the South Australian House of Assembly seat of Newland for the South Australian Branch of the Australian Labor Party since the 2006 election.
Kenyon was raised in Gawler and Adelaide. He is the eldest of five children born to Neville and Elizabeth Kenyon. His siblings are Foof, Jamie, Horse, Pip and Notum. He was educated at Saint Ignatius College, South Australia and studied Asian Studies at Flinders University. He subsequently completed a Bachelor of Applied Science in Environmental Management at the University of South Australia. After working in a number of positions, including as a jackaroo and union organiser, Kenyon was employed as an advisor to Minister for Mineral Resources and Development Paul Holloway, a position which he held until his election to parliament. Kenyon is linked with the Shop, Distributive and Allied Employees Association (SDA).
Kenyon made his first bid for parliament in his early 20s, as the Labor candidate in the safe Liberal state seat of Heysen at the 1997 state election, achieving a 12.3-point two-party swing.
Kenyon was endorsed unopposed as the party's candidate for the electorate of Newland at the 2006 state election, where veteran Liberal MP Dorothy Kotz was retiring. He singled out increasing the use of public transport and addressing youth employment as priorities, and there was some media speculation that his status as a young, relatively conservative father of three would be well-supported in the area of Adelaide known as the "Bible Belt". To this extent, polls as early as 2005 began showing that Kenyon was in with a real chance of winning the seat, although Kotz had previously held the seat by a fair margin. There was ultimately a landslide result across the city on election day, and he achieved a 12.5-point two-party swing to finish with a 56.8 percent two-party vote, polling more than double the required swing needed to take the seat, claiming victory after only 90 minutes of counting.
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