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Doug Thompson is the longest-standing member of Fremantle City Council. In parliamentary terms, Doug is The Father of the House: he has been a member continuously since 1988. In October 2023, he will be reassigned to the new North ward from the old North ward – the new one is a bit bigger, including territory right down to Stevens Street (meaning that I personally am now in Doug's ward instead of the former East).
Doug Thompson in 2013, courtesy of the Fremantle Herald.
Brendan Foster:
DOUG THOMPSON says it “seemed like a good idea at the time” when he first ran for Fremantle city council back in 1988.
On May 7 the north ward veteran celebrated 25 years as an elected member. He admits he’d never expected to “still be here” a quarter-century later.
“I was involved with community activities at the time and a couple of councillors thought I would make a good candidate,” Cr Thompson says.
“I was very naive when I first started and it took me three to four years to learn how the system worked.
“Back then we had two meetings a month. In contrast to today the work has increased exponentially and you will often find councillors out two to three nights a week on council business.”
He’s worked with five mayors: John Cattalini, Jenny Archibald, Richard Utting (who’d edged him out of the mayoral race in 1997), Peter Tagliaferri and Brad Pettitt, and he regards Dr Pettitt as the pick of the crop.
“They all have their strengths and weaknesses,” he says. “It’s a hard choice but I have a high regard for Brad because of his dedication to Fremantle.”
Cr Thompson intends running again in October but he has a way to go to crack the longevity record: James Stevens was an elected member for 38 years.
“I’m enjoying working with the council and there are issues I’m still interested in,” he says.
He has “only a few regrets”.
“There is always the decisions you regret to do with the odd building, where you wished you spoke out more,” he says.
“There are some decisions like not spending more money on cycleways, which I regret now. But the good thing about being on council is you learn from your mistakes.”
The 64-year-old says he is most proud that the internal workings of the council are more coherent.
“It’s not very sexy, but the way the city has reworked itself internally might not mean much to the community, but it has had a big effect on planning and policy,” he says.
“As far as planning goes now we are miles ahead of other councils in WA.”
References and Links
Foster, Brendan 2013, 'The long idea', Fremantle Herald.
This page incorporates material from Garry Gillard's Freotopia website, that he started in 2014 and the contents of which he donated to Wikimedia Australia in 2024. The content was originally created on 30 October, 2021 and hosted at freotopia.org/people/thompsondoug.html (it was last updated on 18 August, 2023), and has been edited since it was imported here (see page history). The donated data is also preserved in the Internet Archive's collection.