Barry O’Sullivan
Fossil Fuels | LNP | Revolving Doors
Current Position
Barry O’Sullivan has no current position within the government.
Previous Positions
Parliamentary service
- Elected to the Senate for Queensland 2016. Retired at the expiration of term 2019.
Parliamentary party positions
- Nationals Whip in the Senate from 2014 to 2016.
Party positions
- Chair of the Nationals Rockhampton Branch.
- Chair of the Nationals Rockhampton State Electorate Council.
- Director of the Nationals Rockhampton Campaign Committee.
- Member of the Liberal National Party Candidate Review Committee from 2008 to 2013.
- Treasurer of the Liberal National Party State Branch (Qld.) from 2009 to 2013.
- Chair of the Liberal National Party Candidate Review Committee from 2010 to 2013.
Private positions (selected)
- Managing Director of Jilbridge Pty. Ltd. and NewLands Group Holdings Pty. Ltd. from 1991 to 2013.
Mining Connections
Barry O’Sullivan has been a strong supporter of coal projects throughout his short-lived senate career, voting in favour of pro-coal legislation a total of 18 times in five years.
- Former National Party Senator Barry O’Sullivan was treasurer of the Queensland LNP from 2009-2013. He previously held the role of chair of the Rockhampton Branch in central Queensland, and was chair and campaign director of the Rockhampton state electorate. O’Sullivan replaced Barnaby Joyce in the Queensland Senate on 11 February 2014, after being cleared by Queensland’s crime and misconduct commission.
- In 1991, O’Sullivan established Jilbridge Pty Ltd, a development and civil construction business based in Toowoomba, Qld. In September 2008, a few weeks after registering the merger of the Liberal and National parties in Queensland, Barry O’Sullivan founded Newlands Civil Construction Pty Ltd. The merged LNP facilitated the entry of unconventional gas to Queensland.
- O’Sullivan resigned as director of Newlands in 2012 prior to his Senate nomination, but retained a stake through Jilbridge (his commercial building and investment firm) and passed Newlands to his son, Barry O’Sullivan Jnr.
- Barry O’Sullivan’s register of interests during his term as Senator (from 11 February 2014 to 30 June 2019), lists him as beneficiary of various family trusts, including The O’Sullivan Investment Trust, and lists Barry Colin O’Sullivan (Jnr) as beneficiary of the Annie O’Sullivan Family Trust. O’Sullivan also nominates shareholdings in Jilbridge Pty Ltd, New Lands Group Pty Ltd, Newlands Civil Construction Pty Ltd, New Lands Group Holdings Pty Ltd and O’Sullivan & Sons Pty Ltd.
- Newlands’ contracts include Origin Energy’s Australian Pacific LNG (APLNG) coal seam gas project. The company has obtained pre-qualifications for Queensland Gas Company (QGC), Arrow Energy, Queensland government and Northern Territory government work.
- O’Sullivan’s company laid the foundations for CSG-LNG entry across regional Queensland, including the main entrance to Wagners’ Wellcamp Airport. In August 2017, it was reported that O’Sullivan’s family business (Newlands Group) had been awarded $25 million for a Queensland infrastructure project that was 80% funded by the Commonwealth government.