Former Liberal member for Hillarys Peter Katsambanis has died, aged 60.<\/p>\n
Mr Katsambanis\u2019 wife Karalee posted the sad news on social media on Saturday.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt is with great sadness and gratitude to the heart transplant team at The Alfred (Hospital in Melbourne) for caring for our darling Peter who has now sadly passed away,\u201d Mrs Katsambanis said in her post.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe are all devastated, he was a great man.\u201d<\/p>\n
Mr Katsambanis \u2014 a former member of the Victorian Parliament before moving to WA \u2014 was elected to the Legislative Council of the WA Parliament at the 2013 State election.<\/p>\n
Four years later, he resigned to successfully contest the Legislative Assembly seat of Hillarys. He later lost the seat to Labor\u2019s Caitlin Collins in 2021.<\/p>\n
WA Liberals, including former premier Colin Barnett, paid tribute to their former colleague.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt is very sad news to hear of Peter\u2019s passing,\u201d Mr Barnett said.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe was a popular member of parliament and I very much enjoyed his company and the way he approached things.<\/p>\n
\u201cPeter just loved politics and participating. He had a good policy brain and he was a team player.\u201d<\/p>\n
The former premier said that was \u201cexemplified\u201d when he switched from Legislative council to assembly after Rob Johnson left the Liberals to run as an independent.<\/p>\n
\u201cPeter took a risk to his own career to do what he believed was the right thing to do and win that seat for the Liberals,\u201d Mr Barnett said.<\/p>\n
WA Liberal leader Basil Zempilas also paid his respects, saying said Mr Katsambanis had \u201cmade an incredible contribution to the Liberal Party and to public life in two States\u201d.<\/p>\n
\u201cService always came first for Peter, he was such a committed representative and he occupies a rare place in Australian politics having served in the Victorian Parliament and in both houses of the Parliament of Western Australia,\u201d Mr Zempilas said.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe also made a significant contribution to the Greek Australian community right around the country.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe will be greatly missed by his friends and former colleagues and we extend our very sincere condolences to Karalee and all the family.\u201d<\/p>\n
Liberal state director Simon Morgan said Mr Katsambanis was the \u201cfinest of warriors\u201d.<\/p>\n
\u201cPeter Katsambanis was the fiercest and finest of warriors for the Liberal cause as a student, a trusted adviser and as a Member of Parliament in both Victoria and Western Australia,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
\u201cOur Party is poorer for his loss and we extend our heartfelt sympathies to Karalee and to all of Peter\u2019s children at this sad time.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Former Liberal member for Hillarys Peter Katsambanis has died, aged 60. Mr Katsambanis\u2019 wife Karalee posted the sad…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":89094,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[22,21,152,149,1072,464],"class_list":["post-89093","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-australia","tag-au","tag-austrlia","tag-news","tag-politics","tag-state-politics","tag-wa-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/89093","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=89093"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/89093\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/89094"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=89093"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=89093"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=89093"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}