Mr Clare, who is the Rise Up Australia Party candidate for the seat of Paterson, was once a member of the Liberal Party.

But he found that the pressure to toe the party line over the needs of the community dissatisfied him – so he left.

Since then, he has run for office in various levels of government.

He joined Rise Up Australia Party when Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull called the election earlier this year and thinks the minor parties can hold the major parties to account.

According to the conservative party’s election pamphlet, the group is against Sharia Law, opposed to multiculturalism but supports multi-ethnicism.

The pamphlet also says the party supports free speech and is against political correctness. 

It also advocates for reinforcing employment in rural and regional areas and a minimum of 51 per cent Australian ownership of land and infrastructure.

“I’m one of these people who are classified as an Australian nationalist and therefore I’m very much on the side of the Australian Patriots,” Mr Clare said.

The self-described republican said he wanted to see reform to the Parliamentary process and the introduction of online citizens referendum for major issues.

“We citizens are left without any say once parliamentarians are elected,” he said. “Democracy, as we run it here in Australia, is a failure because it doesn’t involve the people… and governments can do what they like.”

Mr Clare also supports the introduction of compulsory military national service for unemployed people under the age of 60.

“One of the main things they’ll be doing is backing up the police. They’ll be doing patrols during the night and in shopping centres, just showing the flag and involving the community."

On a local level, Mr Clare said he supported compensation for people caught up in the contamination crisis at Williamtown, and he saw high unemployment and flooding as major issues in Paterson.

He said the flood-prone road at Testers Hollow should have been raised years ago, but Maitland’s inundation problems affected people beyond Cessnock Road and the Gillieston Heights area.

“Flooding is a primary problem in the Maitland area,” he said.

“I’ve always said that we should dig the rivers deeper to accommodate the water overflowing here. There are a lot of things that could be done but there’s a lack of money or unwillingness to tackle the big projects.”