Background
Pyne was born in Gordonvale, the son of former Cairns mayor Tom Pyne, and raised in the suburb of Edmonton.
Pyne was born in Gordonvale, the son of former Cairns mayor Tom Pyne, and raised in the suburb of Edmonton.
James Cook University. Queensland University of Technology.
Pyne was formerly a two-term councillor for the Cairns Regional Council. He suffered a spinal cord injury in December 1991 through breaking his neck in a diving accident when he was 23 years old, which resulted in him becoming quadriplegic. He spent nine months recovering in the Princess Alexandra Hospital"s Spinal Unit in Brisbane before going on to gain a Bachelor of Arts in History and Politics from James Cook University and a Law Degree from Queensland University of Technology.
He first ran in 2008 as Division 3 councillor in the Cairns Regional Council elections, beating the former Deputy Mayor Terry James He inspected the Cairns Regional Council head office prior to taking up his role to ensure it was wheelchair accessible.
He was re-elected in 2012. Division 3 includes the suburbs of Bayview Heights, Lamb Range, Mount Sheridan, White Rock and Woree.
In March 2014 a Local Government formal complaint was filed against him for breaching Cairns Regional Council"s media policy rules. In September 2013, he announced that he would contest Australian Labor Party preselection for the 2015 state election in the seat of Cairns, and in April 2014 he was nominated as the Labor candidate.
On 7 March 2016, after being publicly critical of a number of government decisions, Pyne resigned from the Labor Party, saying that he was "no longer prepared to be told how to vote by someone from Brisbane".
He moved to the crossbench to sit as an independent member.
Australian Labor Party, independent politician.
He has been a member of the Legislative Assembly of Queensland since January 2015, representing the electorate of Cairns. He was elected for the Australian Labor Party, but resigned to sit as an independent in March 2016. Pyne is Australia"s first quadriplegic member of parliament.
In March 2015, Queensland"s Parliament building underwent renovations to accommodate its first quadriplegic member of parliament, including removing two seats and desks in the chamber to allow Rob wheelchair access.