Karen Struthers
Karen Struthers is an Australian politician who served in the Legislative Assembly of Queensland from 1998 to 2012.
She first entered Parliament at the 1998 election, winning the seat of Archerfield after the retirement of sitting member Len Ardill.
Archerfield was abolished in a redistribution ahead of the 2001 state election, and Struthers followed most of her constituents into the new seat of Algester, which she held until her defeat in the 2012 election. She was promoted to the front bench on 12 February 2004 as Parliamentary Secretary to the Premier and Minister for Trade. She was appointed Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Employment, Training and Industrial Relations on 28 July 2012 and became Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Health on 13 September 2006. In March 2009, she was promoted to the Cabinet as Minister for Community Services and Housing and Minister for Women.
Struthers was one of several Labor MPs in previously safe seats who were swept out in the massive Liberal National landslide of 2012, losing to LNP challenger Anthony Shorten on a swing of over 18 percent—enough to turn the seat from safe Labor to safe LNP in one stroke. In a measure of the backlash against Labor that year, Struthers had seen off a challenge from Shorten in 2009, taking 59 percent of the two-party vote.
