David Gillespie (politician)  David Arthur Gillespie (born 20 December 1957) is an Australian politician and gastroenterologist. He has been a Nationals member of the House of Representatives since 2013, representing the Division of Lyne in New South Wales. He served as an assistant minister in the Turnbull Government from 2016 to 2018, serving as Assistant Minister for Rural Health (2016–2017), Assistant Minister for Health (2017) and Assistant Minister for Children and Families (2017–2018). Gillespie was born in Canberra and educated at Saint Ignatius' College, Riverview. He was a gastroenterologist for twenty years and, up until the 2013 election, was the director of physician training at Port Macquarie Base Hospital. Gillespie contested the seat of Lyne for the first time in 2010. While he lost to the incumbent, National-turned-independent Rob Oakeshott, the Nationals picked up an 11-point swing. Following Oakeshott's retirement at the 2013 federal election, Gillespie contested the seat again and won it resoundingly. During Oakeshott's tenure, Lyne remained a comfortably safe National seat in a traditional two-party matchup with Labor, so it had been expected that the seat would revert to the Nationals once Oakeshott retired. After the re-election of the Turnbull Government at the 2016 federal election, Gillespie was appointed Assistant Minister for Rural Health in the a ministerial reshuffle. He was promoted to Assistant Minister for Health in a subsequent rearrangement of the ministry in January 2017. Gillespie has argued for politicians who represent electorates larger than 10,000 square kilometres (such as his own) to receive additional expenses. In February 2018, Gillespie was briefly a candidate to replace Barnaby Joyce as National Party leader. After finding a lack of support for his candidacy within the party room, he withdrew from the race and endorsed Michael McCormack, the only other announced candidate. Gillespie was not retained in the ministry when Scott Morrison replaced Turnbull as prime minister in August 2018. He said he was "disappointed but it is a very competitive space, and the reshuffle is a reflection of how much talent we have". He also stated that "the general electorate was pretty disgusted with all the factional wars that we saw played out in public". Following the resignation of Bridget McKenzie, Gillespie stood unsuccessfully for the deputy leadership of the National Party in February 2020. He was defeated by David Littleproud, with Keith Pitt also running. In the lead-up to the vote, he criticised party leader Michael McCormack's lack of engagement with the national media.