Life goes on for Austin Evans, who was the former Member for Murray before he lost the state election nearly six months ago.
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After leaving office Mr Evans went on a job hunt and soon found work driving tractors and transporting cotton modules on farms around the region.
That helped pay the bills while he set up his engineering contracting business, which is now up and running.
He's recently found his first contracting gig with his old employer Coleambally Irrigation, where he draws upon his engineering know-how to write reports and help out around the place.
Mr Evans said he's enjoyed getting back to his old engineering roots, which used to be his career before getting into politics.
I still have a desire to serve the community
- Austin Evans, former Member for Murray
"Engineering allows you to sit down one one project and get stuck into it," Mr Evans said.
"It's very difficult to do that in parliament because you have so many issues to cover. You rely a lot on ministers and departmental staff to fix those issues."
Although Mr Evans said he's enjoying the quieter engineering life, he still hasn't given up on the idea of getting back into politics one of these days.
He recently ran for a seat in the NSW Legislative Council that became vacant after former Nationals MLC Niall Blair announced his retirement from politics.
He didn't get the position, but Mr Evans said he hasn't ruled out the idea of re-contesting the seat of Murray at the next state election.
"I still have a desire to serve the community," Mr Evans said.
"I'll see what I'm doing in three year's time."
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In the meantime Mr Evans said he'll be watching closely to see whether his successor Helen Dalton would be able to keep her election promises.
In particular, he'd previously described her promise of building a new hospital in two years as "not physically possible".
"That's going to be a very difficult challenge to meet that promise," he said.
Looking back at his time in office, Mr Evans said it had been one hectic adventure.
In 16 months he travelled 85,000 kilometres and spoken to thousands upon thousands of people in the Murray electorate.
"It was, in a word, busy," he said.
But despite the long hours on the road and in the office, Mr Evans said he could look back on his time with a sense of satisfaction.
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