Federal election independent candidate Alex Dyson wants to shake up Wannon's safe seat

Mr Dyson, who grew up in Warrnambool and is known at 'Ratdog' to his fans from his stint as a presenter on ABC's youth radio station triple j, is running as an independent in the federal election.

He said there would be a lot more attention on Wannon if it was a marginal seat.

"I want to see a Prime Minister visit Wannon," he said.

"I don't remember a PM coming during an election campaign. They are not coming because they don't care about Wannon because it is safe. That is why they are touring the marginal seats. When they are there they make promises for that area. I cannot recall a Prime Minister doing that in our time. I want to make a bit of noise in Wannon."

He said everyone knew marginal seats received more funding.

"I want to give people an option," he said.

"It's possible to do better. If I am able to give (the Liberals) a scare, that would be great."

He said he wanted to get people to care more about the environment.

"We need to start taking care of things," he said.

"Even little steps. We don't have a target and we need one. I hope the people of Wannon can get behind that. The surfers, the children in all the primary schools, the farmers. The politicians have not been caring for it."

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Mr Dyson said the state of Wannon's roads was always a hot issue.

"Currently when driving to Warrnambool you go through the roadworks up to Colac and then it stops," he said.

"If you are building a road past Geelong it's to get to Warrnambool. Why do they stop in Colac? It's because (the electorate of) Corangamite has been very close. They don't continue to Warrnambool because Wannon is a safe seat. They only way we can have change is to get the voters in Wannon to send the politicians a message."

He said his nomination had come as a shock to some people.

"It was a bit of a surprise to my friends and family as well," he said.

"I had a lot of internal thoughts and I had told a few people that at some point in my life I would like to run. The last 12 years of voting has made me think I could get involved. I realised there would never be a convenient time, so why not now?

"There seems to be a upswell of support for sensible independents, whether it's Kerryn Phelps who won Wentworth or Zali Steggall who is going against Tony Abbott. They all seem to have their heads screwed on. While politically they might be inexperienced, like myself they are logical thinkers."

He said experts needed to be put in charge of portfolios.

"Put a health expert in as minister of health or a defence expert as defence minister," he said.

"The treasurer shouldn't be a gateway to Prime Minister, it should be the best possible person for the job."

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