Ron Smith – update

Following my previous post, I sought comment from Dr. Ron Smith. His response:

Dear Geoffrey,

I am overseas at the moment. I will hope to have a look at your dissertation late November, when I get back.

I am no longer involved with ACT, though I have some contact with ACT and former ACT persons.

Regards

Ron Smith

This is pretty much what I expected to hear. As I understand it there are a lot of people around who were enthusiastic about ACT in its incipient and more wealthy phase around the mid-1990s, but who dropped off as the party became more institutionalized and more socially conservative.

Another example might be Craig Heatley, founder of Sky Television, who was one of ACT’s early big financial backers, but as far as I can make out has had little involvement in recent years. Unlike Smith, Heatley was never on the list (indeed, his role in ACT was always rather secretive). I’ll see if I can turn up some information on what happened to Heatley and report back in a later post, although I suspect I will not be able to find out much.