He was a Liberal Party member of the Western Australian Legislative Council from 24 December 1996 to 22 May 1997, representing North Metropolitan Region.
Carstairs was born in Kalgoorlie, and was a retired master butcher and City of Wanneroo councillor before entering politics.
This necessitated a countback for the final months of MacLean's term in the Legislative Council, which did not finish until the following year, and Carstairs was elected.
[1] In parliament, he briefly served on the Standing Committee on Estimates and Financial Operations in 1997, and provided the decisive vote in support of major industrial relations changes proposed by the Court Liberal government.
[1][2][3] Carstairs ran for mayor of the City of Wanneroo in both the 1999 and 2003 local government elections, but lost to Jon Kelly both times.