A member of the Liberal Party, he served as Minister for Immigration and Ethnic Affairs in the Fraser government from 1982 to 1983.
[1] The following year, he defeated incumbent single-term MP Marshall Cooke for Liberal preselection in the seat of Petrie.
At a policy forum in August 1982 he stated that Australia had never been a monocultural society, but that "multiculturalism can become a reality only when it is accepted by the nation as a whole".
[5] Hodges lost his seat to the Australian Labor Party (ALP) candidate Dean Wells at the 1983 election.
[8] He narrowly lost Petrie a second time at the 1987 election, following the National Party's decision to run a candidate against him in support of "Joh for Canberra" campaign.