1957 Queensland state election

1957 Queensland state election

3 August 1957
All 75 seats in the Legislative Assembly of Queensland 38 Assembly seats were needed for a majority
Registered	747,455 4.9%
Turnout	706,909 (94.58%) (1.69 pp)
First party Second party   Leader Frank Nicklin Jack Duggan Party Country Labor Leader since 21 May 1941 24 April 1957 Leader's seat Landsborough Toowoomba (lost seat) Last election 16 seats 49 seats Seats won 24 seats 20 seats Seat change 8 29 Popular vote 139,720 201,971 Percentage 19.99% 28.90% Swing 0.72 pp 5.98 pp   Third party Fourth party   Leader Kenneth Morris Vince Gair Party Liberal Queensland Labor Leader since 17 August 1954 26 April 1957 Leader's seat Mount Coot-tha South Brisbane Last election 8 seats New party Seats won 18 seats 11 seats Seat change 10 11 Popular vote 162,372 163,534 Percentage 23.23% 23.40% Swing 7.34 pp 23.40 pp
Legislative Assembly after the election
Premier before election Vince Gair Queensland Labor Elected Premier Frank Nicklin Country

Elections were held in the Australian state of Queensland on 3 August 1957 to elect the 75 members of the state's Legislative Assembly. The major parties contesting the election were the Queensland Labor Party led by Premier Vince Gair, the Labor Party led by former Deputy Premier Jack Duggan, and the Country-Liberal coalition led by Frank Nicklin.

The elections, only 15 months into the parliamentary term, were made necessary by the collapse of the nine-term Labor government. Gair had formed the Queensland Labor Party after being expelled from the Labor Party, and attempted to stay in power as a minority government. However, a request for supply was denied on 12 June, forcing the election. The Country-Liberal Coalition won a decisive victory, taking 42 seats against only 31 for the two Labor factions combined.

Key dates

Date	Event
24 April 1957	Vince Gair was expelled from the Labor Party.
26 April 1957	The Queensland Labor Party was formed, and Parliament was prorogued to 11 June.
11 June 1957	Parliament resumed for business at noon.
13 June 1957	The Parliament was dissolved.
2 July 1957	Writs were issued by the Administrator to proceed with an election.
12 July 1957	Close of nominations.
3 August 1957	Polling day, between the hours of 8am and 6pm.
12 August 1957	The Gair Ministry resigned and the Nicklin Ministry was sworn in.
24 August 1957	The writ was returned and the results formally declared.
27 August 1957	Parliament resumed for business.

Background

On 18 April 1957, the Queensland Central Executive of the Labor Party passed a vote of no confidence in Premier Gair, and on 24 April, despite having gained a unanimous vote of support from the Cabinet, he was expelled from the Labor Party. On 26 April, Gair and 25 MLAs met and formed the Queensland Labor Party (QLP) with those present, with Gair as leader. Those at the meeting included all of the Cabinet except Deputy Premier Jack Duggan and two ex-Labor Independents. All these were also expelled from the party. Duggan resigned from the ministry on 29 April and succeeded Gair as leader of the Labor Party, which commanded the support of 22 MLAs.

Gair almost immediately began talks with Nicklin for confidence and supply support in the legislature. However, Nicklin broke them off on the advice of federal Country Party leader Arthur Fadden, who believed the ructions in Labor gave Nicklin a chance to become Premier himself, ending 22 years in opposition. On 12 June 1957, Lieutenant Governor and Chief Justice of Queensland Alan Mansfield (Governor John Lavarack was indisposed) ordered Parliament to reassemble. Shortly after 10:30 pm that night, Treasurer Ted Walsh moved that supply be granted to the Gair QLP government. The motion was defeated after the ALP and Coalition rose to vote against it, bringing the Gair government down. Gair immediately asked for new elections, which were called for 3 August.

Campaign

On 1 July, Frank Nicklin delivered the Country Party's policy speech at Maroochydore, while Kenneth Morris delivered the Liberal Party's policy speech in Brisbane. The two coalition partners declared to the electorate that only they could deliver unity and effective government, an acceleration of development and civil rights, as well as court supervision of union ballots to limit strike action.

On 4 July, Jack Duggan, the Labor leader, announced Labor's campaign slogan, "A fair go for all", and promised three weeks' annual leave (the issue over which Premier Vince Gair and the party executive had split) would be implemented if his party was elected. On 8 July, Gair, the incumbent Premier representing the Queensland Labor Party (QLP), spent half his speech talking about the dispute that had led to the split, promised an attack upon Communism and a continuance of the previous government's development platform.

Nominations closed on 12 July, with a record total of 219 candidates. Four seats were uncontested, but many seats had both Labor and QLP contestants. Some contests became particularly bitter as the Labor Party accused their QLP opponents of sectarianism and alleged direct interference by ministers of the Catholic Church, despite Archbishop James Duhig's refusal to get involved. The campaigns were strongest in the leaders' and deputy leaders' own seats.

Politicians from around Australia, in particular from the Labor Party, came to Queensland during the campaign, including the federal opposition leader, Dr H. V. Evatt, Arthur Calwell, Clyde Cameron and former Victorian premier John Cain, who died of a stroke on 9 August after giving a speech in Townsville.

Results

See also: Results of the Queensland state election, 1957

When the writs were dropped, the Labor forces were in a precarious position. Every ALP MP faced a QLP challenger, and every QLP MP faced an ALP challenger. This created dozens of three-cornered contests, and the first-past-the-post system left them without the option of directing preferences to each other even if they wanted to do so.

The Coalition actually suffered a swing of 1.2 percent against it. However, the ructions in Labor allowed the Coalition to win a number of three-cornered contests, assuring a comfortable majority for Nicklin, with 42 seats against only 31 for the two Labor factions combined. The ALP lost both Duggan and deputy leader Felix Dittmer, whose seats were won by Liberal candidates. The QLP lost 14 seats (two of them to the ALP), but seven of the ten ministers retained their seats. This began what would be 32 years of non-Labor government in Queensland.

Queensland state election, 3 August 1957 Legislative Assembly << 1956–1960 >>
Enrolled voters		747,455[1]
Votes cast		706,909		Turnout	94.58	+1.57
Informal votes		8,033		Informal	1.14	–0.07
Summary of votes by party
Party		Primary votes	%	Swing	Seats	Change
	Labor	201,971	28.90	–22.32	20	–29
	Queensland Labor	163,534	23.40	+23.40	11	+11
	Liberal	162,372	23.23	–1.84	18	+10
	Country	139,720	19.99	+0.72	24	+ 8
	NQ Labor	7,488	1.07	–0.25	1	± 0
	Ind. Labor	2,257	0.32	+0.26	0	± 0
	Ind. Conservative	2,723	0.39	+0.39	0	± 0
	Independent	18,811	2.69	–0.17	1	± 0
Total		698,876			75

Popular vote Labor   28.90% Queensland Labor   23.40% Liberal   23.23% Country   19.99% NQ Labor   1.07% Independents   3.40%

Seats Country   32.00% Labor   26.67% Liberal   24.00% Queensland Labor   14.67% NQ Labor   1.33% Independents   1.33%

¹ 791,719 electors were enrolled to vote at the election, but three Country seats representing 30,956 enrolled voters and one Liberal seat representing 13,308 voters were unopposed.

Seats changing party representation

This table lists changes in party representation at the 1957 election.

Party changes before election

The following seats changed party representation before the election due to the split of the ALP.

Seat	Incumbent member	Former party		New party
Baroona	Bill Power		Australian Labor		Queensland Labor
Belyando	Tom Foley		Australian Labor		Queensland Labor
Bulimba	Bob Gardner		Australian Labor		Queensland Labor
Bundaberg	Ted Walsh		Australian Labor		Queensland Labor
Carnarvon	Paul Hilton		Australian Labor		Queensland Labor
Carpentaria	Norm Smith		Australian Labor		Queensland Labor
Charters Towers	Arthur Jones		Australian Labor		Queensland Labor
Condamine	Les Diplock		Australian Labor		Queensland Labor
Cook	Bunny Adair		Australian Labor		Queensland Labor
Fortitude Valley	Mick Brosnan		Australian Labor		Queensland Labor
Gregory	George Devries		Australian Labor		Queensland Labor
Haughton	Colin McCathie		Australian Labor		Queensland Labor
Keppel	Viv Cooper		Australian Labor		Queensland Labor
Kurilpa	Tom Moores		Australian Labor		Queensland Labor
Merthyr	Bill Moore		Australian Labor		Queensland Labor
Mulgrave	Charles English		Australian Labor		Queensland Labor
Nash	Greg Kehoe		Australian Labor		Queensland Labor
Nundah	Jim Hadley		Australian Labor		Queensland Labor
Rockhampton	Mick Gardner		Australian Labor		Queensland Labor
Roma	Alfred Dohring		Australian Labor		Queensland Labor
Sandgate	Herbert Robinson		Australian Labor		Queensland Labor
Somerset	Alexander Skinner		Australian Labor		Queensland Labor
South Brisbane	Vince Gair		Australian Labor		Queensland Labor
Tablelands	Harold Collins		Australian Labor		Queensland Labor
Windsor	Tom Rasey		Australian Labor		Queensland Labor

Seats changing hands at election

Seat	Incumbent member	Party		New member	Party
Balonne	John Taylor		Labor	Eddie Beardmore		Country
Bulimba	Bob Gardner		Queensland Labor	Jack Houston		Labor
Buranda	Dick Brown		Labor	Keith Hooper		Liberal
Flinders	Frank Forde		Labor	Bill Lonergan		Country
Fortitude Valley	Mick Brosnan		Queensland Labor	Bob Windsor		Liberal
Gregory*	George Devries		Queensland Labor	Wally Rae		Country
Kelvin Grove	Bert Turner		Labor	Douglas Tooth		Liberal
Keppel	Viv Cooper		Queensland Labor	Merv Thackeray		Labor
Kurilpa	Tom Moores		Queensland Labor	Peter Connolly		Liberal
Merthyr	Bill Moore		Queensland Labor	Sam Ramsden		Liberal
Mount Gravatt	Felix Dittmer		Labor	Graham Hart		Liberal
Mulgrave	Charles English		Queensland Labor	Bob Watson		Country
Nash	Greg Kehoe		Queensland Labor	Max Hodges		Country
Nundah	Jim Hadley		Queensland Labor	William Knox		Liberal
Roma	Alfred Dohring		Queensland Labor	William Ewan		Country
Sandgate	Herbert Robinson		Queensland Labor	Thomas Ahearn		Liberal
Somerset	Alexander Skinner		Queensland Labor	Harold Richter		Country
Tablelands	Harold Collins		Queensland Labor	Tom Gilmore		Country
Toowoomba	Jack Duggan		Labor	Mervyn Anderson		Liberal
Windsor	Tom Rasey		Queensland Labor	Ray Smith		Liberal

• Members in **italics** did not recontest their seats.
• All sitting members of the Queensland Labor Party were elected at the previous election as ALP candidates.
• Sitting member for Gregory, George Devries died before election day. As a result, a supplementary election was held in October for the seat.

Aftermath

The Country Party's win in this election proved to be one of the major turning points in Queensland politics; they remained in power continuously until the 1989 state election.

The ALP elected Les Wood as party leader and Eric Lloyd as deputy leader; neither had previously served in a ministry. Wood, the member for North Toowoomba, died in office on 29 March 1958, and Duggan returned as both a member of Parliament and leader of the party at the by-election on 31 May. Dittmer, meanwhile, was elected to the Australian Senate.

Former Prime Minister Frank Forde, who lost his seat of Flinders by one vote, alleged the wrongful disallowance of some votes and successfully lodged a petition against his opponent's return at the Court of Disputed Returns; however he lost the resulting by-election.

See also

• Members of the Queensland Legislative Assembly, 1956–1957
• Members of the Queensland Legislative Assembly, 1957–1960
• Candidates of the Queensland state election, 1957
• Gair Ministry
• Nicklin Ministry