When was the Australian government formed?
Government of Australia
The Commonwealth of Australia was formed in 1901 as a result of an agreement among six self-governing British colonies, which became the six states. The terms of this contract are embodied in the Australian Constitution, which was drawn up at a Constitutional Convention and ratified by the people of the colonies at referendums. The Australian head of state is the Queen of Australia who is represented by the Governor-General of Australia, with executive powers delegated by constitutional convention to the Australian head of government, the Prime Minister of Australia.
History of the Australian Army
The history of the Australian Army dates back to colonial forces, prior to the Federation of Australia in 1901. Some of the colonial forces, which served the states of Australia at the time, were gradually united into federal units between 1899 and 1903; thus forming the beginning of the Australian Army. The colonial armies were officially united as the "Commonwealth Military Forces" in the Defence Act of 1903. Since then the Australian Army as an organization has changed to suit to needs of the nation; with particular changes occurring during, and following, the World Wars, Korean War, Vietnam War and Gulf War. In 1916 the title "Australian Military Forces" was adopted and remained its official name until 1980, after which it became known as the "Australian Army".
Canberra
In December 1988, the ACT was granted full self-government through an Act of the Commonwealth Parliament. Following the first election on 4 March 1989, a 17-member Legislative Assembly sat at temporary offices at 1 Constitution Avenue, Civic, on 11 May 1989. Permanent premises were opened on London Circuit in 1994. The Australian Labor Party formed the ACT's first government, led by the Chief Minister Rosemary Follett, who made history as Australia's first female head of government.
Australian labour movement
The failure of each of the industrial conflicts of the 1890s was seen as a demoralising blow for the labour movement. Some unionists, demoralised with direct action, turned to a political solution and sought election to colonial parliaments, and led to the formation of the Australian Labor Party. The first general election contested by Labour candidates was the 1891 New South Wales election, where Labour Electoral League of New South Wales candidates won 35 of 141 seats, giving Labour the balance of power. Also in 1891, three United Labor Party (ULP) of South Australia candidates were elected to the South Australian Legislative Council. At the 1893 South Australian election the United Labor Party led by John McPherson won 10 of the 54 seats and the balance of power in the House of Assembly, allowing the liberal government of Charles Kingston to be formed, ousting the conservative government of John Downer. By the 1905 South Australian election Thomas Price became the first Labor Premier of South Australia. Re-elected at the 1906 double dissolution election serving until his death in 1909, it was the world's first stable Labour Party government. So successful, John Verran led Labor to form the state's first of many majority governments at the 1910 South Australian election. In 1899, Anderson Dawson formed a Labour minority government in Queensland, the first Labour Party government in the world, which lasted one week while the conservatives regrouped after a split.
History of Australia
Gold rushes and agricultural industries brought prosperity. Autonomous parliamentary democracies began to be established throughout the six British colonies from the mid-19th century. The colonies voted by referendum to unite in a federation in 1901, and modern Australia came into being. Australia fought on the side of Britain in the two world wars and became a long-standing ally of the United States when threatened by Imperial Japan during World War II. Trade with Asia increased and a post-war immigration program received more than 6.5 million migrants from every continent. Supported by immigration of people from more than 200 countries since the end of World War II, the population increased to more than 23 million by 2014, and sustains the world's 12th largest national economy.
History of the Australian Labor Party
The state branches were also successful, except in Victoria, where the strength of Deakinite liberalism inhibited the party's growth. The state branches formed their first majority governments in New South Wales and South Australia in 1910, in Western Australia in 1911, in Queensland in 1915 and in Tasmania in 1925. Such success eluded equivalent social democratic and labour parties in other countries for many years. Labor also submitted two referenda questions in 1911, both of which were lost. The party adopted the formal name "Australian Labour Party" in 1908, but changed the spelling of "Labour" in its name to "Labor" in 1912.
Australian Labor Party
The ALP was not founded as a federal party until after the first sitting of the Australian Parliament in 1901. Nevertheless, it is regarded as descended from labour parties founded in the various Australian colonies by the emerging labour movement in Australia, formally beginning in 1891. Labor is thus the country's oldest political party. Colonial labour parties contested seats from 1891, and federal seats following Federation at the 1901 federal election. The ALP formed the world's first Labour Party government, as well as the world's first social democratic government at a national level. Labor was the first party in Australia to win a majority in either house of the Australian Parliament, at the 1910 federal election. The Australian Labor Party at both a federal and state/colony level predates, among others, both the British Labour Party and the New Zealand Labour Party in party formation, government, and policy implementation. Internationally, the ALP is a member of the Progressive Alliance network of social-democratic parties, having previously been a member of the Socialist International.
History of Australia (1901–45)
The history of Australia from 1901–1945 begins with the federation of the six colonies to create the Commonwealth of Australia. The young nation joined Britain in the First World War, suffered through the Great Depression in Australia as part of the global Great Depression and again joined Britain in the Second World War against Nazi Germany in 1939. Imperial Japan launched air raids and submarine raids against Australian cities during the Pacific War.
Fraser Government
The Fraser Government was the federal executive government of Australia led by Prime Minister Malcolm Fraser. It was made up of members of a Liberal-Country party coalition in the Australian Parliament from November 1975 to March 1983. Initially appointed as a "caretaker" government following the dismissal of the Whitlam Government, Fraser won in a landslide at the resulting 1975 Australian federal election, and won substantial majorities at the subsequent 1977 and 1980 elections, before losing to the Bob Hawke-led Australian Labor Party in the 1983 election.
Third Deakin Ministry
The Third Deakin Ministry (Protectionist) was the 6th ministry of the Government of Australia. It was led by the country's 2nd Prime Minister, Alfred Deakin. The Third Deakin Ministry succeeded the Second Deakin Ministry, which dissolved on 24 January 1907 following the federal election that took place in December 1906. The ministry was replaced by the First Fisher Ministry on 13 November 1908 after the Labour Party withdrew their support and formed their own minority government.
Fadden Government
The United Australia Party disintegrated after suffering a heavy defeat in the election. Robert Menzies called a conference of conservative parties and other groups opposed to the ruling Australian Labor Party which met in Canberra on 13 October 1944, and again in Albury in December 1944. The formation of a new party – the Liberal Party of Australia – was formally announced at Sydney Town Hall on 31 August 1945.
Prime Minister's Department (Australia)
The Prime Minister's Department was an Australian government department that existed between July 1911 and March 1971.
List of South Australian Ministries
Cabinets began with the 1st Ministry led by B. T. Finniss, which commenced on 24 October 1856 with the introduction of responsible government in South Australia. The current 73rd Ministry is led by Steven Marshall of the Liberal Party of Australia, and was formed on 19 March 2018.
Council of Australian Governments
COAG was established in May 1992 after agreement by the then Prime Minister (Paul Keating), premiers and chief ministers, and it first met in December 1992. It is chaired by the Prime Minister. It meets to debate and co-ordinate government activities between the federal and state or territorial governments and between the state and territorial governments themselves as well as issues affecting local government.
History of the Australian Capital Territory
The Constitution of Australia – which took effect on 1 January 1901 – provided that a new national capital should be built at a site determined by Federal Parliament. It had to be within the state of New South Wales, but at least away from Sydney. The "Seat of Government Act 1908" fixed Canberra as the site of the new capital, and the surrounding region was formally ceded to the federal government on 1 January 1911. It was originally known as the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), adopting its current name in 1938. American architect Walter Burley Griffin won the competition to design the new city, and was appointed to oversee its construction. He was dogged by disputes with the government and the onset of World War I, and was fired in 1921. Multiple planning bodies were established but achieved little, in part due to the Great Depression.
Women and government in Australia
While the "Commonwealth Franchise Act" allowed women to stand in the 1903 and subsequent Federal elections, it was not until the 1943 election that Enid Lyons and Senator Dorothy Tangney became the first women to be elected to the Australian Parliament. The first female to lead a state or territory government was Rosemary Follett serving in 1989 and again between 1991 and 1995 as chief minister of the ACT. The first female premier was Carmen Lawrence, leading Western Australia for three years until 1993. Joan Kirner was the first female premier of Victoria, serving from 1990 to 1992. In the Northern Territory, Clare Martin became the first female chief minister in 2001 winning from opposition and was reelected in 2005 with an increased majority. In 2007, Anna Bligh became the first female premier in Queensland after the retirement of Peter Beattie, and in 2009, Bligh became the first popularly elected woman premier. In NSW, Kristina Keneally became the first female premier of the state in 2009 and was defeated at the 2011 state election. Lara Giddings was the first female Premier of the state of Tasmania between January 2011 and March 2014. In 2015 Annastacia Palaszczuk of Queensland became the first woman to be elected premier from opposition and was the first female premier to be elected for a second term after winning the 2017 Queensland state election. Despite being the earliest state to grant voting rights and allow women to stand in parliament since 1895, South Australia has never elected a female premier.
Government of Queensland
The Government of Queensland, also referred to as the Queensland Government, is the Australian state democratic administrative authority of Queensland. The Government of Queensland, a parliamentary constitutional monarchy, was formed in 1859 as prescribed in its Constitution, as amended from time to time. Since the Federation of Australia in 1901, Queensland has been a state of the Commonwealth of Australia, and the Constitution of Australia regulates its relationship with the Commonwealth. Under the Australian Constitution, Queensland ceded legislative and judicial supremacy to the Commonwealth, but retained powers in all matters not in conflict with the Commonwealth. Key state government offices are located at 1 William Street in the Brisbane central business district.
List of Australian government entities
The current Government is led by Prime Minister Scott Morrison, the leader of the Liberal Party of Australia in Coalition with the National Party of Australia, led by Barnaby Joyce, which was sworn in by the Governor-General on 18 September 2013. The Government changed the structure and portfolios of a number of agencies.
Australia
On 1 January 1901, federation of the colonies was achieved after a decade of planning, consultation and voting. This established the Commonwealth of Australia as a dominion of the British Empire. The Federal Capital Territory (later renamed the Australian Capital Territory) was formed in 1911 as the location for the future federal capital of Canberra. Melbourne was the temporary seat of government from 1901 to 1927 while Canberra was being constructed. The Northern Territory was transferred from the control of the South Australian government to the federal parliament in 1911.
Premiers of the Australian states
The Australian states were founded as British colonies, and executive power was held by a Governor (or sometimes a Lieutenant-Governor) appointed by the British Government (see Governors of the Australian states). From the 1820s the power of the Governors was gradually transferred to legislative bodies, at first appointed, later partly elected, and finally fully elected. Victoria gained full responsible parliamentary government in 1855, New South Wales, South Australia and Tasmania in 1856, Queensland in 1859 and Western Australia (owing to its much smaller population) in 1890.
Separation of powers in Australia
The specific requirement for ministers to sit in Parliament established the connection between executive and legislative, effectively preventing an American-style separation of the two. Strictly speaking, any person may be appointed a Minister, but their appointment lapses if they do not gain a seat in either house of the Parliament within three months. This provision was necessary in 1901, as the first government was sworn in on 1 January but the first parliament was not elected until late March (see Australian federal election, 1901). No non-parliamentarian was appointed a Minister since then, until the appointment of Bob Carr as Foreign Minister in 2012. However, the provision is still relevant. It applies when a minister in the House of Representatives loses their seat at a general election; despite no longer being a member of parliament, the Minister will typically retain their portfolio for some days after the election, until the new government is sworn in. It also applied when John Gorton became Prime Minister in 1968; he was sworn in while a member of the Senate, then he resigned to contest a by-election for a lower house seat, which he won, but between his resignation from the Senate and being elected to the House of Representatives, he remained Prime Minister without holding any seat in Parliament.
Australian Protective Service
Australia's first Commonwealth Police Force was short lived - surviving only two years between December 1917 and 1919 being set up following an altercation between the then Prime Minister of Australia, William Morris (Billie) Hughes and a heckler at a rally in Queensland after local police sergeant declined to become involved 'in a Federal matter'. In later years discussions between Commonwealth government and state authorities resulted in the birth of the Commonwealth Investigation Service - a plainclothes unit with the responsibility of conducting investigations into specific breaches of Commonwealth legislation. The early 1930s saw the formation of the Peace Officer Guard with the aim of protecting Commonwealth property and interests. The Peace Officer Guard (POG) operated at such establishments as munitions factories, research facilities and certain Commonwealth Government departments. The Australian Security Intelligence Organisation (ASIO) came into existence in 1949, absorbing some of the functions of the Commonwealth Investigations Service and assuming new areas of responsibilities. The Commonwealth Police was re-formed in 1960, absorbing both Peace Officer Guards and Commonwealth Investigations Service officers. In 1975 the most ambitious plan to restructure Australia's national police service was attempted by the Commonwealth Government. An amalgamation of Commonwealth Police, Northern Territory Police and Australian Capital Territory Police forces, Department of Customs and Excise and Special Reports Branch of the Department of Immigration would have produced the "Australia Police". However, the amalgamation was abandoned later the same year following a change of Government. The bombing of the Hilton Hotel in Sydney during the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting (CHOGM) on 13 February 1978 prompted the Federal Government to commission an inquiry into Australia's national police service by former London Metropolitan Police Commissioner, Sir Robert Mark. As a consequence of this inquiry, on 19 October 1979, the Commonwealth Police and the Australian Capital Police Forces were amalgamated to form the Australian Federal Police which, shortly after, was expanded to assume the functions of the former Narcotics Section of the Bureau of Customs.
Barton Government
After a series of constitutional conventions and referenda, the colonies agreed to federate as a new "commonwealth": the Commonwealth of Australia. The Constitution of Australia, with its provision for the foundation of a bicameral Australian Parliament, was endorsed by the Imperial Parliament in Britain and signed into law by Queen Victoria. Lord Hopetoun, a Lord-in-waiting to Queen Victoria and a former Governor of the Colony of Victoria, was selected as Australia's first Governor-General, and the appointment of the first Cabinet was put in train.
Curtin Government
The Curtin Government was the federal executive government of Australia led by Prime Minister John Curtin. It was made up of members of the Australian Labor Party in the Australian Parliament from 1941 to 1945.
Second Keating Ministry
The Second Keating Ministry (Labor) was the 60th ministry of the Government of Australia, and was led by Prime Minister Paul Keating. It succeeded the First Keating Ministry upon its swearing in by Governor-General Bill Hayden on 24 March 1993 after the 1993 election, and was replaced by the First Howard Ministry led by John Howard on 11 March 1996 following the Labor government's defeat at the 1996 election.
[[Category:Australian Commonwealth ministries|Keating, 2]]
[[Category:Australian Labor Party ministries]]
[[Category:1993 establishments in Australia]]
[[Category:1996 disestablishments in Australia]]
[[Category:Cabinets established in 1993]]
[[Category:Cabinets disestablished in 1996]]
Leader of the Opposition (South Australia)
Before the 1890s when there was no formal party system in South Australia, MPs tended to have historical liberal or conservative beliefs. The liberals dominated government from the 1893 election to 1905 election with Labor support, with the conservatives mostly in opposition. Labor took government with the support of eight dissident liberals in 1905 when Labor won the most seats for the first time. The rise of Labor saw non-Labor politics start to merge into various party incarnations. The two independent conservative parties, the Australasian National League (formerly National Defence League) and the Farmers and Producers Political Union merged with the Liberal and Democratic Union to become the Liberal Union in 1910. Labor formed South Australia's first majority government after winning the 1910 state election, triggering the merger. The 1910 election came two weeks after federal Labor formed Australia's first elected majority government at the 1910 federal election.
Premiers of the Australian states
The rise of Labor forced the colonies to move towards a two-party system of Labor versus non-Labor, although state politics remained more personalised and less ideological than national politics for many years. The first minority Labor government was formed by Anderson Dawson in Queensland in 1899, and the first majority Labor government was led by James McGowen in New South Wales in 1910. Since about 1910 state politics have followed much the same party pattern as Australian national politics (see Politics of Australia).
History of Australia since 1945
Following two and half decades of economic reform and amidst booming trade with Asia, Australia—in stark contrast to most other Western nations—avoided recession following the 2008 collapse of financial markets. Following the 2010 election, the Gillard Government entered an alliance with the Australian Greens and was destabilized by breaking an election promise not to introduce a carbon tax, by leadership rivalry and by lacking the numbers to push some controversial legislation through the Parliament. Nevertheless, the cross-bench alliance continued to operate and though facing declining poll support and firm opposition from the Liberal-National Coalition, in October the government successfully passed its Clean Energy Bill 2011 aimed to restructure the Australian economy in order to reduce greenhouse gas emissions associated with global warming by increasing costs to industry for carbon emissions. A carbon tax was introduced in Australia on 1 July 2012. Kevin Rudd was reinstated as prime minister in a Labor leadership spill on 27 June 2013.[414] After the 2013 Australian General Election, Rudd lost the role of Prime Minister to Tony Abbott, the Liberal Leader. On 19 December 2013 95% of the Australian military had withdrawn from Afghanistan with the remaining 5% presently training locals in Kabul and Kandahar who are expected to pull out altogether sometime in December 2014, regardless of how the American and British troops' withdraw plays out.
Economic history of Australia
This process of economic reform and restructuring continued under the Coalition Government led by John Howard which took power in 1996. The Howard Government established a goods and services tax from 2000, established a national Productivity Commission, and further deregulated labor markets under WorkChoices in 2006. The result of the process of economic reform is that Australia is now one of the most open economies in the world. It was enjoyed over two decades of economic growth, coupled with low inflation and relatively low unemployment.
Gorton Government
The Gorton Government was the federal executive government of Australia led by Prime Minister John Gorton. It was made up of members of a Liberal-Country Party coalition in the Australian Parliament from January 1968 to March 1971.
Economic history of Australia
In the 1880s, the long boom culminated in a frenzy of speculation and rapid inflation of land prices known as the Land Boom and centred on the city of Melbourne. Governments shared in the wealth and ploughed money into urban infrastructure, particularly railways. Huge fortunes were built on speculation, and Victorian business and politics became notorious for corruption. English banks lent freely to colonial speculators, adding to the mountain of debt on which the boom was built. Following the collapse of the Land Boom, property values in central Melbourne would not return to the level of the 1880s until the late 1950s (in real terms).In 1901, the first federal government formed by the Protectionist Party.
In 1904, the Australian Labor Party forms the Commonwealth government, the first labour movement in the world to attain government.
Military history of Australia during the Second Boer War
The Commonwealth of Australia came into existence on 1 January 1901 as a result of the federation of the Australian colonies, and defence was made a responsibility of the new centralised, federal government. This brought about the creation of the Department of Defence, and two months later on 1 March 1901, the formation of the Australian Army.
Abbott Government
The Abbott Government was the federal executive government of Australia led by the 28th Prime Minister Tony Abbott. The government was made up of members of the Liberal–National Coalition. The Leader of The Nationals, Warren Truss, served as Deputy Prime Minister. Following the 2013 Australian federal election held on 7 September, the Coalition defeated the second Rudd Government, ending six years of Labor Government. The Abbott Government was sworn into office on 18 September 2013. Less than two years later on 14 September 2015, Malcolm Turnbull defeated Abbott in a leadership ballot, 54 votes to 44 and the Turnbull Government became the executive government of Australia.
Australia
Australia was inhabited by indigenous Australians for about 60,000 years before the first British settlement in the late 18th century. It is documented that Aborigines spoke languages that can be classified into about 250 groups. After the European exploration of the continent by Dutch explorers in 1606, who named it New Holland, Australia's eastern half was claimed by Great Britain in 1770 and initially settled through penal transportation to the colony of New South Wales from 26 January 1788, a date which became Australia's national day. The population grew steadily in subsequent decades, and by the 1850s most of the continent had been explored and an additional five self-governing crown colonies established. On 1 January 1901, the six colonies federated, forming the Commonwealth of Australia. Australia has since maintained a stable liberal democratic political system that functions as a federal parliamentary constitutional monarchy, comprising six states and ten territories.
History of Australia (1901–45)
The Labor Party (the spelling "Labour" was dropped in 1912) had been established in the 1890s, after the failure of the Maritime and Shearer's strikes. Its strength was in the Australian Trade Union movement "which grew from a membership of just under 100,000 in 1901 to more than half a million in 1914." The platform of the ALP was democratic socialist. Its rising support at elections, together with its formation of federal government in 1904 under Chris Watson, and again in 1908, helped to unify competing conservative, free market and liberal anti-socialists into the Commonwealth Liberal Party in 1909. Although this party dissolved in 1916, a successor to its version of "liberalism" in Australia which in some respects comprises an alliance of Millsian liberals and Burkian conservatives united in support for individualism and opposition to socialism can be found in the modern Liberal Party. To represent rural interests, the Country Party (today's National Party) was founded in 1913 in Western Australia, and nationally in 1920, from a number of state-based farmer's parties.
History of Australia (1901–45)
The Commonwealth of Australia came into being when the Federal Constitution was proclaimed by the Governor General, Lord Hopetoun, on 1 January 1901. The first Federal elections were held in March 1901 and resulted in a narrow majority for the Protectionist Party over the Free Trade Party with the Australian Labor Party (ALP) polling third. Labor declared it would offer support to the party which offered concessions and Edmund Barton's Protectionists formed a government, with Alfred Deakin as Attorney-General.
1906 Australian federal election
The merger would allow the Deakin Commonwealth Liberals to construct a mid-term parliamentary majority, however less than a year later at the 1910 election, Labour won both majority government and a Senate majority, representing a number of firsts: it was Australia's first elected federal majority government, Australia's first elected Senate majority, the world's first Labour Party majority government at a national level, and after the 1904 Watson minority government the world's second Labour Party government at a national level. The 113 acts passed in the second Fisher government (1910–13) exceeded even the output of the second Deakin government over a similar period. At the time, it represented the culmination of Labour's involvement in politics. It was a period of reform unmatched in the Commonwealth until the 1940s under John Curtin and Ben Chifley.
It was the third federal election in Australia following the adoption of the federal government. The election was largely important as it would demonstrate which of the parties (if any) could hold together a stable government after the unstable second term of the previous one, which saw four different governments in power. It would also see if all parties could survive the implementation of protectionist policies which differentiated the two. This was also the first election where all seats for the House of Representatives were voted for via a First-past-the-post system (at previous elections some states voted as one electorate, using a bloc vote), and the first time that Tasmania was divided into separate electorates. The election result was the continuation of a Protectionist government led by Deakin and supported by Labour, which remained in power largely due to the unwillingness of the Anti-Socialist Party to support a vote of no confidence against it.
Australian labour movement
Labour candidates emerged in the late 19th century with much success, being a part of informal coalition governments from the early 1890s. The first Labour government in the world came in 1899 through Anderson Dawson, though it only lasted for a week. The first national Labour government in the world was that of Chris Watson in 1904, whose government lasted four months. Labour held the balance of power in the early years of federation, and was able to use it to secure the setting up of the protectionist system in Australia, and the passage of the Commonwealth Conciliation and Arbitration Act 1904, to set up a compulsory arbitration system in Australia. In the 1870s and 1880s, the trade union movement had organised a series of protests against "foreign" (by which was meant non-Anglo-Saxon) labour. Their arguments were that Asians and Chinese took jobs away from white men, worked for "substandard" wages, lowered working conditions and refused unionisation. The movement gave support to the White Australia policy following federation, which involved the expulsion of the Kanakas (South Pacific islanders) and stopping all immigration of non-white people.
History of Australia (1901–45)
Melbourne was chosen as the temporary seat of government while a purpose-designed capital city, Canberra, was constructed. The future King George V, then the Duke of York, opened the first Parliament of Australia on 9 May 1901, and his successor (later to be King George VI) opened the first session in Canberra during May 1927. Australia became officially autonomous in both internal and external affairs with the passage of the Statute of Westminster Adoption Act on 9 October 1942. The Australia Act 1986 eliminated the last vestiges of British legal authority at the Federal level. (The last state to remove recourse to British courts, Queensland, did not do so until 1988).
History of Australia since 1945
John Howard served as Prime Minister from 1996 until 2007, the second-longest prime ministerial term after Robert Menzies. One of the first programs instigated by the Howard Government was a nationwide gun control scheme, following a mass shooting at Port Arthur. The government sought to reduce Australia's government deficit and introduced industrial relations reforms, particularly as regards efficiency on the waterfront. After the 1996 election, Howard and treasurer Peter Costello proposed a goods and services tax (GST) which they successfully took to the electorate in 1998. In 1999, Australia led a United Nations force into East Timor to help establish democracy and independence for that nation, following political violence.
Australian Labor Party (Queensland Branch)
The Queensland branch subsequently formed the first Labor government in Australia, albeit briefly, when Anderson Dawson took office for a week in 1899 after a falling out between the non-Labor forces.
Women and government in Australia
On 24 June 2010, Julia Gillard became the first woman to lead one of the major political parties at the federal level as Leader of the Australian Labor Party, as well as the first female Prime Minister of Australia. However, as it became clear that her minority government was headed for an unprecedented landslide defeat, she was deposed by her own party in June 2013 in favour of former Prime Minister Kevin Rudd, whom she had replaced in a similar coup.
Dominion
Four colonies of Australia had enjoyed responsible government since 1856: New South Wales, Victoria, Tasmania and South Australia. Queensland had responsible government soon after its founding in 1859 but, because of ongoing financial dependence on Britain, Western Australia became the last Australian colony to attain self-government in 1890. During the 1890s, the colonies voted to unite and in 1901 they were federated under the British Crown as the Commonwealth of Australia by the "Commonwealth of Australia Constitution Act". The Constitution of Australia had been drafted in Australia and approved by popular consent. Thus Australia is one of the few countries established by a popular vote. Under the Balfour Declaration of 1926, the federal government was regarded as coequal with (and not subordinate to) the British and other Dominion governments, and this was given formal legal recognition in 1942 (when the "Statute of Westminster" was retroactively adopted to the commencement of the Second World War 1939). In 1930, the Australian prime minister, James Scullin, reinforced the right of the overseas Dominions to appoint native-born governors-general, when he advised King George V to appoint Sir Isaac Isaacs as his representative in Australia, against the wishes of the opposition and officials in London. The governments of the States (called colonies before 1901) remained under the Commonwealth but retained links to the UK until the passage of the "Australia Act 1986".
Hawke–Keating Government
The Hawke–Keating Government refers to the Federal Government of Australia from 11 March 1983 to 11 March 1996. The government was formed by the Australian Labor Party, and was led first by Bob Hawke as Prime Minister and then by Paul Keating. The Hawke–Keating Government began after the Fraser Government was defeated at the 1983 election, and ended with defeat at the 1996 election, which ushered in the Howard Government.
Howard Government
The Howard Government refers to the federal executive government of Australia led by Prime Minister John Howard between 11 March 1996 and 3 December 2007. It was made up of members of the Liberal–National Coalition, which won a majority of seats in the House of Representatives at four successive elections. The Howard Government commenced following victory over the Keating Government at the 1996 federal election. It concluded with its defeat at the 2007 federal election by the Australian Labor Party, whose leader Kevin Rudd then formed the First Rudd Government. It was the second-longest government under a single Prime Minister, with the longest having been the second Menzies Government (1949–1966).
Monarchy of Australia
The development of a distinctly Australian monarchy came about through a complex set of incremental events, beginning in 1770, when Captain James Cook, in the name of, and under instruction from, King George III, claimed the east coast of Australia. Colonies were eventually founded across the continent, all of them ruled by the monarch of the United Kingdom, upon the advice of his or her British ministers, the Secretary of State for the Colonies, in particular. After Queen Victoria's granting of Royal Assent to the Commonwealth of Australia Constitution Act on 9 July 1900, which brought about Federation in 1901, whereupon the six colonies became the states of Australia, the relationship between the state governments and the Crown remained as it was pre-1901: References in the constitution to "the Queen" meant the government of the United Kingdom (in the formation of which Australians had no say) and the Colonial Laws Validity Act 1865by which colonial laws deemed repugnant to imperial (British) law in force in the colony were rendered void and inoperativeremained in force in both the federal and state spheres; and all the governors, both of the Commonwealth and the states, remained appointees of the British monarch on the advice of the British Cabinet, a situation that continued even after Australia was recognised as a Dominion of the British Empire in 1907.
In response to calls from some Dominions for a re-evaluation in their status under the Crown after their sacrifice and performance in the First World War, a series of Imperial Conferences was held in London, from 1917 on, which resulted in the Balfour Declaration of 1926, which provided that the United Kingdom and the Dominions were to be considered as "autonomous communities within the British Empire, equal in status, in no way subordinate to one another in any aspect of their domestic or external affairs, though united by a common allegiance to the Crown." The Royal and Parliamentary Titles Act, 1927, an Act of the Westminster Parliament, was the first indication of a shift in the law, before the Imperial Conference of 1930 established that the Australian Cabinet could advise the sovereign directly on the choice of Governor-General, which ensured the independence of the office. The Crown was further separated amongst its dominions by the Statute of Westminster 1931, and, though it was not adopted by Australia until 1942 (retroactive to 3 September 1939), the law's validity in the United Kingdom required its government to seek Australia's consent in allowing the abdication of Edward VIII as the King of Australia and all the other Dominions in 1936.
Liberal Party of Australia
Through 2010, the party remained in opposition at the Tasmanian and South Australian state elections and achieved state government in Victoria. In March 2011, the New South Wales Liberal-National Coalition led by Barry O'Farrell won government with the largest election victory in post-war Australian history at the State Election. In Queensland, the Liberal and National parties merged in 2008 to form the new Liberal National Party of Queensland (registered as the Queensland Division of the Liberal Party of Australia). In March 2012, the new party achieved Government in an historic landslide, led by former Brisbane Lord Mayor, Campbell Newman.
Fadden Government
The newly formed United Australia Party stewarded Australia's recovery from the Great Depression and entry into World War II, generally in coalition with the Country Party. The Lyons Government was led by the popular Joseph Lyons from 1932 to 1939, but his sudden death in 1939 saw the Governor General appoint Country Party leader Earle Page as caretaker Prime Minister pending the election of a new UAP leader. The UAP turned to Robert Menzies, who became Prime Minister and led the first Menzies Government in the final months before the outbreak of World War Two in Europe and through the first two years of Australia's war effort. Menzies and Page had an openly antagonistic relationship and would not work together in coalition.
Australian head of state dispute
The Australian constitution dates from 1901, when the Dominions of the British Empire were not sovereign states, and does not use the term "head of state". In respect of the government of Australia, the monarch, currently Queen Elizabeth II, who has reigned since 6 February 1952, is represented in Australia by the governor-general, in accordance with the Constitution. Elizabeth II is also the sovereign of fifteen other countries, including the United Kingdom (UK), that are informally known, with Australia, as the Commonwealth realms, and as the sovereign the Queen is regarded as head of state. But in Australia the term "head of state" has been used in discussion as a convenient term for describing the person holding the highest rank among the officers of government.
Timeline of the expansion of federal powers in Australia
Federalism was adopted, as a constitutional principle, in Australia on 1 January 1901. Relatively few changes have been made in terms of the formal constitution since Australian federation occurred; in practice, however, the Commonwealth government has increasingly assumed a position of dominance through the acquisition and negotiation of additional powers and responsibilities.
1998 Australian Constitutional Convention
Australia remains a constitutional monarchy under the Australian Constitution adopted in 1901, with the duties of the head of state performed by a Governor-General selected by the Australian Prime Minister. Australian republicanism has persisted since colonial times, though for much of the 20th century, the monarchy remained popular. In the early 1990s, republicanism became a significant political issue. Australian Labor Party Prime Minister Paul Keating indicated a desire to instigate a republic in time for the Centenary of the Federation of Australia in 2001. The opposition Liberal-National Coalition, led by Alexander Downer, though less supportive of the republic plan, promised to convene a Constitutional Convention to discuss the issue. Under John Howard, the Coalition won the 1996 Federal Election and set the Convention date for February 1998.
Government of New South Wales
The Government of New South Wales, also referred to as the New South Wales Government or NSW Government, is the Australian state democratic administrative authority of New South Wales. It is currently held by a coalition of the Liberal Party and the National Party. The Government of New South Wales, a parliamentary constitutional monarchy, was formed in 1856 as prescribed in its Constitution, as amended from time to time. Since the Federation of Australia in 1901, New South Wales has been a state of the Commonwealth of Australia, and the Constitution of Australia regulates its relationship with the Commonwealth. Under the Australian Constitution, New South Wales ceded legislative and judicial supremacy to the Commonwealth, but retained powers in all matters not in conflict with the Commonwealth.
Department of the Environment (Australia, 2013–16)
The Australian Department of the Environment was a department of the Government of Australia that existed between September 2013 and July 2016. The department was charged with responsibility for developing and implementing national policy, programs and legislation to protect and conserve Australia's environment and heritage.
Federation of Australia
The "Commonwealth of Australia Constitution Act (UK)" was passed on 5 July 1900 and given Royal Assent by Queen Victoria on 9 July 1900. It was proclaimed on 1 January 1901 in Centennial Park, Sydney. Sir Edmund Barton was sworn in as the interim Prime Minister, leading an interim Federal ministry of nine members.
History of the Australian Labor Party
At the 1910 election, Fisher led Labour to victory with 50% of the vote and 42 seats. The Fisher government was Australia's first elected federal majority government, held Australia's first Senate majority (22 out of 36), and was the world's first labour party majority government. This was the first time a labour party had controlled any house of a legislature, and the first time it controlled both houses of a bicameral legislature. Labour implemented many of its policies mostly in his first government in fields such as defence, constitutional matters, finance, transport and communications, and social security, including establishing old-age and disability pensions, improved working conditions including a maternity allowance and workers compensation, created a national currency, forming the Royal Australian Navy, the commencement of construction for the Trans-Australian Railway, expanding the bench of the High Court of Australia, founding Canberra and establishing the government-owned Commonwealth Bank of Australia. Fisher carried out measures to break up land monopolies, put forward proposals for more regulation of working hours, wages and employment conditions, and amended the 1904 Conciliation and Arbitration Act to provide greater authority for the court president and to allow for Commonwealth employees' industrial unions, registered with the Arbitration Court. A land tax, aimed at breaking up big estates and to provide a wider scope for small-scale farming, was also introduced, while coverage of the Arbitration system extended to agricultural workers, domestics, and federal public servants. In addition, the age at which women became entitled to the old-age pension was lowered from 65 to 60. The introduction of the maternity allowance enabled more births to be attended by doctors, thus leading to reductions in infant mortality. Fisher also for the first time appointed a High Commissioner to Britain.
Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet (Australia)
The Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet (PM&C) is an Australian Government public service central department of state with broad ranging responsibilities, primary of which is for intergovernmental and whole of government policy coordination and assisting the Prime Minister of Australia in managing the Cabinet of Australia. The PM&C was established in 1971 and traces its origins back to the Prime Minister's Department established in 1911.
1949 Australian federal election
The Chifley Government was defeated, ending the longest period of Labor Federal Government in Australian history up to that date (1941–49). Labor would not return to office until 1972. Robert Menzies became Prime Minister for the second time, and the Liberal Party of Australia won government federally for the first time.
History of the Australian Labor Party
The first general election contested by Labour candidates was the 1891 New South Wales election, where Labour candidates (then called the Labor Electoral League of New South Wales) won 35 of 141 seats. The major parties were the Protectionist and Free Trade parties and Labour held the balance of power. It offered parliamentary support in exchange for policy enactment. Also in 1891, three United Labor Party (ULP) of South Australia candidates were elected to the South Australian Legislative Council. At the 1893 South Australian election the United Labor Party led by John McPherson won 10 of the 54 seats and the balance of power in the House of Assembly, allowing the liberal government of Charles Kingston to be formed, ousting the conservative government of John Downer. By the 1905 South Australian election Thomas Price became the first Labor Premier of South Australia. Re-elected at the 1906 double dissolution election serving until his death in 1909, it was the world's first stable Labour Party government. So successful, John Verran led Labor to form the state's first of many majority governments at the 1910 South Australian election. In 1899, Anderson Dawson formed a Labour minority government in Queensland, the first Labour Party government in the world, which lasted one week while the conservatives regrouped after a split.
Government of Australia
Until 1956 all members of the ministry were members of the Cabinet. The growth of the ministry in the 1940s and 1950s made this increasingly impractical, and in 1956 Robert Menzies created a two-tier ministry, with only senior ministers holding Cabinet rank, also known within parliament as the front bench. This practice has been continued by all governments except the Whitlam Government.
Department of Information (Australia)
The Department of Information (DOI) was an Australian Government department formed during World War II. The department was established in September 1939 under the leadership of John Treloar, the director of the Australian War Memorial, who remained in the role of departmental secretary until early 1941. It was the first of 17 new Australian Government departments to be established during the war, and was responsible for both censorship and disseminating government propaganda. The department was based in Melbourne throughout its existence, though it established divisions in Sydney and bureaus in New York City and London. The DOI was broken up in 1950, with its functions being allocated between other departments.
Chifley Government
The Chifley Government was the federal executive government of Australia led by Prime Minister Ben Chifley. It was made up of members of the Australian Labor Party in the Australian Parliament from 1945 to 1949.
Government of Western Australia
The Government of Western Australia, formally referred to as Her Majesty's Government of Western Australia, is the Australian state democratic administrative authority of Western Australia. It is also commonly referred to as the WA Government or the Western Australian Government. The Government of Western Australia, a parliamentary constitutional monarchy, was formed in 1890 as prescribed in its Constitution, as amended from time to time. Since the Federation of Australia in 1901, Western Australia has been a state of the Commonwealth of Australia, and the Constitution of Australia regulates its relationship with the Commonwealth. Under the Australian Constitution, Western Australia ceded legislative and judicial supremacy to the Commonwealth, but retained powers in all matters not in conflict with the Commonwealth.
History of Australia since 1945
In 1949 the 1941–1949 Labor government (led by Ben Chifley after John Curtin's death in 1945) was defeated by a Liberal–National Party Coalition government headed by Menzies. Politically, Menzies Government and the Liberal Party of Australia dominated much of the immediate post-war era, defeating the Chifley Government in 1949, in part over a Labor proposal to nationalise banks and following a crippling coal strike influenced by the Australian Communist Party. Menzies became the country's longest-serving Prime Minister and the Liberal party, in coalition with the rural based Country Party, won every federal until 1972.
Department of Foreign Affairs (Australia)
The Department of Foreign Affairs was an Australian government department that existed between November 1970 and July 1987.
Keating Government
The Keating Government was the federal executive government of Australia led by Prime Minister Paul Keating of the Australian Labor Party from 1991 to 1996. The Government followed on from the Hawke Government after Paul Keating replaced Bob Hawke as Labor leader in an internal party leadership challenge in 1991. Together, these two governments are often collectively described as the Hawke-Keating Government. The Keating Government was defeated in the 1996 federal election and was succeeded by the Howard Coalition government.
List of Australian government entities
On 18 September 2013 an "Administrative Arrangements Order" was issued by the Governor-General on the recommendation of the Prime Minister Tony Abbott which replaced the previous "Order" of 14 September 2010 issued by the Governor-General on the recommendation of the Gillard Government. The Order formed or re-confirmed government departments, as follows:Following the appointment of Malcolm Turnbull as Prime Minister, three departments were renamed, with effect from 21 September 2015:Following the election of the Turnbull Government, the Department of the Environment was renamed, with effect from 19 July 2016:
Monarchies in Oceania
The Australian monarchy goes back a few hundred years. European explorers started encountering the continent of Australia from the early 17th century, and the Kingdom of Great Britain founded and peopled colonial settlement from 1788. Before the European settlement an estimated half-million Australian Aborigines formed hundreds of different social groupings. Eventually the British government granted Australians more and more powers to govern themselves. On 9 July 1900, in one of her last acts before she died on 22 January 1901, Queen Victoria gave the royal assent to the "Commonwealth of Australia Act"
which would give Australia its own federal constitution and government. On 1 January 1901 the Governor General, Lord Hopetoun declared the federation of six Australian states and several territories in Centennial Park, Sydney. 30 years following that the Statute of Westminster granted equality to the realms and finally on 3 March 1986 Australia Act (in the United Kingdom and Australia) gave full independence to Australia in theory, although in practice it was already operating mostly independently.
Australia
With the loss of its American colonies in 1783, the British Government sent a fleet of ships, the "First Fleet", under the command of Captain Arthur Phillip, to establish a new penal colony in New South Wales. A camp was set up and the flag raised at Sydney Cove, Port Jackson, on 26 January 1788, a date which became Australia's national day, Australia Day. A British settlement was established in Van Diemen's Land, now known as Tasmania, in 1803, and it became a separate colony in 1825. The United Kingdom formally claimed the western part of Western Australia (the Swan River Colony) in 1828. Separate colonies were carved from parts of New South Wales: South Australia in 1836, Victoria in 1851, and Queensland in 1859. The Northern Territory was founded in 1911 when it was excised from South Australia. South Australia was founded as a "free province"—it was never a penal colony. Victoria and Western Australia were also founded "free", but later accepted transported convicts. A campaign by the settlers of New South Wales led to the end of convict transportation to that colony; the last convict ship arrived in 1848.
1975 Australian constitutional crisis
Gough Whitlam's Labor government was elected in 1972 after 23 years of rule by a coalition formed by the Liberal and Country parties. The ALP Government enjoyed a nine-seat majority in the House of Representatives, but did not control the Senate. In accordance with pre-election promises, it instituted a large number of policy changes, and offered much legislation. The Opposition, which still controlled the Senate, allowed some Government bills to pass the Senate, and blocked others.
Barton Government
The Barton Government was the first federal Executive Government of the Commonwealth of Australia. It was led by Prime Minister Sir Edmund Barton, from 1 January 1901 until 24 September 1903, when Barton resigned to become one of the three founding judges of the High Court of Australia.
War cabinet
At the Imperial Conference in London in 1937, the Australian government had agreed to form a War Cabinet on the outbreak of war. The Full Cabinet approved the formation of the War Cabinet on 26 September 1939. As neither Earle Page's Country Party nor John Curtin's Australian Labor Party would join in a coalition government with Menzies' United Australia Party, the War Cabinet initially consisted of:
In November 1939, the Department of Defence was split up. Street became Minister for Army, Menzies also became Minister for Defence Coordination, and three more ministers joined the War Cabinet:
Watson Government
The Australian Federal Parliament had come into being with the Federation of Britain's Australian colonies in 1901. Edmund Barton's Protectionists held power in coalition with Labour, until Barton was succeeded by Alfred Deakin. The short-lived first Deakin Government failed to pass any legislation in the fledgling Australian Federal Parliament, and its shaky coalition with the Labour Party did not long survive the December 1903 Election. By the resumption of Parliament in March 1904, the Deakin Government had fallen, amid a dispute over a Labour Party amendment to the Conciliation and Arbitration Bill.
Joseph Cook
Cook was prime minister for the first six weeks of Australia's involvement in World War I. On 30 July 1914, he was informed via telegram that the British government was considering a declaration of war and advised that Australia should take appropriate defence precautions. He told an election meeting at Horsham, Victoria, the following day to "remember that when the Empire is at war, so is Australia at war". At the suggestion of Governor-General Ronald Munro Ferguson, Cook called an emergency cabinet meeting for 3 August. It was attended by only four members of his ministry, as the others were out campaigning and unable to travel to Melbourne in time. The government decided to offer an expeditionary force of 20,000 men – "of any suggested composition to any destination desired [...] at complete disposal of the Home Government; cost of despatch and
maintenance would be borne by this Government" – and to give the British Admiralty control of the Royal Australian Navy "when desired". Australia's offer was made 40 hours before the United Kingdom declared war on Germany, and it has been suggested that it may have intensified the pressure on the British government to enter the war, along with similar offers made by Canada and New Zealand. The United Kingdom formally accepted Australia's offer on 6 August, and Cook subsequently authorised the creation of the Australian Imperial Force and the Australian Naval and Military Expeditionary Force; the latter captured and then occupied German New Guinea within a few months. Writing in 1962, Malcolm Henry Ellis described him as "the activator and originator of Australia's war effort".
Constitution of Australia
Before the Bill was passed, however, one final change was made by the imperial government, upon lobbying by the Chief Justices of the colonies, so that the right to appeal from the High Court to the Privy Council on constitutional matters concerning the limits of the powers of the Commonwealth or States could not be curtailed by parliament. Finally, the Commonwealth of Australia Constitution Act was passed by the British Parliament in 1900. Western Australia finally agreed to join the Commonwealth in time for it to be an original member of the Commonwealth of Australia, which was officially established on 1 January 1901.
Cook Ministry
The Cook Ministry (Commonwealth Liberal) was the 10th ministry of the Government of Australia. It was led by the country's 6th Prime Minister, Joseph Cook. The Cook Ministry succeeded the Second Fisher Ministry, which dissolved on 24 June 1913 following the federal election that took place in May which saw the Commonwealth Liberals defeat Andrew Fisher's Labor Party - albeit with a one-seat majority. The ministry was replaced by the Third Fisher Ministry on 17 September 1914 following the federal election that took place on 5 September which saw Labor defeat the Commonwealth Liberals.
Culture of Australia
The Commonwealth of Australia was founded in 1901, after a series of referenda conducted in the British colonies of Australasia. The Australian Constitution established a federal democracy and enshrined human rights such as sections 41 (right to vote), 80 (right to trial by jury) and 116 (freedom of religion) as foundational principles of Australian law and included economic rights such as restricting the government to acquiring property only "on just terms". The Australian Labor Party was established in the 1890s and the Liberal Party of Australia in 1944, both rising to be the dominant political parties and rivals of Australian politics, though various other parties have been and remain influential. Voting is compulsory in Australia and government is essentially formed by a group commanding a majority of seats in the Australian House of Representatives selecting a leader who becomes Prime Minister. Australia remains a constitutional monarchy in which the largely ceremonial and procedural duties of the monarch are performed by a Governor General selected by the Australian government.
History of Australia since 1945
The Gillard Labor Government which took power in a hung parliament following the 2010 Australian Election has indicated an intention not to revisit the issue of a vote for an Australian republic during the reign of Queen Elizabeth II, while the Opposition Liberal-National Coalition is led by Tony Abbott, a supporter of the constitutional monarchy. Cultural interest in the Royal Family endures, with 7 million Australians (one third of the population) tuning in to watch the Wedding of Prince William and Catherine Middleton in April 2011.
Military history of Australia
The Commonwealth of Australia came into existence on 1 January 1901 as a result of the federation of the Australian colonies. Under the Constitution of Australia, defence responsibility was now vested in the new federal government. The co-ordination of Australia-wide defensive efforts in the face of Imperial German interest in the Pacific Ocean was one of driving forces behind federalism, and the Department of Defence immediately came into being as a result, while the Commonwealth Military Forces (early forerunner of the Australian Army) and Commonwealth Naval Force were also soon established.
1989 Australian Capital Territory general election
The Labor Party, led by Rosemary Follett, and the Liberal Party, led by Trevor Kaine, were the main challengers. Candidates were elected to fill seats using a modified D'Hondt method for a multi-member single constituency. The result was a hung parliament. However, Labor, with the largest representation in the 17-member unicameral Assembly, formed Government with the support of various non-aligned minor parties. Follett was elected the first Chief Minister at the first sitting of the first Assembly on 11 May 1989.The Australian Capital Territory was established in 1911, initially called the Federal Capital Territory. The Territory was carved out of the state of New South Wales to make way for the site of the capital of Australia. As the Territory grew, particularly the city of Canberra from the 1960s, there were increasing calls for some form of self-government. There were a number of appointed and elected advisory bodies between 1920 and 1986. The main elected representative body of the ACT was the Australian Capital Territory House of Assembly that sat from 1975 to 1986. This House served primarily as an advisory body, with most legislative powers managed by the Federal Minister for the Territories, under section 122 of the Australian Constitution. In an advisory referendum held in 1978, voters in the ACT rejected a proposal for self-government, with 63% voting in favour of the proposition that the 'present arrangements for governing the Australian capital should continue for the time being'. Thirty percent of voters favoured self-government with a locally elected body with state-like powers, and 6% voted for a locally elected body with powers and functions similar to those of local government. In spite of the referendum outcome, in 1983, the federal Labor government of Prime Minister Bob Hawke set up a Self-Government Task Force to report on the government of the ACT. Further, it wanted to force the ACT into line with the states on funding levels and, in late 1988, the Australian Government passed the Australian Capital Territory (Self-Government) Act, allowing for the self-government of the ACT.
Colonial forces of Australia
By 1901, the Australian colonies were federated and formally joined together to become the Commonwealth of Australia, and the federal government assumed all defensive responsibilities. The Federation of Australia came into existence on 1 January 1901 and as of that time the constitution of Australia stated that all defence responsibility was vested in the Commonwealth government. Co-ordination of Australia-wide defensive efforts in the face of imperial German interest in the Pacific Ocean was one of the main reasons for federation, and so one of the first decisions made by the newly formed Commonwealth government was to create the Department of Defence which came into being on 1 March 1901. From that time the Australian Army came into being under the command of Major General Sir Edward Hutton, and all of the colonial forces, including those then on active service in South Africa, transferred into the Australian Army.
Federalism
On the 1st of January 1901 the nation-state of Australia officially came into existence as a federation. The Australian continent was colonised by the United Kingdom in 1788, which subsequently established six, eventually self-governing, colonies there. In the 1890s the governments of these colonies all held referendums on becoming the unified, self-governing "Commonwealth of Australia" within the British Empire. When all the colonies voted in favour of federation, the Federation of Australia commenced, resulting in the establishment of the Commonwealth of Australia in 1901. The model of Australian federalism adheres closely to the original model of the United States of America, although it does so through a parliamentary Westminster system rather than a presidential system.
Barton Ministry
The Barton Ministry (Protectionist) was the 1st ministry of the Government of Australia. It was led by the country's 1st Prime Minister, Sir Edmund Barton. The Barton Ministry was formed on 1 January 1901 when Federation took place and Australia became fully independent from the United Kingdom. The ministry was replaced by the First Deakin Ministry on 24 September 1903 following Barton's retirement from Parliament to enter the inaugural High Court.
Hawke Government
The Hawke Government was the federal executive government of Australia led by Prime Minister Bob Hawke of the Australian Labor Party (ALP) from 1983 to 1991. The Government followed the Liberal-National Coalition Fraser Government and was succeeded by another Labor administration, the Keating Government, led by Paul Keating after an internal party leadership challenge in 1991. Keating served as Treasurer through much of Hawke's term as Prime Minister and the period is sometimes termed the Hawke-Keating Government despite the fact that there were fundamental differences between the two men and their policies.
Fremantle Declaration
The Fremantle Declaration was a restatement and affirmation of legal and human rights principles in Australia. 
It was signed in Fremantle, Western Australia by all of the Attorneys-General of all the Australian States and territories on 10 November 2006. It was not signed by the Commonwealth Attorney-General Philip Ruddock. At the time, all state and territory governments were held by the Australian Labor Party, whereas the Federal (Commonwealth) government was held by the conservative Liberal Party of Australia. The declaration is no more than a commitment to uphold existing national laws and international agreements of which Australia is party, based on principles that are widely held by the Australian public. This uncontroversial statement, however, was intended and perceived as a censure of the conservative government led by John Howard for its attempts to circumvent the Australian legal system in the treatment of unauthorized immigrants and in its acquiescence to the US government treatment of captives accused of terrorism.
John Allan (Australian politician)
Allan's faction propped up Lawson's government until 1923, when a new coalition government was formed with Lawson as Premier and Allan as Minister for Lands and Immigration. This was the first Nationalist-Country coalition state government. In March 1924 the coalition broke down and the Country Party ministers left the government, and Alexander Peacock formed a minority Nationalist government, which fell in April when the Country Party voted against it. George Prendergast then formed a minority Labor government. This in turn fell in November when the Nationalists and Country Party came to a new agreement.
Caretaker government of Australia
The first Australian federal government, headed by Prime Minister Edmund Barton, was sworn in on 1 January 1901, the day on which the Federation of Australia took effect, whereby the six colonies of New South Wales, Victoria, Queensland, South Australia, Western Australia and Tasmania became States of the Commonwealth of Australia. The first election for the new Parliament of Australia was not held until 29 and 30 March 1901. In the meantime, Barton's government operated in a caretaker capacity but, due to the need to quickly establish administrative processes and make important appointments, they were not as inhibited by the caretaker conventions as later governments were.
History of the Australian Capital Territory
The Australian Capital Territory Police was created in 1927, the same year the federal government moved to the ACT, with eleven officers. The size of the force grew over subsequent decades with the development of Canberra, and oversaw law and order in the territory until 1979. In that year, the ACT Police merged with the Commonwealth Police and the Federal Narcotics Bureau to form the Australian Federal Police (AFP), which then took responsibility for law and order in Canberra. Since self-government was granted in 1988, the AFP has performed this under contract to the ACT government.
Government of South Australia
The Government of South Australia, also referred to as the South Australian Government, is the Australian state democratic administrative authority of South Australia. The Government of South Australia, a parliamentary constitutional monarchy, was formed in 1856 as prescribed in its Constitution, as amended from time to time. Since the Federation of Australia in 1901, South Australia has been a state of the Commonwealth of Australia, and the Constitution of Australia regulates its relationship with the Commonwealth. Under the Australian Constitution, South Australia ceded legislative and judicial supremacy to the Commonwealth, but retained powers in all matters not in conflict with the Commonwealth.
Reserved powers doctrine
The reserved powers doctrine was a principle used by the inaugural High Court of Australia in the interpretation of the Constitution of Australia, that emphasised the context of the Constitution, drawing on principles of federalism, what the Court saw as the compact between the newly formed Commonwealth and the former colonies, particularly the compromises that informed the text of the constitution. The doctrine involved a restrictive approach to the interpretation of the specific powers of the Federal Parliament to preserve the powers that were intended to be left to the States. The doctrine was challenged by the new appointments to the Court in 1906 and was ultimately abandoned by the High Court in 1920 in the "Engineers' Case", replaced by an approach to interpretation that emphasised the text rather than the context of the Constitution.
The Constitution sets up the Commonwealth of Australia as a federal polity, with enumerated limited specific powers conferred on the Federal Parliament. The constitutional convention held in Adelaide in 1897, passed a resolution that, as the first condition for the creation of a federal government, "the powers, privileges and territories of the several existing colonies shall remain intact, except in respect of such surrenders as may be agreed upon to secure uniformity of law and administration in matters of common concern." The intention of the framers of the Australian Constitution has been said to be "to create a federal government, albeit of limited jurisdiction, which would be responsive to the popular will in specified matters of national concern and to superimpose it upon existing colonial or state governments which were seen as each adequately responsive to the popular will within their respective territorial constituencies."
1940 Australian federal election
The Coalition had won 36 seats, two short of a majority, but formed a government on 28 October 1940 with the support of both independent crossbenchers, Alexander Wilson and Arthur Coles. The four MPs elected to Lang Labor's successor, the Australian Labor Party (Non-Communist), officially re-joined the ALP just months after the election in February 1941, bringing the ALP seat tally up to 36. The UAP–Country minority government lasted only until October 1941, when the two independents crossed the floor and allowed the ALP to form a minority government with Curtin as prime minister. It remains the only time since the 1910 introduction of an elected two-party system where the government changed as the result of a parliamentary confidence vote.
Economic history of Australia
Wartime measures and the expanded wartime economy provided the basis for rapid economic growth in the period after 1945. Postwar economic reconstruction was also aided by a decisive policy of national development pursued by the Australian Labor Party (ALP), which formed the government from 1941 to 1949. That policy was in line with the general socialist ideals that the ALP held and were then widely supported within the broader labour movement.
Melbourne
At the time of Australia's federation on 1 January 1901, Melbourne became the seat of government of the federation. The first federal parliament was convened on 9 May 1901 in the Royal Exhibition Building, subsequently moving to the Victorian Parliament House where it was located until 1927, when it was moved to Canberra. The Governor-General of Australia resided at Government House in Melbourne until 1930 and many major national institutions remained in Melbourne well into the twentieth century.
Australian Labor Party
The federal parliament in 1901 was contested by each state Labour Party. In total, they won 14 of the 75 seats in the House of Representatives, collectively holding the balance of power, and the Labour members now met as the Federal Parliamentary Labour Party (informally known as the caucus) on 8 May 1901 at Parliament House, Melbourne, the meeting place of the first federal Parliament. The caucus decided to support the incumbent Protectionist Party in minority government, while the Free Trade Party formed the opposition. It was some years before there was any significant structure or organisation at a national level. Labour under Chris Watson doubled its vote at the 1903 federal election and continued to hold the balance of power. In April 1904, however, Watson and Alfred Deakin fell out over the issue of extending the scope of industrial relations laws concerning the Conciliation and Arbitration Bill to cover state public servants, the fallout causing Deakin to resign. Free Trade leader George Reid declined to take office, which saw Watson become the first Labour Prime Minister of Australia, and the world's first Labour head of government at a national level (Anderson Dawson had led a short-lived Labour government in Queensland in December 1899), though his was a minority government that lasted only four months. He was aged only 37, and is still the youngest Prime Minister in Australia's history.
Parliament of Australia
The Commonwealth of Australia came into being on 1 January 1901 with the federation of the six Australian colonies. The inaugural election took place on 29 and 30 March and the first Australian Parliament was opened on 9 May 1901 in Melbourne by Prince George, Duke of Cornwall and York, later King George V. The only building in Melbourne that was large enough to accommodate the 14,000 guests was the western annexe of the Royal Exhibition Building. After the official opening, from 1901 to 1927 the Parliament met in Parliament House, Melbourne, which it borrowed from the Parliament of Victoria (which sat, instead, in the Royal Exhibition Building until 1927).
It had always been intended that the national Parliament would sit in a new national capital. This was a compromise at Federation due to the rivalry between the two largest Australian cities, Sydney and Melbourne, which both wished to become the new capital. The site of Canberra was selected for the location of the nation's capital city in 1908. A competition was announced on 30 June 1914 to design Parliament House, with prize money of £7,000. However, due to the start of World War I the next month, the competition was cancelled. It was re-announced in August 1916, but again postponed indefinitely on 24 November 1916. In the meantime, John Smith Murdoch, the Commonwealth's Chief Architect, worked on the design as part of his official duties. He had little personal enthusiasm for the project, as he felt it was a waste of money and expenditure on it could not be justified at the time. Nevertheless, he designed the building by default.
History of Australia
May 1931 had seen the creation of a new conservative political force, the United Australia Party formed by breakaway members of the Labor Party combining with the Nationalist Party. At Federal elections in December 1931, the United Australia Party, led by former Labor member Joseph Lyons, easily won office. They remained in power until September 1940. The Lyons government has often been credited with steering recovery from the depression, although just how much of this was owed to their policies remains contentious. Stuart Macintyre also points out that although Australian GDP grew from £386.9 million to £485.9 million between 1931–32 and 1938–39, real domestic product per head of population was still "but a few shillings greater in 1938–39 (£70.12), than it had been in 1920–21 (£70.04).
Australia recovered relatively quickly from the financial downturn of 1929–1930, with recovery beginning around 1932. The Prime Minister, Joseph Lyons, favoured the tough economic measures of the Premiers' Plan, pursued an orthodox fiscal policy and refused to accept the proposals of the Premier of New South Wales, Jack Lang, to default on overseas debt repayments. According to author Anne Henderson of the Sydney Institute, Lyons held a steadfast belief in "the need to balance budgets, lower costs to business and restore confidence" and the Lyons period gave Australia "stability and eventual growth" between the drama of the Depression and the outbreak of the Second World War. A lowering of wages was enforced and industry tariff protections maintained, which together with cheaper raw materials during the 1930s saw a shift from agriculture to manufacturing as the chief employer of the Australian economy—a shift which was consolidated by increased investment by the commonwealth government into defence and armaments manufacture. Lyons saw restoration of Australia's exports as the key to economic recovery.
Morrison Government
The Morrison Government is the federal executive government of Australia led by the 30th Prime Minister of Australia, Scott Morrison of the Liberal Party of Australia. The government consists of members of the Liberal-National Coalition, and Michael McCormack, the leader of the junior party in the Coalition, the National Party serves as Deputy Prime Minister. The prime ministership of Scott Morrison commenced on 24 August 2018, when he was sworn in by the Governor-General of Australia.
Local government in Australia
The first official local government in Australia was the Perth Town Trust, established in 1838, only three years after British settlement. The Adelaide Corporation followed, created by the province of South Australia in October 1840. The City of Melbourne and the Sydney Corporation followed, both in 1842. All of these early forms failed; it was not until the 1860s and 1870s that the various colonies established widespread stable forms of local government, mainly for the purpose of raising money to build roads in rural and outer-urban regions. Council representatives attended conventions before Federation, however local government was unquestionably regarded as outside the Constitutional realm.
Deakin Government (1903–1904)
The first Deakin Government was the second federal executive government of the Commonwealth of Australia. It was led by Prime Minister Alfred Deakin, from 24 September 1903 until 27 April 1904. Deakin was the second Prime Minister of Australia, but served as Prime Minister again from 1905–1908 and 1909–1910 – see Second Deakin Government and Third Deakin Government.
Women and government in Australia
In 1989 Rosemary Follett became the first female head of government in Australia, as Chief Minister of the Australian Capital Territory. Carmen Lawrence was the first female premier of an Australian state when she took the office of Premier of Western Australia in February 1990. She was followed by the appointment of Joan Kirner as Premier of Victoria, in which position she served from 1990 to 1992, when her party was swept from office by Jeff Kennett's conservatives. Clare Martin was Chief Minister of the Northern Territory from 2001 to 2007. Anna Bligh became Premier of Queensland in 2007 when Peter Beattie retired. In 2009, she became the first woman in Australia to be elected Premier, though she subsequently suffered a landslide loss to Campbell Newman's LNP in 2012. On 4 December 2009, Kristina Keneally replaced Nathan Rees to become the first female Premier of New South Wales. As Carmel Tebbutt retained the role of Deputy Premier, Keneally also led the first executive in Australia to be led by two women. However, Keneally would also go on to suffer a crushing defeat at the hands of Barry O'Farrell in 2011. In 2011 Lara Giddings became the first female Premier of Tasmania, serving until 2014 when she likewise suffered a crushing loss to conservative leader Will Hodgman. This again leaves South Australia as the only state or territory not to have had a female head of government.
Marion Scrymgour is to date the highest ranked Indigenous woman in a government in Australia when she was Deputy Chief Minister of the Northern Territory from 2007 until 2009.
History of Australia (1901–45)
Although the peak of Army enlistments occurred in June–July 1940, when over 70,000 enlisted, it was the Curtin Labor Government, formed in October 1941, that was largely responsible for "a complete revision of the whole Australian economic, domestic and industrial life." Rationing of fuel, clothing and some food was introduced, (although less severely than in Britain) Christmas holidays curtailed, "brown outs" introduced and some public transport reduced. From December 1941, the Government evacuated all women and children from Darwin and northern Australia, and over 10,000 refugees arrived from South East Asia as Japan advanced. In January 1942, the Manpower Directorate was set up "to ensure the organisation of Australians in the best possible way to meet all defence requirements." Minister for War Organisation of Industry, John Dedman introduced a degree of austerity and government control previously unknown, to such an extent that he was nicknamed "the man who killed Father Christmas."
Australian Labor Party
The Curtin and Chifley governments governed Australia through the latter half of the Second World War and initial stages of transition to peace. Labor leader John Curtin became prime minister in October 1941 when two independents crossed the floor of Parliament. Labor, led by Curtin, then led Australia through the years of the Pacific War. In December 1941, Curtin announced that "Australia looks to America, free of any pangs as to our traditional links or kinship with the United Kingdom", thus helping to establish the Australian-American alliance (later formalised as ANZUS by the Menzies Government). Remembered as a strong war time leader and for a landslide win at the 1943 election, Curtin died in office just prior to the end of the war and was succeeded by Ben Chifley. Chifley Labor won the 1946 election and oversaw Australia's initial transition to a peacetime economy. Labor was defeated at the 1949 election. At the conference of the New South Wales Labor Party in June 1949, Chifley sought to define the labour movement as having: