Redistribution (Australia)
Section 24 of the Constitution of Australia requires that the total number of members of the Australian House of Representatives shall be "as nearly as practicable" twice as many as the number of members of the Australian Senate. There is presently a total of 76 senators: 12 senators from each of the six states and two from each of the two autonomous internal territories (the Australian Capital Territory and the Northern Territory). There are 150 members of the Australian House of Representatives.
Father of the Australian Senate
The first Senate was elected on 29 and 30 March 1901. Despite the different election dates, all the members elected to that first Parliament were considered to have had equal seniority. It follows that there could not be a "longest-serving Senator" until only one Senator from the first Parliament was still serving. That occurred on 14 September 1923 with the death of Hon Edward Millen, leaving Sir George Pearce as the sole longest-serving Senator, and thus the first sole Father of the Senate.