Liberal Party Of Australia (Queensland Division)

The Liberal Party of Australia (Queensland Division), branded as Liberal Queensland, was the Queensland division of the Liberal Party of Australia until 2008.

It was initially formed in October 1943 as the Queensland People's Party (QPP), which then absorbed the disbanded Queensland branch of the United Australia Party in 1944. In 1945, the QPP had an agreement with the newly formed Liberal Party, where in the "federal sphere", QPP would be the Queensland division of the Liberal Party and would run its candidates under the Liberal Party banner in federal elections. However, in the "state sphere", it would continue to exist individually under its own banner. In July 1949, the QPP was renamed to reflect its status as the Queensland division of the Liberal Party.

Based predominantly in Brisbane and other cities in Queensland, from 1957 it held power as the junior party in a coalition with the state Country Party, later the National Party, until 1983 when the Liberals broke away and went into opposition. The party formed another coalition with the Nationals that took power in 1996 but was defeated in 1998. After a further decade in opposition, in 2008, the two parties merged to form the Liberal National Party of Queensland.

History

The centre-right in Queensland has a long history of splits and mergers, with much debate over whether to have a single party aiming to cover the whole state or to have distinctive voices for the metropolitan and rural areas. The Liberal Party was formed after a period that had seen three mergers and three splits in the preceding thirty years. Throughout its history it was beset by the question of relations with the Country/National Party until the two merged.

Origins

John Beals Chandler, the sitting Lord Mayor of Brisbane, was elected to the state parliament as an independent in the 1943 Hamilton state by-election on 9 October 1943. At the time the conservative forces in the parliament were united as the Country-National Organisation but this was under much pressure to split back into separate rural and urban parties which would happen the following year. Chandler disagreed with the Labor Party's collectivism, instead advocating mass capitalism and class-free politics, and this led him to found the Queensland People's Party (QPP) on 26 October 1943. The Country-National Organisation split up the following year, with the urban section reorganizing as the state branch of the United Australia Party. However, by then the UAP was in terminal decline at all levels, and the Queensland UAP was soon absorbed by Chandler's party. At the 1944 state election the party won seven seats, all in Brisbane. The Queensland People's Party contested elections in South East Queensland.

Affiliation with the Liberal Party

The following year, the national UAP was folded into the Liberal Party, and by April 1945, 17 non-Labor forces in Queensland joined the Liberal Party. However, the QPP declined to dissolve itself and join the Liberal Party, leading the Liberal Party the possibility to have to organise its own Queensland division. However, in May 1945, the QPP eventually reached an agreement with the Liberal Party, where the QPP agreed to become the local apparatus of the Liberal Party for federal elections. That meant in the "federal sphere" or relating to federal matters, QPP would be the Queensland division of the Liberal Party. During federal elections, QPP candidates would run under the Liberal Party banner and were bound by the Liberal Party policy and platform. In the "state sphere", QPP would run candidates under its own banner in state elections and were bound by QPP policy and platform. All candidates would be selected by a joint executive consisting of the state provisional executive of the Liberal Party and QPP representatives.

Chandler was succeeded as leader in 1946 by Bruce Pie, a fellow Brisbane based businessman, who led the party to an increase to nine seats in the 1947 state election, offering a bold reform policy that at times clashed with the Country Party's aims. However both Chandler and Pie had business concerns, as well as the former's continued local government role, that meant they could not devote all their time to leading the party. Thomas Hiley took over the leadership in 1948.

Since 1946, there were attempts to rename the QPP to the Liberal Party, including an unsuccessful attempt in October 1948. Hiley was also opposed to a name change. In November 1948, the party expressed its intention to merge with the Country Party, with a potential name "Liberal-Country Party League", similar to the Liberal and Country League in South Australia. However, this was refused by the Country Party as mergers with other parties would violate its party constitution. On 8 July 1949, QPP delegates agreed to a name change and the QPP was renamed Liberal Party of Australia (Queensland Division) to be in line with other Liberal Party state divisions.

Relations with the Country Party remained uneasy for much of the next decade through the leaderships of Hiley and then Kenneth Morris and it was not until 1956 that they were firmly settled. Although the party polled between 20% and 30% of the vote over successive elections, it could not elect more than 11 members and was further hampered by the introduction of a malapportionment in 1949 that strengthened both the Labor and Country parties. The party was also almost entirely limited to electoral success in Brisbane, apart from the seat of East Toowoomba/ Lockyer where future leader Gordon Chalk had gained the seat in 1947 and followed the rural parts in a redistribution.

Coalition government, 1957–1983

In 1957 the Labor Party in Queensland was engulfed in the split that had been growing in the party across Australia over the influence of communism. The sitting Premier Vince Gair was expelled from the party and led a breakaway Queensland Labor Party that sought to retain office. However, when the state parliament resumed sitting, the Liberal, Country and rump Labor parties combined to block supply, bringing down the Gair government and leading to the 1957 state election at which the Country and Liberal coalition won power after a quarter of a century.

The Liberals were still the smaller of the two coalition parties in the state parliament despite polling more votes, a position that was reinforced when the new government modified the malapportionment to its advantage despite some Liberal opposition. Later in 1962 the Liberals secured the reintroduction of preferential voting which would allow the non-Labor vote to combine but also in the long term allowed for the two coalition parties to contest seats against one another. However, for much of the first decade in power relations between the two coalition parties held well, helped by a determination to maintain the relation by Premier and Country Party leader Frank Nicklin

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