Manfred Douglas Cross (12 August 1929 – 30 January 2024) was an Australian public servant and politician. He was educated at various state schools in

Brisbane Brisbane ( ; ) is the List of Australian capital cities, capital and largest city of the States and territories of Australia, state of Queensland and the list of cities in Australia by population, third-most populous city in Australia, with a ...

Queensland Queensland ( , commonly abbreviated as Qld) is a States and territories of Australia, state in northeastern Australia, and is the second-largest and third-most populous state in Australia. It is bordered by the Northern Territory, South Austr ...

before joining the

Queensland public service The Queensland Public Service provides public services to the people of Queensland, Australia on behalf of the Government of Queensland. Typically these are services that are deemed important by the government and which the government believes ...

and later, in 1961, becoming a member of the

Australian House of Representatives The House of Representatives is the lower house of the bicameralism, bicameral Parliament of Australia, the upper house being the Australian Senate, Senate. Its composition and powers are set out in Chapter I of the Constitution of Australia. ...

for the

Division of Brisbane The Division of Brisbane is an Divisions of the Australian House of Representatives, Australian electoral division in the states and territories of Australia, state of Queensland. History The division was proclaimed in 1900, and was one of t ...

Early life

Born in Brisbane, Cross was the son of Manfred Cross, a telegraphist, and Mary McLennan, a dressmaker. He went to

Rainworth State School Rainworth State School is a heritage-listed state school at 185 Boundary Road, Bardon, City of Brisbane, Queensland, Australia. It was built from 1929 to 1930. It was added to the Queensland Heritage Register on 21 August 2019. History Rain ...

Rainworth Rainworth is a village in the ceremonial county of Nottinghamshire in the East Midlands of England. It is split between the local government districts of Newark and Sherwood and Mansfield.OS Explorer Map 270: Sherwood Forest: (1:25 000): To th ...

in the inner Brisbane suburb of Bardon before attending

Brisbane State High School Brisbane State High School (BSHS or commonly State High) is a partially selective, co-educational, state secondary school, located in South Brisbane, Queensland, Australia. It is a member of the Great Public Schools Association of Queensland, ...

. He later studied at the

University of Queensland The University of Queensland is a Public university, public research university located primarily in Brisbane, the capital city of the Australian state of Queensland. Founded in 1909 by the Queensland parliament, UQ is one of the six sandstone ...

before becoming a Queensland state public servant, joining the Queensland Treasury in 1951. On 11 July 1969, he married Barbara who, like Manfred, had been active in Labor Party circles in Queensland.

Parliament and political life

In 1961, Cross was elected to the

as the

Labor Labour or labor may refer to: * Childbirth, the delivery of a baby * Labour (human activity), or work ** Manual labour, physical work ** Wage labour, a socioeconomic relationship between a worker and an employer ** Organized labour and the labour ...

member for the federal parliamentary seat of

. There was a strong nation-wide swing towards Labor in the 1961 federal election and Cross was elected with a comfortable majority in Brisbane of over 57% of the

two-party preferred vote In Australian politics, the two-party-preferred vote (TPP or 2PP), is the result of an opinion poll or a projection of an election result where preferences are distributed to one of the two major parties, the Labor Party and the Liberal/Nation ...

. In the same election, his colleague

Bill Hayden William George Hayden (23 January 1933 – 21 October 2023) was an Australian politician who served as the 21st governor-general of Australia from 1989 to 1996. He was Leader of the Labor Party and Leader of the Opposition from 1977 to 198 ...

, later Leader of the Federal Labor Party and

Governor-General Governor-general (plural governors-general), or governor general (plural governors general), is the title of an official, most prominently associated with the British Empire. In the context of the governors-general and former British colonies, ...

, unexpectedly won the nearby seat of Oxley in

Ipswich Ipswich () is a port town and Borough status in the United Kingdom, borough in Suffolk, England. It is the county town, and largest in Suffolk, followed by Lowestoft and Bury St Edmunds, and the third-largest population centre in East Anglia, ...

. Cross and Hayden, both Labor Party

backbenchers In Westminster and other parliamentary systems, a backbencher is a member of parliament (MP) or a legislator who occupies no governmental office and is not a frontbench spokesperson in the Opposition, being instead simply a member of t ...

in the Federal parliament throughout most of the 1960s, shared a small room in Parliament House in Canberra (now known as " Old Parliament House") and were well-known members from Queensland in the parliament. Cross held the seat of Brisbane in the

1963 Events January * January 1 – Bogle–Chandler case: Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation scientist Dr. Gilbert Bogle and Mrs. Margaret Chandler are found dead (presumed poisoned), in bushland near the Lane Cove ...

1966 Events January * January 1 – In a coup, Colonel Jean-Bédel Bokassa takes over as military ruler of the Central African Republic, ousting President David Dacko. * January 3 – 1966 Upper Voltan coup d'état: President Maurice Yaméogo i ...

, and

1969 1969 ( MCMLXIX) was a common year starting on Wednesday of the Gregorian calendar, the 1969th year of the Common Era (CE) and ''Anno Domini'' (AD) designations, the 969th year of the 2nd millennium, the 69th year of the 20th century, and the ...

elections when Labor failed to win government. In

1972 Within the context of Coordinated Universal Time (UTC) it was the longest year ever, as two leap seconds were added during this 366-day year, an event which has not since been repeated. (If its start and end are defined using Solar time, ...

, Labor leader

Gough Whitlam Edward Gough Whitlam (11 July 191621 October 2014) was the 21st prime minister of Australia, serving from December 1972 to November 1975. To date the longest-serving federal leader of the Australian Labor Party (ALP), he was notable for being ...

won the election and the formed the first Labor Government in Australia for 23 years. As a backbencher, Cross had taken a close interest in Aboriginal affairs and had hoped to become Minister for Aboriginal Affairs in the

Whitlam Government The Whitlam government was the federal executive government of Australia led by Prime Minister Gough Whitlam of the Australian Labor Party. The government commenced when Labor defeated the McMahon government at the 1972 Australian federal elect ...

. However, he narrowly failed to win election to the Ministry and his colleague from Victoria,

Gordon Bryant Gordon Munro Bryant (3 August 1914 – 14 January 1991) was an Australian politician. He was a member of the Australian Labor Party (ALP) and represented the Division of Wills in Victoria from 1955 to 1980. He served as Minister for Aboriginal ...

, became Minister for Aboriginal Affairs in the government.

1975 election

Cross held the seat of Brisbane until 1975. In the federal election that year he was defeated by

Liberal Liberal or liberalism may refer to: Politics * Generally, a supporter of the political philosophy liberalism. Liberals may be politically left or right but tend to be centrist. * An adherent of a Liberal Party (See also Liberal parties by country ...

challenger Peter Johnson amid Labor's meltdown in

in the election; Labor was cut down to only one seat in Queensland with Hayden holding on narrowly for Labor in Oxley. Although Cross led Johnson in early voting, he did not win a clear majority on the first count. The seat was decided after the allocation of

preferences In psychology, economics and philosophy, preference is a technical term usually used in relation to choosing between alternatives. For example, someone prefers A over B if they would rather choose A than B. Preferences are central to decision the ...

. In the third round of preferential counting, a National Country candidate's preferences flowed overwhelmingly to Johnson. The National Country Party had begun contesting seats in the Brisbane area in order to broaden its base.

Later elections and political life

During the 1970s and later, Cross was active in efforts to reform the Labor Party in Queensland. Following a severe loss that the Labor Party suffered in the state election in Queensland in 1974, there was growing support for reform of the organisation of the party. Cross, along with colleagues such as

Peter Beattie Peter Douglas Beattie (born 18 November 1952) is an Australian former politician who served as the 36th Premier of Queensland, in office from 1998 to 2007. He was the state leader of the Labor Party from 1996 to 2007. Beattie was born in Syd ...

Di Fingleton Diane McGrath Fingleton (born 11 January 1947) is a former magistrate in the Queensland Magistrates Court, most notable for being appointed Chief Magistrate and later being convicted of the offence of intimidation of a witness, before the conv ...

, Kev Hooper and Denis Murphy, was one of the activists who supported moves for change. In March 1980 the National Executive of the Labor Party intervened in the management of the party at the state level and appointed Manfred Cross as an interim Queensland Branch Secretary to help guide the reform process. During this period, Cross continued to work for re-election to the national parliament as the member for Brisbane. He narrowly lost to Peter Johnson in a 1977 rematch but succeeded in regaining the seat in

1980 Events January * January 4 – U.S. President Jimmy Carter proclaims a United States grain embargo against the Soviet Union, grain embargo against the USSR with the support of the European Commission. * January 6 – Global Positioning Sys ...

when there was a nation-wide swing towards Labor with Hayden as leader. Cross remained in the parliament as a member of the House of Representatives until his retirement in 1990.

Later life

From 1989 until 1996, Cross was the Chairman of the Library Board of Queensland. In January 1992, Cross was awarded an AM in recognition of his service to the Australian Parliament and to the community. He was also awarded the

Centenary Medal The Centenary Medal is an award which was created by the Australian Government in 2001. It was established to commemorate the centenary of the Federation of Australia and to recognise "people who made a contribution to Australian society or g ...

, for long service as federal member for Brisbane, to local history and to Indigenous rights. Cross died on 30 January 2024, at the age of 94.

References

External links

* Trove, National Library of Australia
Cross, Manfred Douglas (1929 – )
* Historic Hansard
List of speeches in the House of Representatives by Manfred Cross
* Parliament of Australia
Biography for Manfred Cross
* Queensland Speaks
Manfred Cross interviewed by Sue Yarrow
13 December 2010. {{DEFAULTSORT:Cross, Manfred 1929 births 2024 deaths Australian Labor Party members of the Parliament of Australia Members of the Australian House of Representatives for Brisbane Members of the Australian House of Representatives Members of the Order of Australia People educated at Brisbane State High School Australian MPs 1961–1963 Australian MPs 1963–1966 Australian MPs 1966–1969 Australian MPs 1969–1972 Australian MPs 1972–1974 Australian MPs 1974–1975 Australian MPs 1980–1983 Australian MPs 1983–1984 Australian MPs 1984–1987 Australian MPs 1987–1990