Rex Patterson

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Australian politician

title: "Rex Patterson" type: doc version: 1 created: 2026-02-28 author: "Wikipedia contributors" status: active scope: public tags: ["1927-births", "2016-deaths", "australian-labor-party-members-of-the-parliament-of-australia", "members-of-the-australian-house-of-representatives-for-dawson", "members-of-the-australian-house-of-representatives", "members-of-the-cabinet-of-australia", "1975-australian-constitutional-crisis", "cyclone-tracy", "royal-australian-air-force-personnel-of-world-war-ii", "australian-mps-1963–1966", "australian-mps-1966–1969", "australian-mps-1969–1972", "australian-mps-1972–1974", "australian-mps-1974–1975"] description: "Australian politician" topic_path: "history" source: "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rex_Patterson" license: "CC BY-SA 4.0" wikipedia_page_id: 0 wikipedia_revision_id: 0

::summary Australian politician ::

::data[format=table title="Infobox officeholder"]

Field	Value
honorific-prefix	The Honourable
name	Rex Patterson
image	Rex Patterson 1973 (cropped).jpg
caption	Patterson in 1973
office	Minister for Agriculture
term_start	21 October 1975
term_end	11 November 1975
predecessor	Ken Wriedt
successor	Ian Sinclair
office1	Minister for Northern Australia
term_start1	6 June 1975
term_end1	21 October 1975
predecessor1	Himself
successor1	Paul Keating
office2	Minister for the Northern Territory
term_start2	19 October 1973
term_end2	6 June 1975
predecessor2	Himself
successor2	Paul Keating
office3	Minister for Northern Development
term_start3	19 December 1972
term_end3	6 June 1975
predecessor3	Lance Barnard
successor3	Himself
constituency_MP4	Dawson
parliament4	Australian
predecessor4	George Shaw
successor4	Ray Braithwaite
term_start4	26 February 1966
term_end4	13 December 1975
birth_date
birth_place	Bundaberg, Queensland
death_date
death_place	Mackay, Queensland
nationality	Australian
party	Labor
alma_mater	University of Queensland
Australian National University
University of Illinois
University of Chicago
::

Early life, war service and education

Patterson was born in Bundaberg, Queensland on 8 January 1927. He enlisted for war service on 22 February 1945 in Brisbane, Queensland, during the final months of World War II. He served with the Royal Australian Air Force and was discharged on 25 September 1945.

He was educated at the University of Queensland, the Australian National University, the University of Illinois and the University of Chicago.

Political career

Patterson was elected as an Australian Labor Party member for the House of Representatives seat of Dawson, Queensland at a by-election in 1966. He was the first Labor member ever to win it.

When the Whitlam government was elected at the December 1972 election, he was appointed Minister for Northern Development, responsible for the Department of Northern Development, charged with "overall policy and co-ordination in the development of all of Australia north of the 26th parallel". In this role, Patterson was concerned with the Australian sugar and beef industries as well as the specialised development and utilisation of land, water and minerals in northern Australia.

On 19 October 1973, he was sworn in as Minister for the Northern Territory by Queen Elizabeth II, the only occasion when an Australian minister has been sworn in by the Monarch of Australia directly (rather than by the Governor-General of Australia).

On Christmas Day, 1974, the day after Cyclone Tracy, he flew into Darwin with Major-General Alan Stretton and they took responsibility for rebuilding Darwin. In June 1975, Patterson's portfolios were combined and retitled as Minister for Northern Australia.

On 14 October 1975, following Rex Connor's resignation from the ministry, he became Minister for Agriculture. He lost this position when the government was dismissed on 11 November, and lost his seat in the subsequent election.{{cite web | title =Members of the House of Representatives since 1901 | publisher=Parliament of Australia | work=Parliamentary Handbook | url =http://www.aph.gov.au/library/handbook/historical/representatives/makin.price.htm | accessdate = 25 January 2008 |archiveurl = https://web.archive.org/web/20071117114054/http://www.aph.gov.au/library/handbook/historical/representatives/makin.price.htm |archivedate = 17 November 2007}}

Personal life

Patterson died on 13 April 2016.

References

(2016-04-13). "Former politician Rex Patterson has died in Mackay aged 89". Daily Mercury.
"Service record – Patterson, Rex Alan". Department of Veterans' Affairs, Commonwealth of Australia.
(2008). "Who's who in Australia". Crown Content.
"CA 1483: Department of Northern Development, Central Office". National Archives of Australia.
[https://books.google.com/books?id=wmZ2BQAAQBAJ&dq=Rex+Patterson+sworn+in+queen&pg=PT79 Jenny Hocking, ''Gough Whitlam: His Time Updated Edition'']. Retrieved 20 September 2015

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