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1922 Australian federal election

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Field	Value
election_name	1922 Australian federal election
country	Australia
type	parliamentary
ongoing	no
previous_election	1919 Australian federal election
previous_year	1919
outgoing_members	Members of the Australian House of Representatives, 1919–1922
elected_members	Members of the Australian House of Representatives, 1922–1925
next_election	1925 Australian federal election
next_year	1925
registered	2,980,424 4.58%
turnout	1,646,863 (59.36%)
(18.94 pp)
seats_for_election	All 76 seats in the House of Representatives
38 seats were needed for a majority in the House
19 (of the 36) seats in the Senate
election_date
<!-- Australian Labor Party -->	image1	Image:Matthew Charlton 1925.jpg
image_size	190x190px
leader1	Matthew Charlton
leader_since1	[16 May 1922](1922-australian-labor-party-leadership-election)
party1	Australian Labor Party
leaders_seat1	Hunter (NSW)
percentage1	42.30%
swing1	0.19%
last_election1	26 seats
seats1	29 + NT
popular_vote1	665,145
seat_change1	4
<!-- Nationalist Party of Australia -->	image2	Image:Billy Hughes 1919.jpg
leader2	Billy Hughes
leader_since2	14 November 1916
party2	Nationalist Party (Australia)
leaders_seat2	won North Sydney (NSW)
percentage2	35.23%
swing2	9.85%
last_election2	37 seats
seats2	26
popular_vote2	553,920
seat_change2	11
<!-- Country Party -->	image3	File:Earle Page 1920 (cropped).jpg
leader3	Earle Page
leader_since3	5 April 1921
party3	Country
leaders_seat3	Cowper (NSW)
last_election3	11 seats
seats3	14 seats
popular_vote3	197,513
seat_change3	3
percentage3	12.56%
swing3	3.30%
title	Prime Minister
posttitle	Subsequent Prime Minister
before_election	Billy Hughes
before_party	Nationalist Party (Australia)
after_election	Stanley Bruce
after_party	Nationalist/Country coalition
map_image	File:1922_Australian_federal_election.svg
map_caption	Results by division for the House of Representatives, shaded by winning party's margin of victory.
vote_type	First preference

(18.94 pp) 38 seats were needed for a majority in the House 19 (of the 36) seats in the Senate

The 1922 Australian federal election was held on 16 December 1922 to elect members to the Parliament of Australia. All 76 seats in the House of Representatives and 19 of the 36 seats in the Senate were up for election. The incumbent Nationalist Party government failed to win a majority and instead formed a coalition with the Country Party, with S. M. Bruce replacing Billy Hughes as Nationalist leader and prime minister.

The election was held following a period of parliamentary instability, with the Nationalists governing in minority. The main issue of the campaign was Hughes' leadership, which had become increasingly divisive and led to anti-Hughes factions running against endorsed Nationalists. The opposition Australian Labor Party (ALP), led by Matthew Charlton, emerged as the largest single party in the House but with no reasonable prospect of forming government. Page and the Country Party strengthened their parliamentary position and won a clear balance of power, which they used to force Hughes' resignation. A new government was not formed until February 1923, with Bruce as prime minister and Page as deputy prime minister.

Background

The 1919 federal election had resulted in a hung parliament, with the newly formed Country Party holding the balance of power. Prime Minister Billy Hughes' Nationalist Party government was reliant on the support of the Country Party to pass legislation. Country Party leader Earle Page used the situation to his advantage, bargaining for concessions and refusing to guarantee support for confidence motions.

A vote of confidence held in October 1921 on the government's budget passed by only a single vote, when Country MP Alexander Hay abstained from voting. The following month, Hughes made an explicit offer of cabinet portfolios to Page, but on 30 November the Country Party "resolved to have no compromise with Hughes, but to concentrate on getting enough members at the next election to control parliament and insist on his removal".

ALP leader Frank Tudor died in office in January 1922, after a long period of ill health. He was replaced as party leader and opposition leader by New South Wales MP Matthew Charlton, who had been acting leader for some time, although he was not formally confirmed in the position until May 1922.

Campaign

According to Hughes' biographer L. F. Fitzhardinge, "observers noted that the campaign that followed was one of the dullest on record, all parties being received with equal indifference". Gavin Souter's history of the Australian Parliament likewise describes the 1922 election as "probably the dullest yet in federal history".

Nationalist Party

Hughes opened the Nationalist campaign on 4 October 1922 at the Willoughby Town Hall in Chatswood, New South Wales. Following an electoral redistribution, he had declined to recontest his existing seat of Bendigo in Victoria and instead returned to his home state of New South Wales to contest the safe Nationalist seat of North Sydney. The government's platform included a constitutional convention, the introduction of industrial tribunals, public service reforms and acceleration of the construction of Canberra. Hughes also promised to reduce government regulation of the coal and sugar industries, increase government-sponsored migration and provide more assistance to farmers.

For many voters, Hughes' leadership was the defining issue of the election. In Melbourne, disaffected liberals – including Hughes' former treasurer William Watt – stood on explicit anti-Hughes platform, with John Latham running under the slogan "Hughes must go!". The Nationalists in South Australia split into the pro-Hughes National Labor faction and the anti-Hughes Liberal Union faction, running separate House and Senate candidates.

Australian Labor Party

Charlton presented the ALP's campaign speech on the same day in Maitland, New South Wales, a "long and prosy exposition of orthodox Labor policies". He advocated "policies of national development under a unified government with regional devolution of powers, tariff protection and limited immigration". Charlton was briefly hospitalised during the campaign.

Several ALP breakaway groups contested the election in opposition to official ALP candidates. New South Wales MP James Catts was expelled from the ALP in April 1922 and subsequently made "lurid allegations of corruption". He recontested his seat for a new Majority Labor Party which fielded seven candidates at the election. On the left, Michael Considine quit the ALP in 1920 and recontested his seat for the Industrial Socialist Labor Party.

Country Party

The Country Party platform presented by Page included decentralisation, reduction in government expenditure and public debt, tariff and agricultural marketing reforms, and rural credits (a form of government subsidy for primary producers). He also supported placing the Commonwealth Bank under an independent board, tasked with supporting national development projects. His speech was critical of Hughes, alleging broken promises and describing the prime minister as having "total disregard of the financial position of the country".

Results

House of Representatives

Liberal: 5 seats}}

First preference votes	%	Swing	Seats	Change	Two-party-preferred (estimated)
	Labor	665,145	42.30	−0.19	30	4
	Nationalist	553,920	35.23	−9.85	26	11
	Country	197,513	12.56	+3.30	14	3
	Liberal Union	37,904	2.41	+2.41	3	3
	Liberal	32,167	2.04	+2.04	2	2
	Constitutionalist	11,812	0.75	+0.75	0
	Majority Labor	10,303	0.66	+0.66	0
	Industrial Labor	4,331	0.28	+0.09	0
	Protestant Labor	3,631	0.23	+0.23	0
	NT Representation League	362	0.02	+0.02	0
	Independents	51,538	3.28	+1.86	1
Total	1,572,514			76	1
	Nationalist	Win	51.20	−2.90	40	+3
	Labor		48.80	+2.90	29	0

Notes

Independents: William Watson (Fremantle, WA)
Five members were elected unopposed – one Labor, two Nationalist, one Country, and one Liberal.

Senate

First preference Votes	%	Swing	Seats won	Seats held	Change
	Labor	715,219	45.70	+2.86	11	12
	Nationalist	567,084	36.23	−10.16	8	24
	Country	203,267	12.99	+4.20	0	0
	Liberal Union	43,706	2.79	+2.79	0	0
	Socialist Labor	8,551	0.55	+0.55	0	0
	Majority Labor	3,813	0.24	+0.24	0	0
	Independents	23,447	1.50	+0.08	0	0
Total	1,565,087			19	36

Seats changing hands

Seat	Swing	Post-1922	Party	Member	Margin	Margin	Member	Party
Adelaide, SA		Nationalist	Reginald Blundell	0.8	8.0	3.6	George Edwin Yates	Labor
Balaclava, Vic		Nationalist	William Watt	N/A	100.0	100.0	William Watt	Liberal
Barker, SA		Nationalist	John Livingston	N/A	N/A	2.3	Malcolm Cameron	Liberal Union
Barton, NSW		Nationalist	notional – new seat	N/A	13.8	7.6	Frederick McDonald	Labor
Boothby, SA		Nationalist	William Story	N/A	N/A	4.7	Jack Duncan-Hughes	Liberal Union
Calare, NSW		Labor	Thomas Lavelle	2.3	8.5	5.3	Neville Howse	Nationalist
Darwin, Tas		Nationalist	George Bell	4.0	N/A	0.4	Joshua Whitsitt	Country
Denison, Tas		Nationalist	William Laird Smith	3.9	4.3	0.4	David O'Keefe	Labor
Fremantle, WA		Nationalist	Reginald Burchell	N/A	56.9	6.9	William Watson	Independent
Gippsland, Vic		Nationalist	George Wise	5.2	18.1	12.9	Thomas Paterson	Country
Grey, SA		Nationalist	Alexander Poynton	1.8	5.5	3.7	Andrew Lacey	Labor
Henty, Vic		Independent	Frederick Francis	2.9	8.7	5.8	Frederick Francis	Nationalist
Kalgoorlie, WA		Nationalist	George Foley	1.4	7.1	7.4	Albert Green	Labor
Kooyong, Vic		Nationalist	Robert Best	14.3	14.9	0.6	John Latham	Liberal
Macquarie, NSW		Labor	Samuel Nicholls	3.2	0.6	0.2	Arthur Manning	Nationalist
New England, NSW		Nationalist	Alexander Hay*	7.3	N/A	8.5	Victor Thompson	Country
Northern Territory, NT	new division				0.4	H. G. Nelson	Labor
Richmond, NSW		Nationalist	Walter Massy-Greene	22.5	24.0	3.3	Roland Green	Country
Riverina, NSW		Nationalist	John Chanter	N/A	54.3	4.3	William Killen	Country
Wakefield, SA		Nationalist	Richard Foster	N/A	N/A	5.3	Richard Foster	Liberal Union
Wannon, Vic		Nationalist	Arthur Rodgers	4.1	4.9	0.8	John McNeill	Labor
Wilmot, Tas		Nationalist	Llewellyn Atkinson	10.2	N/A	11.2	Llewellyn Atkinson	Country

Members listed in italics did not contest their seat at this election.
*Alexander Hay contested his seat as an independent

Post-election pendulum

Fremantle (WA)	William Watson	IND	06.9 v ALP

Notes

References

Wilks, Stephen. (2020). "'Now is the Psychological Moment': Earle Page and the Imagining of Australia". ANU Press.
Fitzhardinge, Laurence. (1979). "William Morris Hughes: A Political Biography / Vol. 2: The Little Digger, 1914–1952". Angus & Robertson.
McCalman, Janet. "Tudor, Francis Gwynne (Frank) (1866–1922)".
(26 January 1922). "Mr. Charlton Leader in the House". The Sydney Morning Herald.
(17 May 1922). "Federal Labour Party". The Argus.
Souter, Gavin. (1988). "Acts of Parliament: A Narrative History of the Senate and House of Representatives". Melbourne University Press.
Perks, Murray. (1979). "Matthew Charlton (1866–1948)". [[Melbourne University Publishing.
McMullin, Ross. (1991). "The Light on the Hill: The Australian Labor Party 1891–1991". Oxford University Press.
Farrell, Frank. (1981). "Considine, Michael Patrick (1885–1959)".

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