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1970 Australian Senate election

1970 parliamentary election for the Senate in Australia

Field	Value
country	Australia
type	parliamentary
ongoing	no
election_date	21 November 1970
previous_election	1967 Australian Senate election
previous_year	1967
next_election	1974 Australian federal election
next_year	1974
seats_for_election	30 of the 60 seats in the Senate
majority_seats	31
image1	Lionel Murphy 1970.jpg
leader1	Lionel Murphy
party1	Australian Labor Party
seats1	14
seats_after1	26
seat_change1	1
popular_vote1	2,376,215
percentage1	42.22%
swing1	2.81pp
image2	Ken Anderson 1970.jpg
leader2	Ken Anderson
party2	Coalition
seats2	13
seats_after2	26
seat_change2	2
popular_vote2	2,149,023
percentage2	38.18%
swing2	4.59pp
image3	Queensland State Archives 4750 Hon VC Gair Premier of Queensland c 1953.png
leader3	Vince Gair
party3	Democratic Labor Party (Australia, 1955)
seats3	3
seats_after3	5
seat_change3	1
popular_vote3	625,142
percentage3	11.11%
swing3	1.34pp

An election was held on 21 November 1970 for 32 of the 60 seats in the Australian Senate. It is the most recent occasion on which a Senate election has been held without an accompanying election for the House of Representatives.

The election cycle for each house of the federal parliament had been out of synchronisation since prime minister Robert Menzies called the 1963 election for the House of Representatives a year ahead of schedule.

Key dates

Date	Event
16 October 1970	Writs were issued by the respective State Governors to proceed with an election.
29 October 1970	Close of nominations, at 12pm.
21 November 1970	Polling day, between the hours of 8am and 6pm.
17 December 1970	Declaration of the poll for South Australia.
7 January 1971	Return of the writs.

Results

The governing Coalition and the opposition Australian Labor Party won 13 and 14 seats respectively, giving them a total of 26 seats each. The Democratic Labor Party increased its Senate representation by one, and two new independents won seats.

Votes	%	Swing	Seats won	Seats held	Change
	Labor	2,376,215	42.22	–2.81	14	26
Liberal–Country coalition (total)	2,149,023	38.18	–4.59	13	26
Liberal–Country joint ticket	1,098,134	19.51	–14.31	4	***
	Liberal	991,473	17.61	+9.47	8	21
	Country	59,416	1.06	+0.24	1	5
	Democratic Labor	625,142	11.11	+1.34	3	5
	Australia	163,343	2.90	+2.90	0	0
	Better Education Committee	59,813	1.06	+1.06	0	0
	Democratic	52,799	0.94	+0.94	0	0
	Pensioner Power	28,983	0.51	+0.51	0	0
	Defence of Government Schools	27,796	0.49	+0.49	0	0
	National Socialist	24,017	0.43	+0.43	0	0
	Conservative Immigration Movement	4,864	0.08	+0.08	0	0
	Independent	116,838	2.07	+0.37	2	3
Total	5,628,833			32	60

;Notes

In New South Wales and Queensland, the coalition parties ran a joint ticket. Of the four senators elected on a joint ticket, three were members of the Liberal Party and one was a member of the Country Party. In Western Australia, the coalition parties ran on separate tickets. In South Australia, Tasmania, and Victoria, only the Liberal Party ran a ticket.
Two independents were elected – Michael Townley of Tasmania and Syd Negus of Western Australia. This brought the total number of independents in the Senate to three, the other being Reg Turnbull of Tasmania.

References

(7 October 1970). "Election of Senators Act, 1903. Proclamation.".
(7 October 1970). "Senate Elections Act 1958 (No. 6365)".
(14 October 1970). "Senators' Elections Act 1903: Order under Section 3".
(6 October 1970). "Election of Senators for the State of South Australia (Proclamation)".
[http://www.aph.gov.au/library/handbook/historical/senate/index.htm Parliamentary Handbook – Members of the Senate since 1901] {{webarchive. link. (25 July 2008)

Info: Wikipedia Source

This article was imported from Wikipedia and is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Content has been adapted to SurfDoc format. Original contributors can be found on the article history page.

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