Nationalist Party

The second was a politician who I told you was going to be returning, the seventh Prime Minister of Australia, The Rat himself, Billy Hughes.

While Hughes has been missing from the broad Australian picture since the early 1920s, his star had returned earlier in the year, as many in the Nationalist Party had called for him to be brought into the ministry, something Bruce had refused to do.

Hughes, angered at the budget and Bruce's stance on industrial relations, crossed the floor, and in doing so, returned to high relevancy once more.

For their crossing of the floor, both Manne and Hughes were expelled from the party.

Labor won 4% more votes for 48.4- 8% total, leading to it winning 47 seats, 15 more than it had originally.

The Coalition parties were in shambles, meanwhile.

The Nationalists lost 5.4% of the vote for 33.9% of the vote total, and lost 15 seats to hold 14 in total, while the Country Party won only 10% of the vote and won only 10 seats.

Perhaps most devastating was Bruce himself losing his seat of Flinders to Labor's Francis Holloway, who got a 10.9% swing towards him, but won with only a 0.2% margin, or just under 700 votes.

At the 1917 election, it was very much a two-horse race.

The Nationalists were a new party created by a merger of the Liberal Party and supporters of Billy Hughes, who had split from Labor over the issue of conscription.

Over 98% of votes were cast for either the Nationalists or Labor.

But in the following term, cracks began to form in the united anti-labor front.

Farmers groups in particular looked to run their own candidates independent of the Nationalists.

With farmers groups such as the Victorian Farmers Union looking to run candidates, we saw the familiar dance seen in first past the post systems on many occasions: two distinct groups who both want to defeat their common enemy but want something in return for withdrawing.

In early 1918, the National Farmers Organization formally asked Billy Hughes to support preferential voting, but the Prime Minister left for Europe without a reply.

The Western Australian Farmers and Settlers Association, who were affiliated with the Victorian Farmers Union, decided to stand a candidate alongside an independent and candidates for the Labor and Nationalist parties.

The first is in response to the First World War, the second in response to the Great Depression, and the third, the Second World War, basically.

So while the Fusion Liberal Party represented two conservative groups coming together to oppose Labor, the Nationalist Party, which is the party that replaces the Liberals, actually drew defectors from Labor into the right in 1917.

It was also born out of a fundamentally illiberal idea.

Deakin is gone.

So switching over meant that they could have a coalition.

Bruce managed to retain power until 1929 before losing to one James Scallon of Labor who won an election.

Hughes didn't see much point in being in a political party he wasn't in charge of, so he immediately left the Nationalists and founded his own party, which he called the Australian Party.

The election, which saw Labor return to power, was on the 12th of October, 1929.

We'll now briefly discuss the only state election of our episode today, the Tasmanian state election.

Occurring on the 30th of May, it saw two parties, the Nationalists led by John McPhee and the Labour government led by Premier Joseph Lyons, contest it.

The previous years of Tasmanian politics had been relatively cordial, with both parties working together generally and having little issue with each other.

though this changed in 1928, as the Nationalists attacked Labor for unemployment and economic stagnation.

The election saw a turnout of 81.89%, or 91,677 voters.

Labor took home the most votes with 47%, but lost two seats, ending the election with 14, while the Nationalists won 42% of the vote and 15 seats, with one Independent winning a seat in Franklin.

Across Tasmania's five districts, Labor and the Nationalists were tied in all but Franklin, where the Nationalists won three seats, Labor two, and the aforementioned Independent won a seat.

This result meant that the Nationalists now had a majority of one seat, and as such, won the election, with McPhee becoming Premier and Lyons moving into federal politics the next year.