Guide 3 to NSW State Archives relating to Responsible Government - OCR - Flipbook - Page 159
A Guide to New South Wales State Archives relating to Responsible Government
difference of opinion between the Premier and His Excellency should in the ordinary
course be the subject of conference with a view to adjustment; but Sir Gerald
Strickland feels unable to transact public business as usual in view of the division in
the House of Assembly this morning. That division shows that Mr. Wade has taken the
business of the House out of the hands of Mr. Holman, and that the Premier is only
followed by sixteen or seventeen members of the Labour party on the strength of
which Mr. Holman received the Governor's Commission. 2
Holman refused to resign; he sought the advice of his Attorney General who advised that
there was no obligation for the Premier to resign in such circumstances, and that
Ministers may be dismissed and replaced upon the advice of the Premier. Holman then
advised the Governor that he would not resign, but rather that certain Ministers would
resign and be replaced, on his advice, with new Ministers. This occurred despite the
Governor's objections.
The Governor advised the Colonial Office, after the event, of his intimation to the Premier
on 10 November 1916 that he must resign. The Secretary of State for the Colonies was
not impressed. He described the Governor's actions as "unusual" and noted that such
intervention by a Governor must render the working of the constitutional machinery
extremely difficult. He concluded that the resulting strained relations between the
Governor and his Ministers might lead him to the "painful duty" of considering the
Governor's recall. Only a few months later, the New South Wales Government sought the
Governor's recall, and the Secretary of State agreed. Governor Strickland went on leave
in April 1917, never to return.
During the 1910s-1920s the political situation improved for women. While women had
gained the right to vote for Members of the Legislative Assembly under the Women's
Franchise Act, 1902, they were not able to be nominated as candidates at any election or
to be elected as Members of the Assembly. Legal impediments to women standing for
election as Members of the Assembly were not removed until 1918, and the appointment
of women to the Legislative Council was not permitted until 1926.
During the period when the State Government was experimenting with proportional
representation (1918-26) the first woman was elected to the New South Wales
Legislative Assembly, Millicent Preston -Stanley who held the seat of Eastern Suburbs for
the Nationalist Party 1925-27. The second woman to enter the Legislative Assembly was
Australian Labor Party representative Mary Quirk who in 1939 won the seat of Balmain
following the death of her husband John, who had been the Member since 1917; she
held the seat for three more elections. In the Upper House the Lang government
appointed the first two women — Catherine Green and Ellen Webster. Green resigned in
September 1932 but Webster remained in the Legislative Council until it was
reconstituted in 1933. It was 1952 before a woman, Gertrude Melville (ALP), was elected
to the Legislative Council.
In 1911, provision for an absentee vote enfranchised itinerant workers who had been
unable to vote in their own electorate. 1911 also saw the disqualification of members of
the military and naval services from voting being removed, with a few short years later,
in 1918, members of the military or naval forces under the age of 21 being given the
right to vote. Postal votes from 1918 (curtailed between 1949 and 1965) improved
access to the ballot for travellers, the ill and the isolated. Compulsory enrolment of
electors was first introduced in New South Wales in 1921 and voting was made
compulsory for State elections under the Parliamentary Electorates and Elections
(Amendment) Act, 1928, which came into operation on 16 September 1930. The 1928
Act also introduced compulsory preferential voting.
2
Governor Strickland to Premier Holman, 10 November 1916, in SRNSW: CGS 4542,
[12/2031.2]
State Records Authority of New South Wales
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