From Surf Wiki (app.surf) — the open knowledge base

1931 Tasmanian state election

State election in Australia

Summary

State election in Australia

Field	Value
election_name	1931 Tasmanian state election
country	Tasmania
type	parliamentary
ongoing	no
previous_election	1928 Tasmanian state election
previous_year	1928
next_election	1934 Tasmanian state election
next_year	1934
seats_for_election	All 30 seats to the House of Assembly
election_date	9 May 1931
image1
leader1	John McPhee
leader_since1	July 1925
party1	Nationalist Party (Australia)
leaders_seat1	Denison
last_election1	15 seats
seats1	19 seats
seat_change1	4
percentage1	56.40%
swing1	14.20
image2
leader2	Albert Ogilvie
leader_since2	October 1929
party2	Australian Labor Party (Tasmanian Branch)
leaders_seat2	Franklin
last_election2	14 seats
seats2	10 seats
seat_change2	4
percentage2	34.92%
swing2	12.23
map_image	1931 Tasmanian state election.svg
map_size	350px
map_caption	Results of the election
title	Premier
before_election	John McPhee
before_party	Nationalist Party (Australia)
after_election	John McPhee
after_party	Nationalist Party (Australia)

The 1931 Tasmanian state election was held on 9 May 1931 in the Australian state of Tasmania to elect 30 members of the Tasmanian House of Assembly. The election used the Hare-Clark proportional representation system — six members were elected from each of five electorates. For the first time, voting was compulsory, resulting in a high voter turnout.

The Nationalist Party had defeated Labor by one seat at the 1928 election, and John McPhee had been Premier of Tasmania since then. Joseph Lyons left state politics in 1929 to enter federal politics, and was succeeded by Albert Ogilvie as leader of the dispirited Labor Party. The depression had struck Tasmania hard with unemployment nearly 30% and unions impotent.

The Nationalist Party won the 1931 election in a landslide, with 19 seats in the House of Assembly and a margin over Labor of more than 22%, the largest victory over Labor in Tasmania since Hare-Clark elections began in 1909. The win was attributed to public endorsement of McPhee's expenditure cuts over Ogilvie's expansionist policies. It has been said that Ogilvie's error was in identifying with an unpopular federal Labor government.

Despite the scale of the Nationalist victory, the non-Labor forces in Tasmania did not win another election until 1969.

Results

Distribution of votes

Primary vote by division

Darwin	Denison	Franklin	Wilmot
Labor Party	37.2%	31.4%	40.3%	31.8%
Nationalist	62.8%	60.0%	53.7%	43.9%
Other	–	8.5%	6.1%	24.3%

Distribution of seats

Electorate	Seats won
	Bass	Nationalist}}
	Darwin
	Denison
	Franklin
	Wilmot

	Independent

References

[http://www.parliament.tas.gov.au/tpl/Backg/HAElections.htm House of Assembly Elections], [[Parliament of Tasmania]].
[http://www.electoral.tas.gov.au/pages/ElectoralInformation/Election%20Reports/1931.pdf Report on General Election, 1931] {{Webarchive. link. (2008-07-20 , Tasmanian Electoral Commission.)
R. P. Davis, [https://adb.anu.edu.au/biography/mcphee-sir-john-cameron-7437 McPhee, Sir John Cameron (1878 - 1952)], ''[[Australian Dictionary of Biography]]'', Volume 10, Melbourne University Press, 1986, pp 355-356.

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.

elections-in-tasmania 1931-elections-in-australia 1930s-in-tasmania may-1931

Want to explore this topic further?

Ask Mako anything about 1931 Tasmanian state election — get instant answers, deeper analysis, and related topics.

Research with Mako

Free with your Surf account

Content sourced from Wikipedia, available under CC BY-SA 4.0.

This content may have been generated or modified by AI. CloudSurf Software LLC is not responsible for the accuracy, completeness, or reliability of AI-generated content. Always verify important information from primary sources.

Report