Parliament of Western Australia, Legislative Assembly election

* Party did not contest previous election or did not meet criteria for listing, or contested previous election under a different party name.

Notes

Election dates: Elections were held over the period from 22 March to 23 April 1924; for details of polling dates, see Black, Election Statistics, pp. xv-xvii, (see 'Sources', below).

Premier in office at election: The Mitchell Nationalist Coalition government had suffered from a split within its largest party component, the Country Party (see note, below). Even so, the combined Nationalist Coalition vote share at this election (1924) was larger than that gained by the Australian Labor Party, but the Labor Party won a majority of Legislative Assembly seats, and Mitchell resigned as Premier on 15 April 1924.

Premier in office after election: Collier was commissioned as Premier of an Australian Labor Party majority government on 15 April 1924.

Nationalist Party and Nationalist Coalition: The Nationalist Party and the Nationalist Coalition government had been formed as part of the realignment political support that had been prompted by the conscription crisis and the First World War; see the notes to the Legislative Assembly elections of 1917, and 1921. With the defeat of the Nationalist Coalition government at this election (1924), the coalition disbanded, and its constituent parties operated as independent entities.

The Nationalist Party (Nationalists) was the successor to the Liberal Party which had existed before the First World War, but its support was heavily concentrated in the electoral districts of metropolitan Perth; see David Black, 'The Liberal Party and its Predecessors', in Ralph Pervan and Campbell Sharman (editors), Essays on Western Australian Politics, pp 191-232, at pp 201-204 (Perth: University of Western Australia Press, 1979, ISBN 0855641495), and see 'References', below .

In this database, the name Nationalist Party (Nationalists) is used even though some references -- and contemporary commentary -- referred to the party in Western Australia as the National Party; the use of the label 'Nationalist' is used to distinguish the party from the National Party which emerged in the 1970s.

Australian Labor Party: For a study of the Australian Labor Party in Western Australia, see Ralph Pervan and Douglas Mitchell, 'The Changing Nature of the Australian Labor Party', in Ralph Pervan and Campbell Sharman (editors), Essays on Western Australian Politics, pp 129-158, (Perth: University of Western Australia Press, 1979, ISBN 0855641495); for a study of Collier's first period in office, see David Black, 'The Collier Government 1924-1930', University Studies in Western Australian History, [University of Western Australia], 3 (3), October 1959: 58-70, and see 'References', below.

Majority Country Party and Executive Country Party: Tensions within the Country Party over its role in the National Coalition government of Premier Mitchell led to strains between the Primary Producers Association (PPA) and Country Party members of parliament. In 1923, these disagreements came to a head with the executive of the PPA refusing to endorse several sitting Country Party members. As a consequence, the Party split between those who supported continued close cooperation between Country Party members and the National Coalition (the Majority (or Ministerial) Country Party), and those who wished Country Party members to follow a more independent line (the Executive Country Party). Both these groups fielded candidates at this Legislative Assembly election (1924).

For details of this Country Party split, see Lenore Layman, 'The Country Party: Rise and Decline', in Ralph Pervan and Campbell Sharman (editors), Essays on Western Australian Politics, pp 159-190, at pp 163-164 (Perth: University of Western Australia Press, 1979, ISBN 0855641495), and David Black, p. 105, (see 'References', below).

References: For the political context of this election (1924), see David Black, 'Party Politics in Turmoil, 1911-1924', in C T Stannage (editor), A New History of Western Australia, pp 381-405, (Perth: University of Western Australia Press, 1981, ISBN 0855641819).

For an overview of the context of Western Australian parliamentary and electoral politics in this period, see David Black, 'Factionalism and Stability, 1911-1947', in David Black (editor), The House on the Hill: A History of the Parliament of Western Australia 1832-1990, pp 97-151, (Perth: Western Australian Parliamentary History Project, Parliament of Western Australia, 1991, ISBN 0730939839).

Sources

Colin A Hughes and B D Graham, A Handbook of Australian Government and Politics 1890-1964, (Canberra: Australian National University Press, 1968, SBN 708102700); Colin A Hughes and B D Graham, Voting for the South Australian, Western Australian and Tasmanian Lower Houses 1890-1964, (Canberra: Department of Political Science, Research School of Social Sciences, Australian National University, 1976, ISBN 0708113346); David Black, Election Statistics Legislative Assembly of Western Australia 1890-1996, Listed Alphabetically by Constituency, (Perth: Parliament of Western Australia and Western Australian Electoral Commission, 1997); and David Black. An Index to Parliamentary Candidates in Western Australian Elections State and Federal 1890-2006, 2nd edition, (Perth: Parliament of Western Australia, 2006, ISBN 1920830774).