TheWestern Australian Party (orWest Australian Party;WAP) was a short-livedAustralian political party that operated in 1906. It was intended as aliberal party to protect the rights ofWestern Australians and to oppose the increasingly successfulLabor Party, and drew its supporters from theProtectionist Party and theAnti-Socialist Party.John Forrest, a minister inAlfred Deakin's government, accepted the leadership of the party. Candidates were endorsed for all electorates in the1906 federal election, including Forrest, but by the time of the election enthusiasm for the venture had diffused. The party elected Forrest inSwan andWilliam Hedges inFremantle.[1][2][3][4]
Forrest and Hedges did not sit together in federal parliament; Forrest continued to serve as a minister in theProtectionist government ofAlfred Deakin while Hedges sat on the opposition benches as anAnti-Socialist.[5]
The1903 federal election saw theAustralian Labor Party (ALP) win all threeSenate seats in Western Australia and everyHouse of Representatives seat except that held by federal government minister and former premierJohn Forrest.[6]
In the lead-up to the next federal election, there were calls for an anti-Labor organisation to be created. In September 1906, the Senate rejected a bill authorising a survey of the route for the plannedTrans-Australian Railway, which would connect Western Australia to theeastern states and had been a major reason for Western Australians voting tofederate in 1901. The rejection of the bill prompted "a wave of anti-federal feeling" in Western Australia,[6] with liberals seeking to capitalise on this sentiment to organise a new anti-Labor party.[7]
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