1957 Queensland state election

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All 75 seats in theLegislative Assembly of Queensland 38 Assembly seats were needed for a majority
Registered	747,4554.9%
Turnout	706,909 (94.58%) (1.69pp)
First party Second party   Leader Frank Nicklin Jack Duggan Party Country Labor Leader since 21 May 1941 24 April 1957 Leader's seat Landsborough Toowoomba (lost seat) Last election 16 seats 49 seats Seats won 24 20 Seat change 8 29 Popular vote 139,720 201,971 Percentage 19.99% 28.90% Swing 0.72pp 5.98pp   Third party Fourth party   Leader Kenneth Morris Vince Gair Party Liberal Queensland Labor Leader since 17 August 1954 26 April 1957 Leader's seat Mount Coot-tha South Brisbane Last election 8 seats Did not exist Seats won 18 seats 11 Seat change 10 11 Popular vote 162,372 163,534 Percentage 23.23% 23.40% Swing 7.34pp 23.40pp
Legislative Assembly after the election
Premier before election Vince Gair Labor SubsequentPremier Frank Nicklin Country

Elections were held in theAustralian state ofQueensland on 3 August 1957 to elect the 75 members of the state'sLegislative Assembly. The major parties contesting the election were theQueensland Labor Party led byPremierVince Gair, theLabor Party led by former Deputy PremierJack Duggan, and theCountry-Liberal coalition led byFrank Nicklin.

The elections, only 15 months into the parliamentary term, were made necessary by the collapse of the nine-term Labor government. Gair had formed theQueensland Labor Party after being expelled from theLabor Party, and attempted to stay in power as aminority government. However, a request for supply was denied on 12 June, forcing the election. The Country-Liberal Coalition won a decisive victory, taking 42 seats against only 31 for the two Labor factions combined.

On 18 April 1957, the Queensland Central Executive of the Labor Party passed a vote of no confidence in Premier Gair, and on 24 April, despite having gained a unanimous vote of support from the Cabinet, he was expelled from the Labor Party. On 26 April, Gair and 25 MLAs met and formed theQueensland Labor Party (QLP) with those present, with Gair as leader. Those at the meeting included all of the Cabinet except Deputy PremierJack Duggan and two ex-Labor Independents. All these were also expelled from the party. Duggan resigned from the ministry on 29 April and succeeded Gair as leader of the Labor Party, which commanded the support of 22 MLAs.

Gair almost immediately began talks with Nicklin forconfidence and supply support in the legislature. However, Nicklin broke them off on the advice of federal Country Party leaderArthur Fadden (himself a Queenslander), who believed the ructions in Labor gave Nicklin a chance to become Premier himself, ending 22 years in opposition. On 12 June 1957, Lieutenant Governor andChief Justice of QueenslandAlan Mansfield (GovernorJohn Lavarack was indisposed) ordered Parliament to reassemble. Shortly after 10:30 pm that night, Treasurer Ted Walsh moved that supply be granted to the Gair QLP government. The motion was defeated after the ALP and Coalition rose to vote against it, bringing the Gair government down. Gair immediately asked for new elections, which were called for 3 August.

On 1 July,Frank Nicklin delivered the Country Party's policy speech atMaroochydore, whileKenneth Morris delivered the Liberal Party's policy speech inBrisbane. The two coalition partners declared to the electorate that only they could deliver unity and effective government, an acceleration of development and civil rights, as well as court supervision of union ballots to limit strike action.^[7]

On 4 July,Jack Duggan, the Labor leader, announced Labor's campaign slogan, "A fair go for all", and promised three weeks' annual leave (the issue over which PremierVince Gair and the party executive had split) would be implemented if his party was elected. On 8 July, Gair, the incumbent Premier representing theQueensland Labor Party (QLP), spent half his speech talking about the dispute that had led to the split, promised an attack upon Communism and a continuance of the previous government's development platform.^[7]

Nominations closed on 12 July, with a record total of 219 candidates. Four seats were uncontested, but many seats had both Labor and QLP contestants. Some contests became particularly bitter as the Labor Party accused their QLP opponents of sectarianism and alleged direct interference by ministers of theCatholic Church, despite ArchbishopJames Duhig's refusal to get involved. The campaigns were strongest in the leaders' and deputy leaders' own seats.^[7]

Politicians from around Australia, in particular from the Labor Party, came to Queensland during the campaign, including thefederal opposition leader, DrH. V. Evatt,Arthur Calwell,Clyde Cameron and former Victorian premierJohn Cain, who died of a stroke on 9 August after giving a speech inTownsville.^[7]

When the writs were dropped, the Labor forces were in a precarious position. Every ALP MP faced a QLP challenger, and every QLP MP faced an ALP challenger. This created dozens of three-cornered contests, and the first-past-the-post system left them without the option of directing preferences to each other even if they wanted to do so.

The Coalition actually suffered a swing of 1.2 percent against it. However, the ructions in Labor allowed the Coalition to win a number of three-cornered contests, assuring a comfortable majority for Nicklin, with 42 seats against only 31 for the two Labor factions combined. The ALP lost both Duggan and deputy leaderFelix Dittmer, whose seats were won by Liberal candidates. The QLP lost 14 seats (two of them to the ALP), but seven of the ten ministers retained their seats. This began what would be 32 years of non-Labor government in Queensland.

¹ 791,719 electors were enrolled to vote at the election, but three Country seats representing 30,956 enrolled voters and one Liberal seat representing 13,308 voters were unopposed.

This table lists changes in party representation at the 1957 election.

The following seats changed party representation before the election due to the split of the ALP.

• Members in **italics** did not recontest their seats.
• All sitting members of the Queensland Labor Party were elected at the previous election as ALP candidates.
• Sitting member forGregory,George Devries died before election day. As a result, a supplementary election was held on 5 October for the seat.^[9]

The Country Party's win in this election proved to be one of the major turning points in Queensland politics; they remained in power continuously until the1989 state election.

The ALP electedLes Wood as party leader andEric Lloyd as deputy leader; neither had previously served in a ministry. Wood, the member forNorth Toowoomba, died in office on 29 March 1958, and Duggan returned as both a member of Parliament and leader of the party at theby-election on 31 May. Dittmer, meanwhile, was elected to theAustralian Senate.

Former Prime MinisterFrank Forde, who lost his seat ofFlinders by one vote, alleged the wrongful disallowance of some votes and successfully lodged a petition against his opponent's return at the Court of Disputed Returns; however he lost theresulting by-election.

• Members of the Queensland Legislative Assembly, 1956–1957
• Members of the Queensland Legislative Assembly, 1957–1960
• Candidates of the Queensland state election, 1957
• Gair Ministry
• Nicklin Ministry

• Elections in Queensland
• 1957 elections in Australia
• 1950s in Queensland
• August 1957 in Australia

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