House to House

An MP Goes Breathing Space for In all respects the period from the 1910 debate, with all the absurdity that that episode unearthed, right through to the mid-1930s, was one of marking time for Parliament House in Western . Ten governments had come and gone in a twenty-six year period, six of them conservative administrations and four led by Labor premiers with a smooth transition from one Labor Premier to another in 1936. It is true that, at times, there were periods of peace and plenty, and prior to 1914 a variety of economic indices-railway expansion, wheat and flour production and population growth to name some-showed impressive if not spectacular advances for the people of the small state. Yet if economic progress was unspectacular the State and its Parliament were but a short step away from an extraordinary incident in 1915 that was ever a reminder that in a parliamentary democracy human frailty was rarely far from lofty issues of state. The incident came in the form of the downfall and reported disappearance that year of the sitting member for Roebourne, J.P. (Joe) Gardiner, a young Labor MP, union secretary and hotel manager, who had been elected only four years before when he was all of twenty-five. The disappearance was to end Gardiner's personal political career but it was to have even more serious consequences for the Scaddan Labor Government of which he was a part. For within ten months of Gardiner's seat being declared vacant on 30 September 1915 for non­ attendance, Scaddan's government was to fall by vote of the House rather than the vote of the people. Rumours and counter-rumours concerning Gardiner's disappearance and its aftermath continued on in A.L.P. mythology for at least five decades, with speculation running rife that The 1914 engagement of Rocbourne MP. Joseph Gardiner; and a young Gardiner had vanished as a direct May Holman set offa chain of consequence of falling in love events that ended in the annulment with, and marrying, the young of their marriage, his sudden Mary Alice (later known as May) absence from Parliament, and ultimately the fall of the Scadden Holman in the District Registry Government. Office in on 9 May 1914. Courtesy: Parliament House.

113 iuse to House May Holman-who would one day herself be elected to Parliament in 1925 as MLA for Forrest and Australia's first ALP woman MP-was the daughter of long-time union activist, journalist and MLA, John Barkell Holman, a former Minister for Railways and Labour, who is said to have fiercely opposed the marriage, and who allegedly threatened to 'deal with' Gardiner if he didn't get out of his daughter's life.' The official records show that the marriage was eventually formally annulled in May 1919. A closer examination of the admittedly scarce evidence suggests that Gardiner's marriage to Holman may not have been the only imperative that drove him out of town. Instead some evidence emerges of a young man, in all likelihood unsuited to the demands and pressures of elective office, finding himself in deep financial trouble and desperate to find a way out. In this respect at least, Gardiner's disappearance seems to bear a striking resemblance to that, almost sixty years later in 1974, of the British MP, John Stonehouse, who, amidst mounting business woes, faked his own suicide in the United States and was later found, and arrested, in . One obvious difference between the two cases was the level of media attention they attracted: Stonehouse's disappearance from the mother of parliaments and his subsequent arrest were to generate worldwide publicity. In far off fifty-nine years earlier Gardiner was clearly but inexplicably the subject of an 'old­ boys' agreement struck by West Australian newspapers and political leaders by which publicity over the incident was minimised, and what little publicity that did break through the wall of silence was disguised by a veneer of mystery. But the difference cannot be explained away simply because Gardiner had gone absent in a small, isolated corner of Australia, where some cosiness between MPs and Pressmen might have been expected. The fact was that Perth metropolitan and country newspapers were, in all other respects, fearless in their reporting at the time of all or any stories that warranted news coverage. Newspapers then, as now, frequently and comprehensively reported the foibles of all those whose activities were drawn to their attention. A glance at their content in this era does not suggest any coyness or modesty, or a desire to protect readers from improper or illegal behaviour. However, it is not difficult to read between the lines in all this that even to hard-bitten newsmen of the day the Gardiner matter was somehow off limits: that the reasons for his disappearance and departure from Western Australia were not seen as issues of public interest or scandal, but rather a private misdemeanour and the embarrassment caused by a twenty-year-old girl falling in love with a politically-overwhelmed and compromised young MP. Gardiner's hold on his remote seat of Roebourne was severed, as already indicated, on 30 September 1915, under Section of 38(5) of the Constitution Act Amendment Act 1899 which provided that a Member's seat could be declared vacant if he failed to attend Parliament for two consecutive months of any session. As previously stated also, the oral tradition, passed down successive generations to reach the present authors, was that he had got out of town to escape the wrath of May's father by then Deputy Speaker, for entering into the marriage in May 1914 in a Perth Registry Office, itself something anathema to the staunchly Catholic Holman family. But there was more to all this than met the eye. An examination of Hansard and the Votes and Proceedings of the period shows that any 'disappearance' was not at all sudden, but in fact widely expected, and with its roots in a variety of clashes Gardiner may have had with Labor luminaries. That Gardiner-a bootmaker by trade but a

114 union activist by inclination, and who had been involved in the shipping trade on the House to HOI north-west coast before becoming manager of a hotel in Cossack-had become a thorn in the side of Labor's hierarchy is undoubted, if his last speech in the House in January 1915 is anything to go by. That debate indicates strongly that some sort of cleavage with the Labor Party was on the horizon that month, when an issue affecting the north-west whaling industry blew up in Parliament and Gardiner, as member for Roebourne, challenged his own Government's attitude. He went so far in a colourful exchange as to confront the stance being adopted by the minister in charge of the matter, Rufus Henry Underwood, himself member for Pilbara. When he got to his feet, Gardiner at first complimented Underwood on an eloquent speech but then added somewhat icily that it was a speech:

absolutely devoid offacts and [one which] bristled with inaccuracies. 2 In the minutes that followed Gardiner was in turn to lock horns with the Premier, Scaddan, and another senior Minister, in exchanges that clearly showed deep antagonism had developed towards Gardiner. Just what prompted that ill-feeling is almost impossible to know but it may have had its basis in the ceremony at the registry office only eight months earlier. Whatever the reason, within five days-on 2 February-the clerks of the House began to record Gardiner as being absent without leave. Indeed, he was not seen in the House again for the remaining fourteen days of the session. The period of absence at that point was still far short of the two months required for forfeiture of his seat, which meant that the countdown would have to begin from scratch when the new session got under way. Meanwhile, some eleven weeks later, on 25 April 1915-the very day that thousands of eager Australian soldiers made a fateful landing on the shores of Gallipoli-a press report left the public in doubt as to Gardiner's future. He was it seems not waiting around for parliament to act: he had apparently determined to head for Gilruthland, more conventionally known as the Northern Territory, but so-nicknamed after its then highly controversial Administrator, Dr John Gilruth. The Sunday Times thus reported that:

It has become known within the last few days that Mr J. P Gardiner; the member for Roebourne in the State Assembly, has gone to the Northern Territory, where he intends to remain. 3 The news report was low-key and moderate, and emphatic at least on the pivotal issue that Gardiner had by then left for the Northern Territory. It added that it understood that he would submit his resignation 'when he reaches Darwin, which should be shortly.' The story was repeated verbatim in the Northern Times in Gardiner's electorate in the issue of 8 May 1915, though later events show that he did not resign but awaited the House's declaration of his vacancy on 30 September. The newspapers largely held their fire until the vacancy occurred, but then became a little more forthcoming, with the Northern Times of 9 October editorialising that: at length, after many months during which the electors of the Roebourne district have been bereft of the valuable service of their own chosen representative in the Legislative Assembly that gentleman has forfeited his Premier and Joe seat ... His whereabouts [are] ... apparently very vague, and the reasons Gardiner were to lock horns prio which necessitated his absence from the position ... and his consequent to Gardiner's disappearance. neglect ... relegated to oblivion. 4 Courtesy: Parliament House.

115 'use to House The Sunday Times took off the gloves eight days later and was quick to reinforce its dislike of the Scaddan Government as well as its hope for the election of a Liberal to replace Gardiner. It wrote scornfully of Roebourne as having been: For the best part of a year ... voiceless and voteless in Parliament, abandoned by its representative and neglected by the administration that he supported. 5 Perhaps getting to the kernel of the issue, and certainly bringing new allegations to light, the newspaper editorialised that there had been at least some element of:

deprivation [on the part ofvoters} and ... disgrace [on the part ofGardiner}, apart from the ignominy of being associated even indirectly with unpaid beer debts and dubious transactions with money lenders. 6 The truth-or at least some of it-was perhaps now beginning to emerge. Apparently, the Joint House Committee as early as July 1914 had begun confronting a scandal in which the official Parliament House caterer reported confidentially that he, as a contractor, was being saddled with 'the large amount owing to him for refreshments by some members of Parliament'." While the committee was adamant the problem was the caterer's rather than its own to deal with, it did resolve to advise all MPs that 'in consequence ofthe caterer's complaint that a large sum was outstanding ... from members he had been authorised in future to demand cash for all food and drinks supplied.' 8 The problem continued unabated for months until the caterer, appropriately named C. Kitchener, told the House Committee on 20 January 1915 the startling news­ seven days before Gardiner's last speech in the House and two weeks before his first being listed as absent-that Perth's tradespeople were now refusing credit to him, Kitchener: for the reason that I am unable to pay accounts ... [because} there is a large amount ofmoney owing to me by ex-members and others, which sums I have repeatedly sought to recover; but without avail? If the Joint House Committee was not already disturbed by that news, the tabling at the May 1915 meeting of a letter from the Fremantle office of Burns Philp & Co must have caused a sensation." The company, a long-established and reputable Australian trader, effectively asked for Parliament to pay the trade debts of Kitchener as a way of resolving the scandal. In fairness, there is no mention of the name of any member in the committee's records, a not unusual occurrence given that such minute-takers were always careful to protect the identity of MPs whose activities had been drawn to its attention. By extension, Gardiner's name does not figure in the records. However, given the tensions that have been shown to exist in Gardiner's life-his marriage and the critical parliamentary exchanges of his own caucus colleagues-there is at least a strong probability that the Sunday Times reference on 17 October to Gardiner's connection 'even indirectly with unpaid beer debts' and other dubious transactions are an indication that he was one of the MPs failing to pay his parliamentary bills. Meanwhile, back in Parliament the new session that met for the first time on 29 July was replete with its own tensions, with Scaddan's once-handsome majority already down to two following the October 1914 election, effectively reduced to one with

116 Gardiner missing. It would have been lost on nobody that within two months House to House Roebourne would be declared vacant and a fresh election called. Nor was anyone under any doubt about the outcome: Roebourne was now effectively an opposition Liberal seat with the recent closure of the Whim Creek mine contained within the electorate, and the departure of the Labor-oriented miners. Under this scenario the seat fell vacant with the passage of a motion moved in Parliament on 30 September. Remarkably, it was supported without so much as a single word from the Opposition, doubtless buoyed by the prospect of entering a by­ election that would almost certainly cut the Government's majority to one. In the circumstances it is also difficult to avoid the conclusion that non-Government MPs were not keen to make capital either out of the Gardiner-Holman marriage or any knowledge that they had of the parliamentary chits scandal of unpaid debts-perhaps in the knowledge that some of their own members also owed money to Parliament. One ominous note was struck in the 8 May story in the Northern Times by an adjoining story-placed there by accident or design?-which reported that Premier Scaddan, now in Sydney for an important Premiers' Conference, was ill in hospital with pneumonia. II Whatever the seriousness of his own malady, it was certainly an omen that the Government, like its leader, was in a serious state of ill-health. As it eventuated, Roebourne was won at the by-election by the Liberal candidate, W. J Butcher who was to hold the seat for only two years. However, his success on this November 1915 day, and the decision the following month by the member for Williarns-Narrogin, E.B. (Bertie) Johnston, to resign from the Labor Party and his subsequent re-election in January 1915 as an Independent, were effectively to seal the fate of the Scaddan administration. When Parliament met the following July the government fell, the last occasion to date that an Opposition has taken power in Western Australia immediately following a vote in the Legislative Assembly. Meanwhile, Gardiner's whereabouts in the next six years were to keep researchers puzzled for years to come. Official records such as Post Office Directories gave no hint of his location in any Australian State or Territory. But truth is stranger than fiction, and as things turned out Gardiner was not one to 'do a bunk' entirely. True, he had been found wanting when it came to living up to his responsibilities as a very young MP. But he did not disappear into oblivion, the victim of some heinous plot to get rid of him because of his marriage to May Holman. Instead, defence records uncovered in 2004 for this history project" show conclusively that the four-year gap in Gardiner's life after leaving Perth early in 1915 were well and truly filled by his enlistment in the A.LP. in the 1st Division Signal Company Engineers-and his subsequent service overseas in both France and Belgium. If he appears to have shirked his duties in Western Australia he similarly appears to have redeemed himself in the one place that noone, contemporaries or future researchers, thought to look for him: in the service of his country. Apart from a solitary recorded disciplinary incident in France in May 1917-when he was found guilty of possessing a false leave pass, hardly a hanging offence-Gardiner did himself proud. At one frantic point there were rumours that he had been wounded in action in July 1916 and a relative, trying to get to the bottom of the report in Australia, wrote to the Defence Minister, Senator George Pearce-a fellow West Australian and probably personally known to Gardiner. The relative's letter spelt out to the Minister that Gardiner was the 'late Member for Roebourne' and sought to understand the nature of his wounds. 13

117 House to House There were no wounds because he had not been unfortunate enough to have been part of the July 1916 slaughter that was to cost so many Australian lives on the battlefields of France that month. But his service records did reveal that at the time of his enlistment in January 1916 he had scars on his right eye, right temple, nose, lip, both wrists, and right and left knees. How he came by these peace-time injuries is not known but they were real enough, as were, doubtless, the emotional scars that he left behind in a much-wondering May Gardiner (nee Holman). When he enlisted Gardiner described himself on official forms as a labourer and as a married man. Thus in January 1916 he clearly regarded himself as the lawful spouse of May. But he also obviously had no intention of keeping in contact with her and for the next three years she was kept ignorant of his whereabouts. That she knew he had enlisted is certain for on 26 April 1919, well after hostilities had ended, she telegraphed the army asking to be informed of his present whereabouts. That same day the army dispatched a letter to May's home in Beaufort Street in Perth saying he was assumed to be still with his unit as a driver. 14 The date of her inquiry may be pivotal, for within a month-in May 1919-the Catholic Church granted her an annulment, a declaration that a valid marriage had never taken place. Gardiner in fact returned to Australia the following month, on 18 June 1919, and was discharged from the service on 16 August. Exactly a year later, on June 18 1920, the civil marriage the couple had contracted in 1914 was the subject of a formal divorce. Joe Gardiner, the one-time MP who had helped bring down a government, reappeared in mainstream society in 1921 when he married Bertha Annie Paver in . He is described on those marriage documents as a labourer. From there Gardiner, and Bertha, who subsequently had a daughter, Joyce, appear to have settled in where Gardiner saw out his life for the next fifty-odd years as a tester, labourer and meter reader, but was listed as a journalist" when he died at the age of seventy-eight in 1965, mourned by his wife of forty-four years. His death went unnoticed by both Victorian and West Australian media outlets, a quiet exit for a man who had been at the centre of the most dramatic political events in the West in his long-distant youth. For her part, May Holman's life was one of significant achievement but one which was to end in tragedy. Elected, by now unmarried, to the Western Australian Parliament at a by-election in 1925 to fill the vacancy for the timber industry seat of Forrest left vacant following the death of her father, she thus became the first Australian woman elected as a Labor MP. She was highly regarded as a gifted musician, founded and conducted the Labor Choral Union, and was a substitute delegate to the League of Nations Assembly in Geneva in 1930. She became secretary of the Parliamentary Labor Party in 1933 and was reputedly only a step away from the Ministry when, on election eve in 1939, as already indicated, she was seriously injured in a traffic accident in the south-west and died two days after the poll which she had won comfortably with a two-to-one majority.

Marking Time The period which threw up the Gardiner sensation and its immediate fall-out was to coincide with the First World War. A little over a decade later the world was to begin to feel the onset of the Great Depression of the late 1920s. These were two cataclysmic events which might reasonably be said to have occupied or affected half the full

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