EARLE PAGE

Party

The Country Party held the balance of power after the Nationalist Party lost their majority in the 1922 federal election. As leader, Page proved to be politically adept, forcing the resignation of Billy Hughes as prime minister and securing favourable Coalition conditions from Stanley Melbourne Bruce his successor.

This included the appointment of five Country Party members in a Cabinet of eleven. The Coalition became known as the Bruce – Page government and remained in office until 1929, with Page as deputy leader and treasurer.

It was not until after the 1934 election that Lyons required Page and the Country Party to form office. Page, unable to work with Menzies, the new UAP leader, resigned.  

Partnerships

Stanley Bruce commented about Page that ‘he had new brainwaves every day’. The vast volume of Page’s ideas centred on the economic advancement of northern New South Wales and his hometown of Grafton.

For most of his political career, when not attending  parliament, Page was engaged in perpetual development surveys of the north coast of the state. In 1925, when Page was treasurer, he appointed Sir George Buchanan, a British expert on ports, to examine marine navigation.

The report recommended an extensive expansion of port facilities to provide an outlet for produce from rural areas situated near the coast. Grafton was one of the townships identified as a first class waterway and potential deep- sea shipping port. In the end, few of the recommendations were carried out.

By 1939, Page was still pushing for Grafton to become a port, and was accused by the state Minister for Public Works, Eric Spooner, of  using ‘the sacred name of defence to advance his own local scheme.’ He responded to Spooner saying ‘successive New South Wales Governments, disregarding their advice and plans, spent money in such a way as to make the entrance worse than when Flinders passed in 1806.’  

People

On 5 July 1939, Page attended an official ceremony at the Eungai Memorial Hall to mark the switching on of electricity in the small township. The switching- on ceremony was combined with the Diggers Debutante Ball, where the debutantes were presented to Page as the special guest of honour.

As mayor of South Grafton in 1918, Page had been the driving force behind the establishment of hydro-electricity on the Nymboida River, a tributary of the Clarence. It was Page’s frustration with state government inaction on this issue that propelled him into federal politics. Page recalled in his speech that, ‘it took some five years to beat down opposition in my own town to electrical installation.

Another five years to wear down the opposition on my own river. Another five to overcome the opposition in the surrounding districts…’ The electricity was turned on gradually, external hall lights first, followed by the internal lights turned on in honour of returned servicemen from the district and ‘immediately the gloom was dispelled by a brilliant illumination.’  After the ball ‘was pleasingly carried out’ and supper taken, Page was toasted for his contribution to Australian development.     

Publications

Carl Bridge, Sir Earle Page (1880-1961) Australian Dictionary of Biography, National Centre of Biography, Australian National University, published first in hardcopy 1988

Brian Costar & Peter Vlahos, Sir Earle Page, 7 April 1939 – 26 April 1939, in Michelle Grattan (ed.), Australian Prime Ministers, New Holland Publishers, Sydney, 2000 

Paul Davey, The Country Party Prime Ministers: Their Trials and Tribulations, Chatswood, 2011

Ulrich Ellis, The Country Party: A Political and Social History of the Party in New South Wales, F.W. Cheshire, Melbourne, 1958

Sir Earle Page, Truant Surgeon: The Inside Story of Forty Years of Australian Political Life, Angus & Robertson, Sydney, 1963

Jim Page, The History of Heifer Station, McPhee Printers, 2004

The Manning River Times, Port and Railway – Questions to Sir Earle Page, 5 April, 1939

Nambucca and Bellinger News, Electric extension to the Eungai District – Sir Earle Page present at switching-on ceremony, 7 July, 1939

The Sydney Morning Herald, Port at Grafton – Condition a National Tragedy – Sir Earle Page’s Reply to Mr Spooner, 7 March, 1939