List Of People Who Have Served In Both Houses Of The Australian Parliament
This is a list of Members of the Australian Parliament who have served in both the Senate and the House of Representatives.
Section 43 of the Constitution of Australia says: "A member of either House of the Parliament shall be incapable of being chosen or of sitting as a member of the other House".
Consequently, a member of one house who wishes to transfer to the other house must resign from the first house before the election or appointment to the other house. A person may simultaneously stand for election to both houses, and if successful in both bids, must choose which house he or she will be a member of. No person has ever successfully stood for election to both houses at the same time.
The following list comprises 41 men and 4 women. Of these:
- 27 people were members of the House of Representatives before joining the Senate
- 18 people were members of the Senate before joining the House of Representatives.
The first person to have been a member of both Houses was James McColl (Victoria), on 1 January 1907. All the other states and territories are represented in the list, the first person from each being:
- Queensland: William Higgs, 13 April 1910
- South Australia: William Story, 5 May 1917
- New South Wales: Josiah Thomas, 1 July 1917
- Tasmania: David O'Keefe, 16 December 1922
- Western Australia: Thomas Marwick, 21 December 1940
- Northern Territory: Grant Tambling, 11 July 1987
- Australian Capital Territory: Bob McMullan, 2 March 1996.
The first woman to have been a member of both Houses was Kathy Sullivan (Qld), on 1 December 1984.
Only 2 people have gone from one House to another and later returned to the first House:
- Jack Duncan-Hughes, House of Representatives 1922–28, Senate 1931–38, House of Representatives 1940–43
- Sir Philip McBride, House of Representatives 1931–37, Senate 1937–44, House of Representatives 1946–58.
No member of this list has yet served the Parliament for an aggregate period of 30 years or more. The longest-serving person who has been a member of both Houses was Grant Chapman, who was in the Senate for 20 years 356 days, and in the House of Representatives for 7 years 83 days, a total of 28 years 74 days. The shortest-serving was Thomas Marwick (1 year 65 days in the Senate; 2 years 244 days in the House of Representatives; a total of 3 years 309 days).
In the present Parliament, two senators (David Fawcett and Michael Ronaldson) were previously members of the House of Representatives, and one member of the House of Representatives (Bronwyn Bishop) was previously a senator.
No person has ever represented one state or territory in one House and a different state or territory in the other House, although various attempts have been made. One possible future example of this is current Queensland Senator Barnaby Joyce who has been selected by the National Party to contest the seat of New England in New South Wales at the 2013 election.
Incidentally, no person has ever represented more than one state or territory in the Senate; but there are a number of members who represented different states or territories in the House of Representatives during their career.
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