George William Martens was an Australia

Australia

Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...

n politician. Born in Mount Perry, Queensland

Mount Perry, Queensland

Mount Perry is a small town in the North Burnett Region in southeastern Queensland, Australia. Mount Perry is about northwest of Brisbane, the capital of Queensland, and about west of Bundaberg. At the 2006 census, Mount Perry and the surrounding area had a population of 431.It is a historically...

, he received a primary education before becoming a bushworker. He was active in the trade union

Trade union

A trade union, trades union or labor union is an organization of workers that have banded together to achieve common goals such as better working conditions. The trade union, through its leadership, bargains with the employer on behalf of union members and negotiates labour contracts with...

 movement, notably the Sugar Workers Union, and was an organiser with the Australian Workers' Union

Australian Workers' Union

The Australian Workers' Union is one of Australia's largest and oldest trade unions. It traces its origins to unions founded in the pastoral and mining industries in the 1880s, and currently has approximately 135,000 members...

, of which he eventually became Queensland

Queensland

Queensland is a state of Australia, occupying the north-eastern section of the mainland continent. It is bordered by the Northern Territory, South Australia and New South Wales to the west, south-west and south respectively. To the east, Queensland is bordered by the Coral Sea and Pacific Ocean...

 secretary. In 1928, he was elected to the Australian House of Representatives

Australian House of Representatives

The House of Representatives is one of the two houses of the Parliament of Australia; it is the lower house; the upper house is the Senate. Members of Parliament serve for terms of approximately three years....

 as the Labor

Australian Labor Party

The Australian Labor Party is an Australian political party. It has been the governing party of the Commonwealth of Australia since the 2007 federal election. Julia Gillard is the party's federal parliamentary leader and Prime Minister of Australia...

 member for Herbert

Division of Herbert

The Division of Herbert is an Australian Electoral Division in Queensland. Eligible voters within the Division elect a single representative, known as the member for Herbert, to the Australian House of Representatives. The division was first contested at the 1901 election...

, defeating the sitting Nationalist

Nationalist Party of Australia

The Nationalist Party of Australia was an Australian political party. It was formed on 17 February 1917 from a merger between the conservative Commonwealth Liberal Party and the National Labor Party, the name given to the pro-conscription defectors from the Australian Labor Party led by Prime...

 Lewis Nott

Lewis Nott

Lewis Windermere Nott was an Australian politician, medical practitioner and hospital superintendent. He represented two federal electorates, more than 1,000 km and 21 years apart.-Early life and war service:...

. He held the seat until 1946, when he retired from politics to become director of Commonwealth Oil Refineries

Commonwealth Oil Refineries

Commonwealth Oil Refineries was an Australian oil companyCommonwealth Oil Refineries that operated bewtween 1920 and 1952 as a joint venture of the Australian government and the Anglo-Persian Oil Company....

. Martens died in 1949.