Varney Parkes was an Australian politician.

He was born in Ryde

Ryde, New South Wales

Ryde is a suburb of Sydney, New South Wales, Australia. Ryde is located 13 km north-west of the Sydney central business district and 8 km east of Parramatta. Ryde is the administrative centre of the local government area of the City of Ryde and part of the Northern Suburbs area...

, the seventh child of Henry Parkes

Henry Parkes

Sir Henry Parkes, GCMG was an Australian statesman, the "Father of Federation." As the earliest advocate of a Federal Council of the colonies of Australia, a precursor to the Federation of Australia, he was the most prominent of the Australian Founding Fathers.Parkes was described during his...

 and Clarinda Varney. He attended public schools and then The King's School in Parramatta before working at the Bank of New South Wales and the Colonial Architect's Office. On 21 March 1883 he married Mary Cameron Murray, but she died five months later; on 24 December 1884 he married her older sister Isabella, with whom he had three surviving children. Parkes worked as an architect at Liverpool

Liverpool, New South Wales

Liverpool is a suburb in south-western Sydney, in the state of New South Wales, Australia. Liverpool is located 32 km south-west of the Sydney central business district, and is the administrative centre of the local government area of the City of Liverpool...

 and Canterbury

Canterbury, New South Wales

-Commercial area:Canterbury has a mixture of residential, commercial and industrial developments. Commercial developments are mostly situated on Canterbury Road and surrounding streets...

, and was elected to the New South Wales Legislative Assembly

New South Wales Legislative Assembly

The Legislative Assembly, or lower house, is one of the two chambers of the Parliament of New South Wales, an Australian state. The other chamber is the Legislative Council. Both the Assembly and Council sit at Parliament House in the state capital, Sydney...

 in 1885 as the member for Central Cumberland

Electoral district of Central Cumberland

Central Cumberland was an electoral district of the Legislative Assembly in the Australian state of New South Wales from 1859 to 1894, in Cumberland County, which includes Sydney...

. He left the Assembly in 1888 but was re-elected for East Sydney

Electoral district of East Sydney

East Sydney was an electoral district for the Legislative Assembly in the Australian State of New South Wales created in 1859 from part of the electoral district of Sydney, covering the eastern part of the current Sydney central business district, Woolloomooloo, Potts Point, Elizabeth Bay and...

 in 1891, switching to Canterbury

Electoral district of Canterbury

Canterbury is an electoral district of the Legislative Assembly in the Australian state of New South Wales. It is represented by Linda Burney of the Australian Labor Party.-History:...

 in 1894. He served until 1900 and then a second term from 1907 to 1913 as a Liberal

Liberal Reform Party (Australia)

The Liberal Reform Party was an Australian political party, active in New South Wales state politics between 1901 and 1916. The question of tariff policy which, had created and divided the Free Trade Party and Protectionist Party in New South Wales in the 1890s, became a federal issue at the time...

. In 1895 he was bankrupted, and not discharged until 1907. Parkes served as Postmaster-General from 1898 to 1899. He died in Sydney in 1935.