William Watt
Encyclopedia
William Alexander Watt PC
(23 November 187113 September 1946) was an Australian politician who was the 24th Premier of Victoria, and later a leading federal politician and Speaker of the House of Representatives
.
Watt was born at Barfold
, near Kyneton
, and was educated at Errol Street State School. he became a newsboy, worked for an ironmongery and a tannery, later as a clerk and an accountant and then went into business as a grain merchant in North Melbourne
. He married Florence Carrighan in 1894, but she died in childbirth in 1896. In 1907, he married Emily Helena Seismann and they eventually had five children. He became active in the Australian Natives Association
, a lobby group of Australian-born liberals who supported Australian federation and other causes. He was closely associated with the Victorian liberal leader Alfred Deakin
.
for North Melbourne, defeating Labor
's George Prendergast
(another future Premier), but at the 1900 election Prendergast recaptured the seat. In 1902 he was returned for the safe liberal seat of East Melbourne, holding that seat until 1904, when he shifted to Essendon. In 1899 he became Postmaster-General in the short-lived government of Allan McLean
, then sat out Thomas Bent
's government, returning to office under John Murray
in 1909 as Treasurer, a post he held until 1912. By that time he was leader of the "urban" faction of the Liberal Party
, opposed to Murray's rural-dominated government. When Murray resigned as Premier on 12 May, Watt succeeded him.
In December 1913 the rural faction, now led by Donald McLeod, moved a successful no-confidence motion in Watt's government, with Labor support. McLeod expected to become Premier, but instead the acting Governor, Sir John Madden, sent for the Labor leader, George Elmslie
, who formed Victoria's first Labor government. This forced the Liberal factions to re-unite, and a few days later Elmslie was duly voted out and Watt resumed office. Frustrated by his inability to overcome the factionalism of the Victorian Liberals and pass any effective legislation, Watt resigned as Premier in June 1914, allowing Sir Alexander Peacock
to re-assume the Liberal leadership.
. He became a leading member of the Nationalist Party
when it was formed in 1916 under the leadership of Billy Hughes
, and in 1917 he was appointed Minister for Works and Railways in the Hughes Government. By now he had moved away from his earlier liberalism and was regarded as a hard-line conservative.
In March 1918 Watt was appointed Treasurer
, and became in effect Hughes's deputy. When Hughes left Australia for London in April, Watt became Acting Prime Minister, a position he held until Hughes returned from the Versailles peace conference in August 1919. During this period he also had the portfolio of Trade and Customs
. For his service as Acting Prime Minister, Watt was appointed to the Imperial Privy Council
in the 1920 New Year Honours, entitling him to the style "The Right Honourable".
He was a trusted figure in Melbourne business circles and shared the dissatisfaction that most conservatives felt at the increasingly erratic and autocratic way Hughes ran the government. He also disliked Hughes personally and felt that Hughes had not acknowledged his efforts as Acting Prime Minister. Although he remained loyal in public, he was keen to leave Hughes's ministry. He was seen by many as Hughes's likely successor.
In April 1920 Hughes dispatched Watt to London on a financial mission. Watt was in poor health and his suspicion that Hughes was trying to get him out of the way was aggravated by Hughes's habit of communicating directly with the British government over the head of Watt, supposedly his representative. Watt was appointed Australia's representative at the Spa Conference
on reparations
, but when Hughes cabled that Watt was not to agree to anything without consulting him, Watt complained that he was being treated like "a telegraph messenger." After an acrimonious exchange of cables, Watt resigned as Treasurer and returned to Australia.
Watt spent the next two years on the back bench. At the 1922 elections he supported rebel former Liberals in Victoria who opposed Hughes and stood against Nationalist candidates: one of these, John Latham, won the seat of Kooyong
from the Nationalist member. After the elections, the newly formed Country Party
held the balance of power, and used it to force Hughes's resignation. But Watt was passed over for leadership of the new coalition government in favour of the Treasurer, Stanley Bruce
. As a consolation prize Watt was elected Speaker
, a position he held until 1926. He retired in 1929.
Watt was chairman of a several companies based from his base in Collins House, including the Silverton Tramway
and Qantas
. He was partly disabled by a stroke in 1937 and died in his home in Toorak
and was survived by his wife, two sons and three daughters.
Privy Council of the United Kingdom
Her Majesty's Most Honourable Privy Council, usually known simply as the Privy Council, is a formal body of advisers to the Sovereign in the United Kingdom...
(23 November 187113 September 1946) was an Australian politician who was the 24th Premier of Victoria, and later a leading federal politician and Speaker of the House of Representatives
Speaker of the Australian House of Representatives
The Speaker of the House of Representatives is the presiding officer of the House of Representatives, the lower house of the Parliament of Australia. The presiding officer in the upper house is the President of the Senate....
.
Watt was born at Barfold
Barfold, Victoria
Barfold is a locality situated on the Heathcote-Kyneton Road in Victoria, Australia. It has a community hall, Barfold Hall, and an Anglican church, Barfold Union Church....
, near Kyneton
Kyneton, Victoria
Kyneton is a town on the Calder Highway in the Macedon Ranges of Victoria, Australia. The Calder Freeway bypasses Kyneton to the north and east. The town was named after the English village of Kineton, Warwickshire. The town has three main streets: Mollison Street, Piper Street and High Street...
, and was educated at Errol Street State School. he became a newsboy, worked for an ironmongery and a tannery, later as a clerk and an accountant and then went into business as a grain merchant in North Melbourne
North Melbourne, Victoria
North Melbourne is a large inner city suburb of Melbourne, Victoria, Australia, 2 km north-west from Melbourne's central business district. It is bounded by the CityLink freeway to the west, Victoria Street to the south, O'Connell and Peel Streets to the east and Flemington Road to the north. Its...
. He married Florence Carrighan in 1894, but she died in childbirth in 1896. In 1907, he married Emily Helena Seismann and they eventually had five children. He became active in the Australian Natives Association
Australian Natives Association
The Australian Natives' Association , a mutual society was founded in Melbourne, Australia in April 1871. The Association played a leading role in the movement for Australian federation in the last 20 years of the 19th century. In 1900 it had a membership of 17,000, mainly in Victoria.The ANA...
, a lobby group of Australian-born liberals who supported Australian federation and other causes. He was closely associated with the Victorian liberal leader Alfred Deakin
Alfred Deakin
Alfred Deakin , Australian politician, was a leader of the movement for Australian federation and later the second Prime Minister of Australia. In the last quarter of the 19th century, Deakin was a major contributor to the establishment of liberal reforms in the colony of Victoria, including the...
.
State politics
In 1897 Watt was elected to the Victorian Legislative AssemblyVictorian Legislative Assembly
The Victorian Legislative Assembly is the lower house of the Parliament of Victoria in Australia. Together with the Victorian Legislative Council, the upper house, it sits in Parliament House in the state capital, Melbourne.-History:...
for North Melbourne, defeating 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...
's George Prendergast
George Prendergast
George Michael Prendergast , Australian politician, was the 28th Premier of Victoria. He was born to Irish emigrant parents in Adelaide, but he grew up in Stawell in the Wimmera district of Victoria...
(another future Premier), but at the 1900 election Prendergast recaptured the seat. In 1902 he was returned for the safe liberal seat of East Melbourne, holding that seat until 1904, when he shifted to Essendon. In 1899 he became Postmaster-General in the short-lived government of Allan McLean
Allan McLean (Australian politician)
Allan McLean was an Australian politician, the 19th Premier of Victoria.McLean was born in the highlands of Scotland and came to Australia as a child in 1842 with his family. He later said 'were practically frozen out of Scotland' by 'an exceptionally severe winter'...
, then sat out Thomas Bent
Thomas Bent
Sir Thomas Bent KCMG , Australian politician, was the 22nd Premier of Victoria. He was one of the most colourful and corrupt politicians in Victorian history....
's government, returning to office under John Murray
John Murray (Victorian politician)
John Murray , Australian politician, was the 23rd Premier of Victoria.Murray was born near Koroit, Victoria, the son of James Murray and his wife Isabella, née Gordon, both Scottish immigrants. When Murray was a child his parents settled on a farm, Glenample station, at Port Campbell in the...
in 1909 as Treasurer, a post he held until 1912. By that time he was leader of the "urban" faction of the Liberal Party
Commonwealth Liberal Party
The Commonwealth Liberal Party was a political movement active in Australia from 1909 to 1916, shortly after federation....
, opposed to Murray's rural-dominated government. When Murray resigned as Premier on 12 May, Watt succeeded him.
In December 1913 the rural faction, now led by Donald McLeod, moved a successful no-confidence motion in Watt's government, with Labor support. McLeod expected to become Premier, but instead the acting Governor, Sir John Madden, sent for the Labor leader, George Elmslie
George Elmslie (Australian politician)
George Alexander Elmslie , Australian politician, was the 25th Premier of Victoria, and the first Labor Premier....
, who formed Victoria's first Labor government. This forced the Liberal factions to re-unite, and a few days later Elmslie was duly voted out and Watt resumed office. Frustrated by his inability to overcome the factionalism of the Victorian Liberals and pass any effective legislation, Watt resigned as Premier in June 1914, allowing Sir Alexander Peacock
Alexander Peacock
Sir Alexander James Peacock, KCMG , Australian politician, was the 20th Premier of Victoria.Peacock was born of Scottish descent at Creswick, the first Victorian Premier born after the gold rush of the 1850s and the attainment of self-government in Victoria. He was distantly related to the family...
to re-assume the Liberal leadership.
Federal politics
At the 1914 federal election Watt was elected Liberal member for the seat of BalaclavaDivision of Balaclava
The Division of Balaclava was an Australian Electoral Division in Victoria. The division was created in 1900 and was one of the original 75 divisions contested at the first federal election. It was named for the suburb of Balaclava, which in turn was named for a battlefield of the Crimean War...
. He became a leading member of the Nationalist Party
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...
when it was formed in 1916 under the leadership of Billy Hughes
Billy Hughes
William Morris "Billy" Hughes, CH, KC, MHR , Australian politician, was the seventh Prime Minister of Australia from 1915 to 1923....
, and in 1917 he was appointed Minister for Works and Railways in the Hughes Government. By now he had moved away from his earlier liberalism and was regarded as a hard-line conservative.
In March 1918 Watt was appointed Treasurer
Treasurer of Australia
The Treasurer of Australia is the minister in the Government of Australia responsible for government expenditure and revenue raising. He is the head of the Department of the Treasury. The Treasurer plays a key role in the economic policy of the government...
, and became in effect Hughes's deputy. When Hughes left Australia for London in April, Watt became Acting Prime Minister, a position he held until Hughes returned from the Versailles peace conference in August 1919. During this period he also had the portfolio of Trade and Customs
Minister for Trade (Australia)
The Australian Minister for Trade has been Dr. Craig Emerson since 14 September 2010.-Portfolio:Currently the Minister for Trade administers the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade jointly with the Minister for Foreign Affairs, although prior to 1987 there was a separate Department of Trade...
. For his service as Acting Prime Minister, Watt was appointed to the Imperial Privy Council
Privy Council of the United Kingdom
Her Majesty's Most Honourable Privy Council, usually known simply as the Privy Council, is a formal body of advisers to the Sovereign in the United Kingdom...
in the 1920 New Year Honours, entitling him to the style "The Right Honourable".
He was a trusted figure in Melbourne business circles and shared the dissatisfaction that most conservatives felt at the increasingly erratic and autocratic way Hughes ran the government. He also disliked Hughes personally and felt that Hughes had not acknowledged his efforts as Acting Prime Minister. Although he remained loyal in public, he was keen to leave Hughes's ministry. He was seen by many as Hughes's likely successor.
In April 1920 Hughes dispatched Watt to London on a financial mission. Watt was in poor health and his suspicion that Hughes was trying to get him out of the way was aggravated by Hughes's habit of communicating directly with the British government over the head of Watt, supposedly his representative. Watt was appointed Australia's representative at the Spa Conference
Spa Conference
The Spa Conference was a meeting between the Supreme War Council and Weimar Republic in Spa, Belgium on 5–16 July 1920. It was the first post-war conference to include German representatives. The attendees included British and French Prime Ministers Lloyd George and Alexandre Millerand, German...
on reparations
Reparation (legal)
In jurisprudence, reparation is replenishment of a previously inflicted loss by the criminal to the victim. Monetary restitution is a common form of reparation...
, but when Hughes cabled that Watt was not to agree to anything without consulting him, Watt complained that he was being treated like "a telegraph messenger." After an acrimonious exchange of cables, Watt resigned as Treasurer and returned to Australia.
Watt spent the next two years on the back bench. At the 1922 elections he supported rebel former Liberals in Victoria who opposed Hughes and stood against Nationalist candidates: one of these, John Latham, won the seat of Kooyong
Division of Kooyong
The Division of Kooyong is an Australian Electoral Division in the state of Victoria. It is located in the inner eastern suburbs of Melbourne, and encompasses the suburbs of Kew, Hawthorn, Hawthorn East, Balwyn, Canterbury, Camberwell and Surrey Hills. The Division was proclaimed in 1900, and was...
from the Nationalist member. After the elections, the newly formed Country Party
National Party of Australia
The National Party of Australia is an Australian political party.Traditionally representing graziers, farmers and rural voters generally, it began as the The Country Party, but adopted the name The National Country Party in 1975, changed to The National Party of Australia in 1982. The party is...
held the balance of power, and used it to force Hughes's resignation. But Watt was passed over for leadership of the new coalition government in favour of the Treasurer, Stanley Bruce
Stanley Bruce
Stanley Melbourne Bruce, 1st Viscount Bruce of Melbourne, CH, MC, FRS, PC , was an Australian politician and diplomat, and the eighth Prime Minister of Australia. He was the second Australian granted an hereditary peerage of the United Kingdom, but the first whose peerage was formally created...
. As a consolation prize Watt was elected Speaker
Speaker of the Australian House of Representatives
The Speaker of the House of Representatives is the presiding officer of the House of Representatives, the lower house of the Parliament of Australia. The presiding officer in the upper house is the President of the Senate....
, a position he held until 1926. He retired in 1929.
Watt was chairman of a several companies based from his base in Collins House, including the Silverton Tramway
Silverton Rail
Southern and Silverton Rail is an Australian regional rail operator providing rail freight haulage, hook and pull, terminal and shunting services, maintenance and first response/recovery services...
and Qantas
Qantas
Qantas Airways Limited is the flag carrier of Australia. The name was originally "QANTAS", an initialism for "Queensland and Northern Territory Aerial Services". Nicknamed "The Flying Kangaroo", the airline is based in Sydney, with its main hub at Sydney Airport...
. He was partly disabled by a stroke in 1937 and died in his home in Toorak
Toorak, Victoria
Toorak is a suburb of Melbourne, Victoria, Australia, 5 km south-east from Melbourne's central business district located on a rise on the south side of a bend in the Yarra River. Its Local Government Area is the City of Stonnington...
and was survived by his wife, two sons and three daughters.