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Rex Patterson : A Voice for the North by Lyndon Megarrity

Australian Biographical Monographs 22

Paperback, 90 pages, $19.95

ISBN 9781922815972

This is the first biography of Rex Patterson, Federal Labor Member for Dawson in northern Queensland, a seat which he won unexpectedly in 1966 from the Country Party. In some ways his win marked the rise and rise of Gough Whitlam who a year later became federal Labor leader and eventually took Labor to victory in December 1972. Rex was a different sort of Labor member for that time – university educated and interested in rural and regional issues. He was a good choice by Whitlam in being made the first Minister for Northern Development. He also served as Minister for the Northern Territory; for a brief period in 1975, Patterson’s two portfolios were amalgamated and he became the first Minister for Northern Australia.

With the Whitlam Government falling apart in the last few months of 1975 with ministerial sackings and resignations, Patterson took over in the senior portfolio of Agriculture, but it was short-lived. A month later the Whitlam Government was sacke