THIS week King Island became the seat of power for Australia.
Deputy Prime Minister Richard Marles took a break from Canberra and chose King Island for some R&R. During his time on the island, he was Acting Prime Minister, and the King Island Council Chambers and support were at his disposal if needed.
The deputy prime minister of Australia is the deputy chief executive and the second highest ranking officer of the Australian Government.
When Australia has a Labor government (as it does now), the deputy leader of the parliamentary party holds the position of deputy prime minister.
The deputy prime minister becomes acting prime minister if the prime minister is unable to undertake their role for a short time, for example if they are ill, overseas or on leave. If the prime minister were to die, then the deputy prime minister would be appointed prime minister by the Governor- General, until the government votes for another member to be its leader.
Acting PM Marles is not the first Australian leader to visit King Island. On 13 April 1938, Joseph Aloysius (Joe) Lyons, Australia’s 10th Prime Minister, unexpectedly descended from the clouds.
A Royal Australian Air Force plane in which he was travelling from Tasmania
to the mainland had to land because of severe weather. Newspapers reported that islanders were delighted at his unexpected visit, and he was taken on a tour of
dairy farms and watched cheese making processes. The island hastily organised a dinner in Currie which was “attended by the Warden and prominent settlement residents.”
In a flying three-day visit to Northern Tasmania, in his second prime ministership, Sir Robert Menzies spent the 4th of July 1961 on King Island and toured soldier settlers’ properties and attended lunch given by the council and met local representatives.
In April 1968, then federal Labor opposition leader Gough Whitlam visited and presented five Life Membership medallions to members of the King Island District School P&F Association Sports Committee at the King Island Wood Chops Carnival.
Those honoured were Jim Smith, Pat O’Connell, W.D Keating, Geoff Chisholm, MHA, and J Britton. Mr Whitlam noted that the Axeman Association contributions funded the building many of the school’s facilities.
While on the island, the still to be elected 21st prime minister, laid a wreath at the grave site of the four RAAF pilot officers buried in Currie Cemetery.
They were killed when their RAAF Beaufort A9-352 crashed on King Island 11 July 1943 and were known to him.
Sir Billy Snedden then leader of the opposition as part of his tour of the Brad- don electorate on 20 November 1974 met with residents in the King Island Town Hall supper room for an hour and then with the King Island Liberal Party for a ‘Friday Conference.’