Albert Gardiner

Albert Gardiner (30 July 1867 – 14 August 1952) was an Australian Labor Party politician. He held the distinction of being the party's sole Senator between 1920 and 1922.

Gardiner was born in Orange, New South Wales and educated at Flanagan's School. He was apprenticed as a carpenter at 15. In 1890, he moved to Parkes and worked on the gold battery at the Hazelhurst mine.

Political career

In 1891, Gardiner was elected as an Australian Labor Party member for Forbes, although he refused to sign Labor's solidarity pledge in 1893. In 1894, with the abolition of Forbes, he was elected the member for Ashburnham, but was defeated in 1895. He stood unsuccessfully for Ashburnham in 1898 for the Free Trade Party and Orange in 1901 as an independent. In 1897, he divorced his first wife Ada Evelyn Jewell, who he had married in 1892, and he married Theresa Alice Clayton in 1902. He was elected member for Orange in 1904, but lost the seat in 1907.

From 1910 to 1926, Gardiner was a Senator for New South Wales in Federal Parliament. He was appointed Vice-President of the Executive Council in 1914 and Assistant Minister for Defence in 1915. He resigned from the ministry in opposition to conscription before the first plebiscite on conscription in October 1916. After, the Labor split over the issue, he became Labor leader in the Senate and the only Labor Senator from 1920 to 1922. In 1918, he delivered Federal Parliament's longest speech at 12 hours and 40 minutes. In 1926, he lost his Senate seat, but he filled a casual vacancy for five months in 1928, despite expulsion from the Lang-led state branch of the party. He unsuccessfully contested Dalley as an independent Labor candidate in 1928. He then unsuccessfully contested the State seats of Waverley in 1932 and Canterbury in 1935 as an Official Labor candidate, that is recognised by the Federal Labor Party, but not the State branch.

Gardiner died at Bondi Junction, survived by his wife, a son and a daughter.