JOSEPH COOK

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‘Turncoat’ was one of the milder epithets applied by infuriated Labor men to Joseph Cook when he refused to sign the Solidarity pledge, deserted the party and joined the Free Traders. Probably Cook's religious convictions forbade him signing a pledge which would have made him vote according to the dictates of caucus, instead of those of his own conscience.

Cook's background was very similar to Fisher's. As a boy of nine he began work in the Staffordshire coalmines. When his father was killed in a mining accident, he found himself the sole supporter of his family at the age of 12. But this did not prevent him studying for the Methodist ministry, trying to educate himself and joining in union affairs.

In 1885, at the age of 25, he brought his new bride to New South Wales and started work in the Lithgow coalmines. He had abandoned hopes of the Methodist ministry but he retained those principles which opposed drinking, smoking, gambling and other frivolous pastimes. Years of lay-preaching had given him a fine turn of oratory, which he used as a union executive. In Lithgow he impressed union men so much that they soon made him secretary and president of the local lodge. In 1888 he led them in a demonstration against Chinese immigration, which they saw as a threat to their jobs.

A dignified and imposing figure, he was the district's natural choice of parliamentary candidate when Labor made its 1891 bid for a voice in the Colonial Parliament. And when the tariff question caused Labor parliamentarians to divide into those of Free Trade and those of Protectionist sympathies, they chose Cook as leader of the Free Trade group.

The way ahead seemed clear until Cook rejected the Solidarity pledge. A howl of outrage rose when he defected, enlisted under George Reid's banner and, in 1898, became a minister in Reid's colonial government.

Cook served Reid well as a loyal and able administrator and, in 1901, won the federal seat of Parramatta which he was to hold for 20 years.

Five years on the Free Trade backbenches appear to have crystallised his change of heart. The coalminer from affordshire, who had spoken out so ardently for God and the working class, became a committed conservative. He condemned Labor policies and, when he became deputy leader of the Free Traders, he was Reid's lieutenant in the anti-socialist campaign.

When Reid resigned, Cook stepped into the leadership in a climate which was bringing Free Traders and Protectionists closer together against the Labor threat. Cook allied his party with Deakin's and became deputy leader and Minister for Defence in what was generally known as the 'fusion' government.

As Minister for Defence he invited Lord Kitchener, the British military hero, to Australia to advise on the defence of the Commonwealth. Kitchener's recommendations inspired the Defence Act of 1909, providing for compulsory military training in peacetime and the establishment of Duntroon Military College. This legislation, together with laying the groundwork for the Royal Australian Navy, was probably Cook's most significant political achievement - although he was basically executing Deakin's defence plans for the nation.

The Labor landslide of 1910 overwhelmed the ‘fusion’ and Cook devoted the next three years to a gradual takeover from Deakin and construction of the new Liberal Party. He adopted the title from the Liberal Party of Great Britain, which professed "encouragement of democratic reforms and the abolition of aristocratic privileges" But when Cook's Liberals squeaked into power in 1913, they turned away from the reforming fervour of the Deakin and Fisher years. Party policy was increasingly conservative and anti-socialist. When Cook tried to improve his parliamentary position by forcing a double dissolution, the electors showed their opinion of the new party by giving Labor another victory.

Six weeks earlier, Britain had declared war on Germany and Australia rushed to join the fray. Cook assured Labor that his Liberals would do all they could to help the cause and the two parties worked together fairly amicably until the conscription issue of 1916 tore the Labor Party asunder. The Liberals joined ‘Billy' Hughes and his remaining Labor supporters in forming the Nationalist Party, with Hughes as Prime Minister and Cook as Minister for the Navy. Many people saw the Liberal move as yet another example of Cook's political opportunism.

But Hughes described Cook as "the most reliable and helpful of men" and, in 1919, took him to the Versailles Peace Conference. Cook's later comment on their roles at the conference was that "I did a lot of the yarding but Hughes did all the barking. That's what little dogs are for".

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