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ABC News

National

RMIT ABC Fact Check

Clive Palmer and the United Australia Party claim three former prime ministers as their own. Is that correct?

Clive Palmer UAP Australia Robert Menzies United Australia Party Australian Electoral Commission Liberal Party Joseph Lyons Billy Hughes Fact Check

United Australia Party chairman Clive Palmer claims Sir Robert Menzies, Joseph Lyons and Billy Hughes as former prime ministers of his party. (AAP: Dave Hunt)

The claim

United Australia Party chairman Clive Palmer says his party can boast three former prime ministers.

In a December 2021 press release, Mr Palmer said: "We are very pleased to announce that we are officially celebrating 90 years since this great party first held government under our inaugural Prime Minister, Joseph Lyons."

"We are also commemorating other United Australia Party leaders who were Prime Ministers of Australia in Billy Hughes and Sir Robert Menzies," he said.

In the "about us" section of the United Australia Party's website, the party also claims Mr Lyons, Mr Hughes and Sir Robert as its own: "Our history — United Australia Party prime ministers".

So, were these former prime ministers members of the same political party as Mr Palmer?

RMIT ABC Fact Check investigates.

The verdict

Mr Palmer's claim is nonsense.

The original United Australia Party was a political party established in 1931 and formally disbanded in 1945. Experts told Fact Check that many members then transferred to the Liberal Party and historical accounts show assets also moved across.

Sir Robert Menzies is Australia's longest-serving prime minister. (The National Library of Australia)

Mr Lyons and Sir Robert (who was Mr Menzies at the time) were indeed prime ministers as leaders of the original UAP. Mr Hughes was also at one stage leader of the UAP, however, he served as prime minister under earlier Australian Labor Party, National Labor Party and Nationalist Party governments.

Mr Palmer's party on the other hand has only been registered with the Australian Electoral Commission since 2018 and has changed its name twice since then.

A party of the same name was briefly registered in Queensland in 2012 before merging with his Palmer United Party. Palmer United Party was voluntarily deregistered in 2017.

In a statement to Fact Check, a spokesman for the Australian Electoral Commission said: "The current UAP was registered in 2018. It was not a continuation of registration from the UAP registered in the 1930s."

Experts told Fact Check the contemporary iteration of the UAP had no connection or continuity to the original UAP beyond sharing the same name. One expert compared the claim to changing his name to "Charles Dickens" and claiming he wrote Oliver Twist.

Furthermore, experts argued significant differences in policies and voter bases set the parties apart.

One said the "true heir" to the UAP was today's Liberal Party.

The original United Australia Party

The United Australia Party was the forerunner of the modern-day Liberal Party. (Trove: The Bulletin)

The original United Australia Party was established in 1931 combining the Nationalist Party and conservative former members of the Australian Labor Party.

The party's policies largely responded to the great depression, promising Australians fiscal responsibility and an alternative to the warring factions of the ALP.

The UAP held federal office for almost ten years controlling the government outright and in coalition with the Country Party. Over this term, the party was primarily led by Mr Lyons until his death in 1939. Mr Menzies, as he then was, succeeded him as prime minister.

Joseph Lyons led the historical United Australia party for most of its existence. (Wikimedia Commons)

After the 1940 federal election Mr Menzies narrowly retained the office of prime minister supported by independents in a hung parliament where Labor and the UAP-CP Coalition held 36 seats each.

Following leadership strife within the Coalition and disagreements with the ALP, Mr Menzies resigned as prime minister and leader of the UAP in 1941.

Following his resignation, Mr Hughes — who had formerly served as prime minister as leader of the ALP, National Labor Party and the Nationalist Party — assumed leadership of the UAP but not the prime ministership.

This position instead briefly went to the leader of the Country Party Arthur Fadden, before the Coalition was overthrown by the ALP with the support of independents just three months later.

After the UAP suffered a crushing election defeat by Labor in the 1943 federal election, the new Liberal Party emerged with Mr Menzies as leader.

As Liberal leader, Mr Menzies became prime minister again in 1949, serving a record term until 1966. He was knighted in 1963.

Billy Hughes's time as prime minister ended before he joined the United Australia Party. (National Archives)

The Australian Parliamentary Library describes the UAP as "predecessor to the modern Liberal Party". The National Museum of Australia says the Liberal Party "was in effect a radically reorganised and rebranded version of the United Australia Party that had in recent years struggled to gain and hold government".

The UAP did not survive. In a thesis published by the Australian National University, Canberra historian Sylvia Marchant writes: "The moribund UAP was formally wound up in January 1945 and its assets and membership transferred to the new [Liberal] party."

She refers to an article by BD Graham published in 1963 which says: "The Liberal Party in New South Wales was the direct heir of the U.A.P.-Democratic Party to the extent of inheriting its members of Parliament, its paid officers and premises, its parliamentary and conciliar leaders, its general policies, and most of its rank-and-file members."

In his 1964 book Australian Party Politics, political scientist James Jupp described "the essential continuity of many of [the UAP's] practices, personnel and support" when the Liberal Party was formed.

"The non-Labor party has only had one major crisis, between 1941 and 1944," Dr Jupp wrote.

"From the ruins of that it built a new machine, though its voters and leading parliamentarians were still basically the same."

The changing face of Clive Palmer's United Australia Party

In September 2012, IP Australia registered a trademark for "United Australia Party" at Mr Palmer's Brisbane office address which included the categorisation of "services of a political party".

In April 2013, two sitting members of the Queensland Legislative Assembly, Alex Douglas and Carl Judge, told parliament they had joined the United Australia Party. Dr Douglas said the emergence of the UAP "occurred organically over the last year".

Two months later, Dr Douglas told parliament the Electoral Commission of Queensland had officially registered the party in the state.

Meanwhile, at the federal level, in July 2013 Mr Palmer lodged a successful application with the Australian Electoral Commission to register the "Palmer United Party".

Mr Palmer won the federal seat of Fairfax from the Coalition in September 2013 alongside two Senators under the PUP banner. Following a Senate re-run, a third senator was elected in 2014.

In November 2013, Dr Douglas told Queensland Parliament that he now represented the Palmer United Party and said "the Palmer United Party and the United Australia Party have merged as one".

Mr Palmer did not recontest Fairfax in the July 2016 election and the PUP did not win any Senate seats.

The PUP was voluntarily deregistered in May 2017.

In 2018, Mr Palmer registered a new political party with the AEC named "United Australia Party". This was subsequently renamed "Clive Palmer's United Australia Party" in 2020 and then reverted back to "United Australia Party" in 2021.

In August 2021, federal MP Craig Kelly, who had been sitting as an independent after leaving the Liberal Party, switched to the UAP. He was named leader of the UAP and announced the UAP's intention to contest all 151 lower house seats in the upcoming federal election. Mr Palmer remains chairman of the party.

Federal MP Craig Kelly defected from the Liberal Party, joining the UAP in August 2021. (ABC News: Danny Morgan)

The rules on naming parties

Australian elections are regulated by the Commonwealth Electoral Act 1918 and are overseen by the Australian Electoral Commission.

Speaking to Fact Check, a spokesman for the AEC said there were some restrictions on the naming of parties.

"There are restrictions in the Electoral Act relating to names that are the same or similar to names of political parties that are currently on the federal register. This does not extend to previously registered political parties," he said in an email.

"The AEC does not own the term 'political party' — people can consider themselves a political party without being federally registered. There is nothing in electoral law that says people cannot refer to their organisation as a political party if they're not on the register."

However, a party must be federally registered for a party name and/or logo to appear on the ballot paper at a federal election, the spokesman said.

Are the parties related?

Can Clive Palmer's party claim connections with any former Australian prime ministers? Experts say it can't. (ABC News: Christopher Gillette)

In a statement to Fact Check, a spokesman on behalf of the Australian Electoral Commission said: "The current UAP was registered in 2018. It was not a continuation of registration from the UAP registered in the 1930s."

Experts told Fact Check the contemporary iteration of the United Australia Party led by Mr Kelly and chaired by Mr Palmer had no relation to the historical UAP apart from its name.

Professor in government and international relations at the University of Sydney Rodney Tiffen said the most glaring problem with the current UAP's claim to former prime ministers was the fact that the UAP was formally disbanded almost 80 years prior to Mr Palmer's rebrand of his political party.

"The UAP went out of existence in about 1944-5, then didn't exist again until a couple of years ago," he said.

"So to say there is a direct link between the two is just ridiculous.

"There's no continuity at all, no direct lineage between the UAP of the 1930s and 1940s and Clive Palmer's party," he said.

"It's like me changing my name to Charles Dickens and then claiming I wrote Oliver Twist."

Professor and electoral law expert at the University of Queensland's School of Law Graeme Orr agreed, telling Fact Check Mr Palmer's claim was "clearly false" and that "nothing connects the two entities, other than an opportunistic recycling of the name."

He also identified the modern day Liberal party as the UAPs successor.

"As an association, [the UAP] members agreed to disestablish. It was understood its MPs would join the new Liberal Party of Australia, led by Menzies," he said in an email.

"Its true heir is clearly the Liberal Party."

Furthermore, Professor Tiffen pointed to stark differences between the parties' bases and policy platforms explaining that in contrast to the fringe politics pursued by Mr Palmer's party, the former UAP was a party of mainstream conservative appeal.

"Joseph Lyons was the exact opposite of someone like Clive Palmer or Craig Kelly," he said.

"The UAP was basically a very mainstream party."

Professor of politics in the School of Social Sciences at Monash University James Walter also pointed to major philosophical differences between the parties. He described the former UAP as: "a sort of loose confederation of Deakinite liberals and one-time social democrats, much influenced, however, by fiscal rectitude and by their media supporters."

"None of this, however, would put them in the same camp of extreme individualism, let alone anti-state activism, promoted by Palmer and Kelly," he said.

Principal researcher: Sonam Thomas

Sources

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