Industrial Labor Party

The Industrial Labor Party or Heffron Labor Party was a short-lived but influential political party active in New South Wales between 1936 and 1939. It was a splinter group of the Australian Labor Party(ALP) and was formed by Bob Heffron after he and Carlo Lazzarini attempted to depose the party leader Jack Lang (who had been Premier of New South Wales 1925-27 and again 1930-32). Both Heffron and Lazzarini subsequently lost their party endorsements for the 1938 election.

At that election, the ILP stood candidates in 6 of the 90 seats and won 3.7% of the popular vote. Heffron and Lazzarini retained their seats in the Legislative Assembly. The party was successful at two subsequent by-elections in the seats of Hurstville (won by Clive Evatt) and Waverley (won by Clarrie Martin). These victories were seen as evidence of Lang's diminishing political power. Three other MLAs, Frank Burke (Newtown), C. M. A. Davidson (Cobar) and Ted Horsington (Sturt), all resigned from the ALP and joined the ILP in June 1939.

Under pressure from the federal executive of the ALP, the ILP was readmitted into the ALP at a unity conference on 26 August 1939. Heffron and William McKell then successfully combined to depose Lang on 5 September 1939.

References

• Nairn, Bede (1995) Jack Lang the 'Big Fella': Jack Lang and the Australian Labor Party 1891-1949, Melbourne University Press, Melbourne ISBN 0-522-84700-5, OCLC 34416531.