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20-515: The Nuclear Disarmament Party ( NDP ) was an Australian political party formed in June 1984. It was founded by medical researcher Michael Denborough as the political arm of the Australian anti-nuclear movement , which had been active since the early 1970s. The NDP primarily attracted left-wing Labor Party voters who were disillusioned with Bob Hawke 's pro-nuclear stance. At the 1984 federal election ,

40-547: A lone vigil for 52 days outside Parliament House, Canberra, in protest at what he considered was the unjust invasion of Iraq. He was appointed a Member of the Order of Australia in 1999. He died on 8 February 2014, survived by his wife, four children and six grandchildren. 1987 Australian federal election Too Many Requests If you report this error to the Wikimedia System Administrators, please include

60-499: A member of parliament. The New South Wales Branch of the NDP asked Dunn to resign so they could seek to have Wood appointed to fill the casual vacancy. This might have allowed Wood to re-enter the Senate, but Dunn refused, citing various difficulties and risks with this scenario. The NDP state branch passed a vote of no confidence in her, and she resigned from the party on 22 August 1988, the day she

80-453: A senator for New South Wales , but after less than a year in office was disqualified by the Court of Disputed Returns and replaced by Irina Dunn . However, Dunn was expelled from the party after less than a month in office, and like Vallentine served out the rest of her term as an independent. The NDP had no electoral success after 1987, and the 1990 election was the last at which the party ran

100-600: A serious campaign. After several years of inactivity, the party was revived for the 1998 election . It attracted little support in its second manifestation, and was eventually formally disbanded in December 2009, when it voluntarily relinquished its registration with the Australian Electoral Commission (AEC). In the meantime, many of its initial members had either returned to the Labor Party or become involved with

120-566: A stronger stance against the policies of the U.S., and also that Hawke had overturned a long-standing ALP policy not to mine uranium, and had allowed mining in South Australia at Olympic Dam near Roxby Downs , which has since become one of the largest uranium mines in the world. At the December 1984 federal election the NDP received 643,061 votes (7.23% of the total), and exceeded 4% in every state except Tasmania, where it received 3.9%. Amongst

140-632: The Australian Greens . The NDP was founded by Canberra doctor and peace activist Michael Denborough in response to the world political situation in the early 1980s, particularly the arms race between the United States under Ronald Reagan and the Soviet Union . Such activists were disappointed that the Australian Labor Party government of Bob Hawke , elected in 1983, had not taken

160-713: The Australian National University , retiring in 1995. He later became an emeritus professor. Denborough founded the Nuclear Disarmament Party (NDP) in 1984 and was a candidate in the Australian Capital Territory for the Senate in the Federal elections of 1987 , 1990 and 2007 . He published Australia and Nuclear War in 1984. NDP Senators Jo Vallentine and Robert Wood were elected in 1984 and 1987 respectively. In 2003 he conducted

180-761: The Victorian upper house province of Nunawading , and having the winning vote drawn from a hat, a Labor government for the first time in its history had control of the Victorian Legislative Council . A fresh election was ordered by the Court of Disputed Returns. The Liberals won re-election and Labor lost its slim majority. Within a week of polling day Mr Martin Peake, Chairman of the Victorian Nuclear Disarmament Party, lodged an official complaint with

200-593: The Chief Electoral Officer of Victoria, about a deceptive NDP how to vote card handed out at the booths. In essence, the Victorian ALP state secretary organised forged NDP how-to-vote cards and members of the Labor Party were recognised handing out this card and that the allocation of preferences to the ALP on the card damaged the NDP. The government entered a cover-up to protect its state secretary Peter Batchelor and

220-630: The Department of Clinical Science from 1975 to 1981 and acting director of the Centre for Resource and Environmental Studies in 1982. He edited The Role of Calcium in Drug Action , the research for which centred on malignant hyperthermia which he described in 1962 and tentatively linked with Sudden Infant Death Syndrome . From 1992 to 1994 he was professor of the John Curtin School of Medical Research at

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240-634: The Labor party. As police investigated the case, the culprits blamed the Socialist Workers Party . After this the NDP consisted of a group of activists led by Denborough. At the July 1987 federal election, the party's Senate vote in New South Wales fell from 9.6% to 1.5%. However, after distribution of preferences from other minor parties, the NDP's Robert Wood received more than the 7.7% quota, and hence

260-586: The NDP candidates were Peter Garrett , a rock singer, and Jean Melzer , a former Victorian ALP senator. Garrett polled 9.6% of the vote in NSW, and Melzer polled 7.3% in Victoria. Because of an adverse distribution of preferences (see Australian electoral system ), neither Garrett nor Melzer was elected. However, Western Australian peace activist Jo Vallentine was elected to the Senate. In April 1985, Vallentine, Garrett and Melzer, along with 30 other members, walked out of

280-403: The NDP polled 7.23 percent of the total Senate vote, electing Jo Vallentine as a senator for Western Australia . However, Vallentine resigned from the party before taking her seat, due to allegations of a takeover by Trotskyists affiliated with the Socialist Workers Party . The NDP's vote collapsed to 1.1 percent at the 1987 election – a double dissolution . Robert Wood was elected as

300-457: The national conference in Melbourne and resigned from the NDP, claiming that the party had been taken over by the Socialist Workers Party (SWP), a Trotskyist group. In the wake of the split, Vallentine became an independent 'senator for nuclear disarmament' and went on to be re-elected as a ‘Vallentine Peace Group’ candidate in the double dissolution election of 1987 . Due to a tied vote in

320-441: The statewide senate vote – more than Irina Dunn's independent ticket, but not nearly enough to be elected. The NDP was voluntarily deregistered by the Australian Electoral Commission (AEC) on 23 April 1992. It was re-registered on 7 May 1998, and stood candidates at another four federal elections ( 1998 , 2001 , 2004 , and 2007 ) before again being voluntarily deregistered in December 2009. Michael Denborough Denborough

340-757: Was Resident Medical Officer at the National Heart Hospital in London in 1958 before travelling to Australia, where he was first assistant at the University of Melbourne and Royal Melbourne Hospital from 1960 to 1968, reader in medicine at the University of Melbourne from 1972 to 1974 and was a professorial fellow at the John Curtin School of Medical Research in Canberra from 1974 to 1991, working as acting head of

360-601: Was born in Salisbury , Rhodesia (now Harare , Zimbabwe ) to Paul Peter Denborough and Alma Mary Hepburn. He was educated at Prince Edward School in Salisbury and the University of Cape Town before being awarded a Rhodes Scholarship to Exeter College, Oxford , where he was an assistant at the Nuffield Department of Clinical Medicine, Radcliffe Infirmary . He married Erica Elizabeth Griffith Brown on 12 December 1959. He

380-467: Was duly elected. In May 1988, however, Wood, who was born in the United Kingdom, was disqualified from membership of the Senate on the grounds that he had not been an Australian citizen at the time of nomination. Wood's seat was won on a recount of the ballots by the second candidate on the NDP ticket in NSW, Irina Dunn . When Wood was subsequently granted Australian citizenship he became eligible to be

400-558: Was sworn in to the senate. Like Wood and Vallentine, Dunn described herself as a Senator for Nuclear Disarmament having already distanced herself from the NDP. She lost her Senate place at the 1990 election . At the 1990 election , the NDP only ran candidates in New South Wales, the Australian Capital Territory , and the Northern Territory . Robert Wood was the lead candidate in New South Wales, and polled 1.04% of

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