page_title: Lee Batchelor
section_title: Federal
hierarchical_section_title: Lee Batchelor / Political career / Federal
caption_attribution_description: Picture of w:Lee Batchelor.
context_page_description: Egerton Lee Batchelor was an Australian politician and trade unionist. He was a pioneer of the Australian Labor Party in South Australia, which at the time was known as the United Labor Party. He was a member of the South Australian House of Assembly, leading the ULP from 1898 until his resignation in 1899 to accept a ministerial post in a non-Labor government, with the party's approval. Batchelor entered federal politics in 1901 and held cabinet posts in the first three ALP governments. He was Minister for Home Affairs under Chris Watson, and then served two terms as Minister for External Affairs under Andrew Fisher. He suffered a fatal heart attack at the age of 46 while climbing Mount Donna Buang.
context_section_description: He retired from the South Australian parliament in 1901 and stood for election to the Parliament of Australia in the first Australian election. Batchelor, along with Holder, was elected to the Australian House of Representatives in the single statewide Division of South Australia. Batchelor was the only Labor member of the seven MPs. Labor candidate Thomas Price finished eighth. After South Australia was divided into electoral divisions for the 1903 election to which Batchelor was assigned the Division of Hindmarsh. Batchelor however unselfishly gave up this seat for one of his state MPs, instead deciding to contest the Division of Boothby against former Premier Vaiben Solomon. The voters of Boothby rewarded this selflessness with his election.
  In 1904, Batchelor was the Minister for Home Affairs in the government of Chris Watson. He was a "certain inclusion" in Watson's ministry, and along with Billy Hughes had been counselled Watson in selecting the remainder of the Watson ministry. One of his main responsibilities in the short-lived ministry was for the passage of the Seat of Government Act as to the founding of the new national capital. He was nominated in the leadership contest when Watson retired as inaugural Labor leader in 1907 but declined to stand.
  From 1908 to 1909, and again from 1910 to 1911, Batchelor was the Minister for External Affairs under the governments of Andrew Fisher. Batchelor attended the 1911 Imperial Conference along with Fisher, as the leading spokesperson on trade and foreign policy matters.
  When the Northern Territory was transferred to the control of the Commonwealth in January 1911, Batchelor was the first minister to be given the responsibility of overseeing the administration of the territory. During this time he worked to create reserves for the Indigenous peoples of the Northern Territory.
  Batchelor collapsed and died from a heart attack when climbing Mount Donna Buang in October 1911, at age 46. He was the first serving Minister who was also a member of the parliament to die in office (Sir James Dickson, Minister for Defence, died in January 1901 but he was not a member of parliament). Shortly after his death, in 1912, the town of Batchelor, Northern Territory (which is about 98 kilometres south of Darwin) was named after him.
caption: Batchelor, c. 1901
exif: {"Image Tag 0x000B": "Windows Photo Editor 10.0.10011.16384", "Image Orientation": "Horizontal (normal)", "Image Software": "Windows Photo Editor 10.0.10011.16384", "Image DateTime": "2016:01:09 11:39:30", "Image ExifOffset": "2242", "Image Padding": "[]", "Thumbnail Compression": "JPEG (old-style)", "Thumbnail XResolution": "96", "Thumbnail YResolution": "96", "Thumbnail ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormat": "4516", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormatLength": "6615", "EXIF DateTimeOriginal": "2016:01:07 10:36:08", "EXIF DateTimeDigitized": "2016:01:07 10:36:08", "EXIF SubSecTimeOriginal": "81", "EXIF SubSecTimeDigitized": "81", "EXIF ColorSpace": "sRGB", "EXIF Padding": "[]"}