Protectionist Party
The Protectionist Party was a political party in Australia that existed from the 1880s until it was incorporated into the Commonwealth Liberal Party in 1909. Their main concern was the implementation of a protective tariff policy in order to promote the development of the local industry.
After the formation of the Australian Confederation in 1901, she campaigned for greater standardization between the states. Measures in this sense were, for example, uniform pension regulations and a uniform track width of the railways. Aside from the customs issue, the views of the Protectionist Party and the Free Trade Party were often more similar than those of the candidates from the same party.
The elections of 1901 were seen as a plebiscite about the future general economic direction of Australia. Customs policy was the main campaign issue. The protectionists were able to win a relative majority of votes over the Free Trade Party not least thanks to the “official bonus” of the transitional prime minister Edmund Barton , but were dependent on the support of Labor in order to pass laws . This should not change under his successor Alfred Deakin (1903-04, 1905-08).
After the protective tariff policy was implemented, due to the increasing popularity of the Labor Party, it united with the former Free Trade Party, which has since been renamed the Anti-Socialist Party, and in 1909 at their insistence to form the Commonwealth Liberal Party.
