Tom Hayes (Australian politician) explained

Tom Hayes
Office:Minister-in-Charge of Housing and Materials
Premier:John Cain
Term Start:17 December 1952
Term End:31 March 1955
Predecessor:Ivan Swinburne
Successor:John Sheehan
Constituency Am2:Melbourne
Assembly2:Victorian Legislative
Term Start2:26 June 1924
Term End2:22 April 1955
Predecessor2:Alexander Rogers
Successor2:Arthur Clarey
Birth Date:22 February 1890
Birth Place:Ararat, Victoria
Death Place:Warrandyte, Victoria, Australia
Restingplace:Coburg Cemetery
Party:Labor Party
Otherparty:Australian Labor Party (Anti-Communist)
Democratic Labor Party
Occupation:Railway worker

Thomas Hayes (22 February 1890 – 19 February 1967) was an Australian politician. He was the Labor Party member for Melbourne in the Victorian Legislative Assembly from 1924 to 1955.

Hayes was born in Ararat, Victoria to an Irish railway worker, Patrick Hayes, and his wife Sarah. He was educated at St Mary's School, and then followed his father into the railway industry, joining the Ararat branch of Victorian Railways, and was later transferred to Melbourne. During the early 1920s, he was president of the shunters section and later the transportation sections of the Australian Railways Union.[1]

At the 1924 state election, he was elected to the seat of Melbourne for the Labor Party. He was also a councillor on the Melbourne City Council from 1939 to 1965. When the government of John Cain took office in December 1952, Hayes was appointed to the Cain Ministry as Minister-in-Charge of Housing and the associated portfolio of Minister-in-Charge of Materials.

In March 1955, Hayes left the ALP in the 1955 split and joined the Australian Labor Party (Anti-Communist)—relinquishing his ministerial portfolio to John Sheehan.[2] He was defeated in the 1955 state election,[3] but remained active in the Democratic Labor Party, serving as deputy leader in Victoria in 1961.

Notes and References

  1. http://www.parliament.vic.gov.au/re-member/bioregfull.cfm?mid=1137 Hayes, Thomas
  2. News: Cain silent on poll. . . Melbourne . 2 April 1955 . 10 May 2012 . 5 . National Library of Australia.
  3. Ainsley Symons (2012), 'Democratic Labor Party members in the Victorian Parliament of 1955–1958,' in Recorder (Australian Society for the Study of Labour History, Melbourne Branch) No. 275, November, Pages 4-5.