6 News' top 6 party name antics

From the High Court to the dictionary, Leo Puglisi and Stuart Jeffery rank 6 News’ top 6 political party name shenanigans.

6. A Fusion of Fusion Parties

Some conspiracy theorists claim that political parties are unconstitutional. However, political parties have existed from the very start of the Commonwealth of Australia in 1901, following their spread in the late 1880s.

But they were still new enough that party lines were yet to be fully drawn. Three parties emerged after the 1901 election: Protectionist, Free Trade and Labo(u)r.

The modern Australian Liberal-Labor rivalry didn’t exist until the 1920s. But the first move towards it was the unification of the Protectionist and Free Trade/Anti-Socialist parties as the Fusion Party under Andrew Deakin with the Liberal/Fusion Party.

Thus began Australia’s history of political party mergers.

Australia’s largest merger was the FUSION Party in 2021, with the Pirate Party, Climate Change Justice Party, Climate Emergency Action Alliance: Vote Planet party, Science Party, and Secular Party.

Ironically, the FUSION | Planet Rescue | Whistleblower Protection | Innovation party is at the exact opposite end of the political spectrum as the old Fusion Party, and is the only party in this list to not claim successor status.

5. Labor’s American Spell Checking

Whereas the Protectionist and Free Trade parties began as coalitions of NSW colonial politicians, Labor began as a union-driven movement in several colonies at the same time.

Australia’s Labor predates the UK’s equivalent, and was largely inspired by the US labor movement, especially the American Federation of Labor, which was created in 1886.

Without any existing Labour parties in what is now the UK-English speaking part of the world to draw its name from, the AFL’s influence meant that the Australian Labor Party, and its state branches, although often changing the spelling of ‘ Labor’, eventually kept the US spelling.

4. Australian Communists v Communist Australians

Australian Communist Party v Commonwealth (1951) is probably one of the best-known High Court judgments, where the High Court blocked an attempt by Prime Minister Robert Menzies to ban the party on national security grounds. It stands as one of the best examples of the court’s ability to check Parliament.

It was followed by an attempted referendum to give the government the power to ban the ACP, which was defeated by a campaign led by Labor leader and former High Court judge H.V. Evatt.

However, by the end of 1951 the Australian Communist Party had changed its name to the Communist Party of Australia, which was its original name until 1944.

The party was disbanded in 1991. The Socialist Party of Australia picked up the CPA’s name in 1996. In 2019, a new Australian Communist Party split off from the party, and both claim to be successors to the party which appeared in the High Court battle.

3. Conservative Liberals

As with Labor, the Liberal Party’s name bears the hallmarks of colonial-era politics.

In this case, the word ‘liberal’ didn’t always have the same political meaning as it does today. The meaning of ‘liberal’ used in the Liberal Party’s name is what we would call ‘classical liberal,’ to distinguish itself from the modern centre-left ‘liberals.’

Classical liberalism involves limited government, civil liberties and an unregulated capitalist economy. Once considered ‘progressive’ for its view on rights in the 17th and 18th centuries, it falls on the political right today.

This version of ‘liberal’ is what inspired the Fusion/Liberal Party in 1909, which combined the Protectionist and Free Trade ‘right-wing’ parties, and gave today’s Liberal Party the same meaning.

2. Menzies Reincarnated? The United Australia Party

The immediate predecessor of the modern Liberal Party was the United Australia Party, formed in 1931, the merger of the Nationalist Party and smaller right-wing parties.

Amongst the party’s leaders were former Prime Minister Billy Hughes and Robert Menzies, both as Opposition Leader and Prime Minister. It also featured John Latham, the last Opposition Leader for the Nationalist Party and future High Court Chief Justice, the sole dissenter in the Communist Party Case.

Expressing his dissatisfaction with the modern Liberal Party, and its Queensland Liberal-National branch, Clive Palmer would launch the United Australia Party in 2013, originally formed in 2012 as the Palmer United Party, claiming to be the true successor of the ‘Party of Menzies.’

In Babet v Commonwealth (reasons yet to be published) in February 2025, the High Court held that the voluntary deregistration of the UAP after the 2022 election meant that, under the Commonwealth Electoral Act 1918 (Cth), they couldn’t re-register until after the 2025 election.

1. The Liberal Democrats go to the High Court

In the lead up to the May 2022 federal election, the Commonwealth government amended the Commonwealth Electoral Act 1918 (Cth) to increase the number of party members required for party registration from 500 to 1500, and to prevent parties from having similar names.

Because the Liberal Party was older and more established, the Australian Electoral Commission asked the Liberal Democrats to change their name. The Liberal Democrats, represented by John Ruddick, challenged this before the High Court, based on the implied freedom of political communication.

Challenges to similar legislation, including one by the Democratic Labor Party, had been unsuccessful, and Ruddick v Commonwealth was no different.

As in the DLP case, Mulholland v Australian Electoral Commission (2004), and more recently in Babet v Commonwealth, the High Court said that there is “no common law liberty of communication” when it comes to how party names appear on ballot papers, only rights granted by legislation, which can just as easily be taken away or amended.

The Liberal Democrats are now known as the Libertarian Party, although a loophole in New South Wales election legislation let them keep their name on the ballot paper a bit longer.