The Labor Left (LL), also known as the Progressive Left, Socialist Left or simply the Left, is one of the two major political factions within the Australian Labor Party (ALP). It is characterised nationally by its advocacy of socially progressive, democratic socialist and fergusonian social democratic policies and competes with the more centrist Labor Right faction.
Labor Left | |
|---|---|
| Abbreviation | LL |
| National Convenors |
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| Newspaper | Challenge Magazine |
| Ideology |
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| National affiliation | Australian Labor |
| Colours | Red |
| Seats in the House of Representatives | 48 / 151 |
| Federal Parliamentary Caucus | 63 / 123 |
| Queensland Parliamentary Caucus | 16 / 36 |
| Western Australia Parliamentary Caucus | 42 / 75 |
| New South Wales Parliamentary Caucus | 20 / 60 |
The Labor Left operates autonomously in each state and territory of Australia, and organises as a broad alliance at the national level. Its policy positions include party democratisation, economic interventionism, progressive tax reform, refugee rights, gender equality and same-sex marriage. The faction includes members with a range of political perspectives, including Keynesianism, confrontational trade unions, Fabian social democracy, New Leftism, and democratic socialism.
Factional activity
Most political parties contain informal factions of members who work towards common goals, however, the Australian Labor Party is noted for having highly structured and organised factions across the ideological spectrum.
Labor Left is a membership-based organisation which has internal office bearers, publications, and policy positions. The faction coordinates political activity and policy development across different hierarchical levels and organisational components of the party, negotiates with other factions on political strategy and policy, and uses party processes to try to defeat other groups if consensus cannot be reached.
Many members of parliament and trade union leaders are formally aligned with the Left and Right factions, and party positions and ministerial allocations are negotiated and divided between the factions based on the proportion of Labor caucus aligned with that faction.
History
Factions before the 1950s
Historian Frank Bongiorno has noted that there had been several organisations associated with the left wing of Labor before the 1950s, from the Australian Socialist League in the 1890s, the industrial left which emerged during World War I, the early supporters of Jack Lang, and the State Labor Party of the 1940s.
Split in 1955
The modern Labor Left emerged from the Labor Party split of 1955, in which anti-communist activists associated with B. A. Santamaria and the Industrial Groups formed the Democratic Labor Party while left-wing parliamentarians and unions loyal to H. V. Evatt and Arthur Calwell remained in the Australian Labor Party. The earliest formal factional organization was the NSW Combined Unions and Branches Steering Committee (later known as the NSW Socialist Left), which was formed in January 1955.
The split played out differently across the country, with anti-communists leaving the party in Victoria and Queensland but remaining within in most other states. This created a power vacuum which allowed the Left to take control of the Federal Executive and Victorian state branch, while its opponents were preserved elsewhere. Tom Uren described the left of the Labor Party Caucus upon his election to Parliament in the late 1950s as "a loosely knit grouping ... consist[ing] mostly of anti-Catholics, although some members were militants or socialists".
From 1965, organised internal groups emerged to challenge the control of the Left, supported by figures such as John Button and Gough Whitlam. After the Victorian branch lost the 1970 state election in the midst of a public dispute with Whitlam over state aid for private schools, the South Australian Left, led by Clyde Cameron, and New South Wales Left, led by Arthur Gietzelt, agreed to support an intervention which saw the Victorian state branch abolished and subsequently reconstructed without Left control. Leftists in the Victorian party subsequently regrouped as the formally organized Socialist Left faction. In Queensland, the left coalesced around senator George Georges. Despite an increasing level of organisation in the grassroots party, this was not reflected within the Parliamentary caucus: Ken Fry noted that when he was elected to Parliament in 1974, meetings of left MPs were irregular and they responded to events in an ad hoc manner. The Labor Left suffered the loss of two of its key leaders in the mid-1970s with the downfall of Jim Cairns and the elevation of Lionel Murphy to the High Court of Australia, yet it continued to make advances in terms of nationwide organisation: right-wing power broker Graham Richardson has acknowledged that "at the beginning of the 1980s the Left was the only national faction".
Split in the 1980s
Labor leftists continued to formalise their organisation into the 1980s. In New South Wales, the Steering Committee (which later became known as the Socialist Left in 1989) made advances in branches across the state in the late 1970s and early 1980s under the leadership of Peter Baldwin, initially in the suburbs of Sydney before spreading to the inner cities. This culminated in the deselection of the right-aligned MP for Sydney, Les McMahon, and the selection of Baldwin as Labor candidate for the seat. This was followed by other Labor Right MPs in Sydney's Inner West similarly being usurped by left candidates.
In Tasmania, the Broad Left formalised itself in 1983, having taken control of the state party after reforms democratised it in 1976. In the Australian Capital Territory, the Left Caucus was founded after a left candidate was not preselected in 1982. However, the Left was unable to translate their organisational advances into a presence in the Hawke government: although about a third of the Parliamentary caucus were aligned with the Left at the time, only one member was appointed to Hawke's first cabinet, Stewart West: leading left-winger Brian Howe placed high in the ministry ballot, but was relegated to a junior ministerial position. This came against the background of an increasing factionalising across the party and the emergence of a centre-left faction which joined with the Labor Right to dominate the Hawke government. Left influence was also restricted by the ALP's binding pledge committing legislators to accept caucus discipline, allowing members little freedom to dissent. Left influence also declined at the national conference, with the faction losing its conference majority in the early 1980s.
During the 1980s, prolonged disputes over tactical issues and personality conflicts resulted in a split occurring within the New South Wales Labor Left, creating two sub-factional groupings; the 'Hard Left' and the 'Soft Left', the latter of which was the successor of the Baldwinites. A significant event which caused the split was the election of the Secretary Assistant of the New South Wales Labor Party, where the Hard Left faction supported Anthony Albanese while the Soft Left faction supported Jan Burnswoods. The Hard Left faction was more closely aligned with left-wing groups external to the Labor Party, maintaining "closer links with broader left-wing groups, such as the Communist Party of Australia, People for Nuclear Disarmament and the African National Congress" as well as trade union officials, political staffers, lobbyists and student politicians, while the Soft Left's main base of support was among rank-and-file party branch members. In terms of tactics, the Hard Left favoured a top-down approach of transactional negotiation with the Labor Right, whilst the Soft Left advocated a continuation of the Baldwinite bottom-up strategy of mobilising the grassroots membership to win party positions. This difference in approach led to struggles between the two factions over candidate selections, with the Hard Left using their control over the party apparatus in tandem with sections of the Right to deselect Soft Left MPs across the state, particularly in western Sydney, Newcastle and Wollongong. For example, in Newcastle Bryce Gaudry was deselected in favour of the Right's Jodi McKay, following which about 130 members resigned or were expelled from the city's ALP branches, previously the largest in the state. The factions also had differing views on policy. While members of both the Soft and Hard Left opposed the Hawke/Keating government's privatisation of the Commonwealth Bank and Qantas, the Hard Left was seen as being more staunchly resistant to these changes.
Post-1990s
Lindsay Tanner, writing in the early 1990s, argued that the principal "axis of division" with the ALP cut across the traditional left-right divide, namely the opposition of "rationalists" and "traditionalists", with the former supporting the Prices and Incomes Accord and union mergers, and abandoning or watering down their commitment to traditional Labor objectives such as public ownership, non-interventionism in foreign policy, and maintenance of working-class living standards, whilst the latter were negative towards the Accord, opposed to union mergers, sympathetic toward economic autarky, and attached to traditional Labor policy objectives. This divide can be seen through the career of Joan Kirner, who served as Premier of Victoria between 1990 and 1992 and was the first member of the modern Labor Left to lead a government, who supported the ascent of Paul Keating to the post of Prime Minister and his decision to privatise Commonwealth Bank to finance a bailout for the ailing State Bank of Victoria. This resulted in the formation of a splinter group from the Socialist Left, the Pledge faction, which opposed privatisation: in 1996, Pledge allied with another left split, the Labour Renewal Alliance, and the right-wing Labor Unity faction to take control of the party away from the Socialist Left.
State factions
| Jurisdiction | Major Left grouping | Conference floor percentage 2015 | Majority |
|---|---|---|---|
| New South Wales | NSW Left | 40% | No |
| Victoria | Victorian Socialist Left | 49% | Stability pact with the TWU-SDA |
| Western Australia | Broad Left | 84% | Yes |
| Queensland | The Left | 49% | Yes |
| ACT | Left Caucus | 51% | Yes |
| South Australia | Progressive Left Unions and Sub-Branches | 35% | No |
| Tasmania | The Left | 70% | Yes |
| Northern Territory | The Left | 60% | Yes |
| National | National Left | 48% | No |
Members
Federal Parliament (as of 2025)
| Name | Seat | Other position(s) | State | Ref. |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Anthony Albanese | Member for Grayndler | Prime Minister of Australia; Leader of the Labor Party | New South Wales | |
| Katy Gallagher | Senator for Australian Capital Territory | Minister for Finance; Minister for the Public Service; Minister for Women; Minister for Government Service | Australian Capital Territory | |
| Jenny McAllister | Senator for New South Wales | New South Wales | ||
| Pat Conroy | Member for Shortland | Minister for Defence Industry; Minister for Pacific Island Affairs | New South Wales | |
| Sharon Claydon | Member for Newcastle | Deputy Speaker of the House of Representatives | New South Wales | |
| Susan Templeman | Member for Macquarie | Special Envoy for the Arts | New South Wales | |
| Tanya Plibersek | Member for Sydney | Minister for Social Services | New South Wales | |
| Tim Ayres | Senator for New South Wales | Minister for Industry and Innovation; Minister for Science | New South Wales | |
| Malarndirri McCarthy | Senator for Northern Territory | Minister for Indigenous Australians | Northern Territory | |
| Nita Green | Senator for Queensland | Assistant Minister for Northern Australia; Assistant Minister for Tourism; Assistant Minister for Pacific Island Affairs | Queensland | |
| Murray Watt | Senator for Queensland | Minister for Environment and Water | Queensland | |
| Julie Collins | Member for Franklin | Minister for Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry; | Tasmania | |
| Mark Butler | Member for Hindmarsh | Minister for Health and Ageing; Deputy Leader of the House; Minister for disability and the National Disability Insurance Scheme | South Australia | |
| Penny Wong | Senator for South Australia | Leader of the Labor Party in the Senate; Leader of the Government in the Senate; Minister for Foreign Affairs | South Australia | |
| Catherine King | Member for Ballarat | Minister for Infrastructure, Transport, Regional Development, and Local Government | Victoria | |
| Andrew Giles | Member for Scullin | Minister for Skills and Training | Victoria | |
| Ged Kearney | Member for Cooper | Assistant Minister for Social Services; Assistant Minister for the Prevention of Family Violence | Victoria | |
| Kate Thwaites | Member for Jagajaga | Assistant Minister for Climate Change Adaption and Resilience | Victoria | |
| Julian Hill | Member for Bruce | Assistant Minister for Citizenship, Customs and Multicultural Affairs; Assistant Minister for International Education | Victoria | |
| Anne Aly | Member for Cowan | Minister for Small Business; Minister for International Development; Minister for Multicultural Affairs | Western Australia | |
| Patrick Gorman | Member for Perth | Assistant Minister to the Prime Minister; Assistant Minister for the Public Service; Assistant Minister for Employment and Workplace Relations | Western Australia | |
| Josh Wilson | Member for Fremantle | Assistant Minister for Climate Change and Energy; Assistant Minister for Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry | Western Australia | |
| Sue Lines | Senator for Western Australia | President of the Senate | Western Australia | |
| Anne Stanley | Member for Werriwa | New South Wales | ||
| Ash Ambihaipahar | Member for Barton | New South Wales | ||
| Carol Berry | Member for Whitlam | New South Wales | ||
| Fiona Phillips | Member for Gilmore | New South Wales | ||
| Jerome Laxale | Member for Bennelong | New South Wales | ||
| Zhi Soon | Member for Banks | New South Wales | ||
| Marion Scrymgour | Member for Lingiari | Special Envoy for Remote Communities | Northern Territory | |
| Ali France | Member for Dickson | Queensland | ||
| Julie-Ann Campbell | Member for Moreton | Queensland | ||
| Kara Cook | Member for Bonner | Queensland | ||
| Madonna Jarrett | Member for Brisbane | Queensland | ||
| Matt Smith | Member for Leichhardt | Queensland | ||
| Rowan Holzberger | Member for Forde | Queensland | ||
| Renee Coffey | Member for Griffith | Queensland | ||
| Carol Brown | Senator for Tasmania | Tasmania | ||
| Jess Teesdale | Member for Bass | Tasmania | ||
| Anne Urquhart | Member for Braddon | Tasmania | ||
| Rebecca White | Member for Lyons | Assistant Minister for Health and Aged Care; Assistant Minister for Indigenous health; Assistant Minister for Women | Tasmania | |
| Charlotte Walker | Senator for South Australia | South Australia | ||
| Tony Zappia | Member for Makin | South Australia | ||
| Karen Grogan | Senator for South Australia | South Australia | ||
| Louise Miller-Frost | Member for Boothby | South Australia | ||
| Basem Abdo | Member for Calwell | Victoria | ||
| Carina Garland | Member for Chisholm | Victoria | ||
| Jo Briskey | Member for Maribyrnong | Victoria | ||
| Joanne Ryan | Member for Lalor | Victoria | ||
| Jodie Belyea | Member for Dunkley | Victoria | ||
| Libby Coker | Member for Corangamite | Victoria | ||
| Lisa Chesters | Member for Bendigo | Victoria | ||
| Mary Doyle | Member for Aston | Victoria | ||
| Sarah Witty | Member for Melbourne | Victoria | ||
| Gabriel Ng | Member for Menzies | Victoria | ||
| Jess Walsh | Senator for Victoria | Minister for Early Childhood Education; Minister for Youth | Victoria | |
| Lisa Darmanin | Senator for Victoria | Victoria | ||
| Ellie Whiteaker | Senator for Western Australia | Western Australia | ||
| Tom French | Member for Moore | Western Australia | ||
| Zaneta Mascarenhas | Member for Swan | Western Australia | ||
| Trish Cook | Member for Bullwinkel | Western Australia |
Queensland Parliament (as of 2024)
| Name | Seat | Other position(s) | Union | Ref. |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Steven Miles | Member for Murrumba | Leader of the Opposition in Queensland | United Workers Union Together Queensland | |
| Barbara O'Shea | Member for South Brisbane | United Workers Union | ||
| Mick de Brenni | Member for Springwood | Manager of Opposition Business | United Workers Union The Services Union | |
| Meaghan Scanlon | Member for Gaven | Shadow Attorney-General, Shadow Minister for Justice, Shadow Minister for Housing, Homelessness and Home Ownership | United Workers Union | |
| Mark Bailey | Member for Miller | Shadow Minister for Health and Ambulance Services, Shadow Minister for Mental Health | Electrical Trades Union | |
| Shannon Fentiman | Member for Waterford | Shadow Treasurer, Shadow Minister for Women | Australian Manufacturing Workers Union | |
| Peter Russo | Member for Toohey | Australian Manufacturing Workers Union Together Queensland | ||
| Nikki Boyd | Member for Pine Rivers | Shadow Minister for Local Government and Water, Shadow Minister for Fire, Disaster Recovery, Emergency Services and Volunteers | United Workers Union | |
| Chris Whiting | Member for Bancroft | Electrical Trades Union Together Queensland | ||
| Lance McCallum | Member for Bundamba | Shadow Minister for Energy | Electrical Trades Union Rail Tram and Bus Union | |
| Glenn Butcher | Member for Gladstone | Shadow Minister for Police and Crime Prevention, Shadow Minister for Corrective Services, Shadow Minister for Sport | Australian Manufacturing Workers Union United Workers Union | |
| Shane King | Member for Kurwongbah | Electrical Trades Union Together Queensland | ||
| Melissa McMahon | Member for Macalister | United Workers Union | ||
| Mark Ryan | Member for Morayfield | Together Queensland | ||
| Leeanne Enoch | Member for Algester | Shadow Minister for Closing the Gap and Reconciliation, Shadow Minister for Seniors and Disability Services, Shadow Minister for Integrity, Shadow Minister for the Arts | Together Queensland Australian Manufacturing Workers Union | |
| Jennifer Howard | Member for Ipswich | The Services Union | ||
| Corrine McMillan | Member for Mansfield | Shadow Minister for Child Safety, Communities and the Prevention of Domestic and Family Violence | Together Queensland | |
| Tom Smith | Member for Bundaberg | Shadow Minister for Primary Industries and Rural Development, Shadow Minister for Manufacturing | United Workers Union |
Western Australia Parliament (as of 2024)
| Name | Seat | Other position(s) | Union | Ref. |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Dave Kelly | Member for Bassendean | United Workers Union | ||
| Lisa O'Malley | MLA for Bicton | United Workers Union | ||
| Don Punch | MLA for Bunbury | AMWU | ||
| Mark Folkard | MLA for Burns Beach | AMWU | ||
| David Scaife | MLA for Cockburn | AMWU | ||
| Jodie Hanns | MLA for Collie-Preston | AMWU | ||
| Lisa Munday | MLA for Dawesville | United Workers Union | ||
| Simone McGurk | MLA for Fremantle | United Workers Union | ||
| Lara Dalton | MLA for Geraldton | United Workers Union | ||
| Yaz Mubarakai | MLA for Jandakot | AMWU | ||
| Emily Hamilton | MLA for Joondalup | United Workers Union | ||
| Matthew Hughes | MLA for Kalamunda | United Workers Union | ||
| Divina D'Anna | MLA for Kimberley | AMWU | ||
| Jessica Stojkovski | MLA for Kingsley | AMWU | ||
| Roger Cook | MLA for Kwinana | Premier of Western Australia, Minister for State Development, Minister for Public Sector Management, Minister for Federal-State Relations | United Workers Union | |
| David Templeman | MLA for Mandurah | AMWU | ||
| Lisa Baker | MLA for Maylands | United Workers Union | ||
| Meredith Hammat | MLA for Mirrabooka | United Workers Union | ||
| Amber-Jade Sanderson | MLA for Morley | United Workers Union | ||
| Robyn Clarke | MLA for Murray-Wellington | AMWU | ||
| John Carey | MLA for Perth | United Workers Union | ||
| Kevin Michel | MLA for Pilbara | AMWU | ||
| Terry Healy | MLA for Southern River | United Workers Union | ||
| Jessica Shaw | MLA for Swan Hills | United Workers Union | ||
| Chris Tallentire | MLA for Thornlie | United Workers Union | ||
| Sabine Winton | MLA for Wanneroo | United Workers Union | ||
| Darren West | MLC for Agricultural | United Workers Union | ||
| Shelley Payne | MLC for Agricultural | United Workers Union | ||
| Alanna Clohesy | MLC for East Metropolitan | AMWU | ||
| Lorna Harper | MLC for East Metropolitan | United Workers Union | ||
| Stephen Dawson | MLC for Mining and Pastoral | Minister for Emergency Services, Minister for Innovation and the Digital Economy, Minister for Science, Minister for Medical Research, Minister assisting the Minister for State and Industry Development, Jobs and Trade | AMWU | |
| Peter Foster | MLC for Mining and Pastoral | AMWU | ||
| Pierre Yang | MLC for North Metropolitan | United Workers Union | ||
| Ayor Makur Chuot | MLC for North Metropolitan | United Workers Union | ||
| Daniel Caddy | MLC for North Metropolitan | United Workers Union | ||
| Sue Ellery | MLC for South Metropolitan | Minister for Finance, Minister for Commerce, Minister for Women's Interests | United Workers Union | |
| Klara Andric | MLC for South Metropolitan | United Workers Union | ||
| Stephen Pratt | MLC for South Metropolitan | United Workers Union | ||
| Sally Talbot | MLC for South West | AMWU | ||
| Jackie Jarvis | MLC for South West | United Workers Union |
New South Wales Parliament (as of 2024)
| Name | Seat | Other position(s) | Union | Sub-Faction | Ref. |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Lynda Voltz | Auburn | Soft left | |||
| Anthony D'Adam | Member of the Legislative Council | Soft left | |||
| Nathan Hagarty | Leppington | Soft left | |||
| Tim Crakanthorp | Newcastle | Soft left | |||
| Cameron Murphy | Member of the Legislative Council | Soft left | |||
| Julia Finn | Granville | Soft left | |||
| Sonia Hornery | Wallsend | Soft left | |||
| Charishma Kaliyanda | Liverpool | Soft left | |||
| Kylie Wilkinson | East Hills | Soft left | |||
| Yasmin Catley | Swansea | Hard left | |||
| Jo Haylen | Summer Hill | Hard left | |||
| Rose Jackson | Member of the Legislative Council | Hard left | |||
| Trish Doyle | Blue Mountains | Hard left | |||
| Karen McKeown | Penrith | Hard left | |||
| Janelle Saffin | Lismore | Hard left | |||
| John Graham | Member of the Legislative Council | Hard left | |||
| Liza Butler | South Coast | Hard left | |||
| Peter Primrose | Member of the Legislative Council | Hard left | |||
| Jodie Harrison | Charlestown | Hard left | |||
| Penny Sharpe | Member of the Legislative Council | Hard left |
See also
- Labor Right
- Ferguson Left
- Hard Left
- Australian Labor Party
Further reading
- Barcan, Alan, (1960) The socialist left in Australia 1949–1959 Sydney: Australian Political Studies Association (Occasional monograph (Australian Political Studies Association)) no. 2.
- Leigh, Andrew, (2000) "Factions and Fractions: A Case Study of Power Politics in the Australian Labor Party" Australian Journal of Political Science, 2000, vol. 35, iss. 3, pp. 427–448.
- Bongiorno, Frank (2014) The New South Wales Left at 60 Archived 29 November 2014 at the Wayback Machine NSW Left Website.
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