Australian History: Stanley Melbourne Bruce
Stanley Melbourne Bruce was born in Melbourne in 1883, went to Cambridge University as a law student in 1902 and then settled in London. Bruce practised as a barrister and was chairman of the London board of his family's thriving Melbourne importing business.
When the First World War broke out, he was commissioned as an officer in the British Army and fought at Gallipoli and the Western Front. In 1917, decorated with the Military Cross and Croix de Guerre and bearing the scars of two severe wounds, he was invalided out of the army and returned to Melbourne to reorganise the family business.
He caught the attention of National Party whilst making recruiting speeches on behalf of Australian patriots. In the 1918 elections, the party offered the federal seat of Flinders and he was successful.
Bruce was appointed Treasurer by Hughes after he represented Australia in 1921 at the League of Nations (precursor of the United Nations).
He retained his seat in the 1922 elections but the National Party won only 28 seats against Labor's 30. The Nationals could govern only with the support of the new Country Party's 14 seats. Earle Page, the CP leader, agreed to a coalition but rejected Hughes as Prime Minister. Bruce proved the only man acceptable to both sides of the coalition and, after only five years in politics, he became Prime Minister.
He seems to have given little thought to social reforms but concentrated on land settlement and developmental works. At the same time, Bruce kept the Country Party on side with export subsidies and price support for primary produce. Possibly his most significant achievement was the establishment of what is now the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organization. His policies called for a strong, unified Australia which would attract overseas investors, and for closer ties with Britain on foreign affairs. As a businessman, he worked with Earle Page to create the Loan Council as an authorised body for public borrowing instead of voluntary annual payments by the Commonwealth to the states. He also organised the 1927 transfer of the Parliament, and some government departments, to Canberra.
As a businessman, he saw socialists as inefficient and disruptive. The Russian Revolution of 1917 was fresh in everyone's memory and many people believed Australian Labor to be the spearhead of a similar revolution. Bruce increased tensions with antiunion legislation and proposals such as abandonment of the arbitration system. He spoke of maintaining law and order but his legislation actually increased industrial turbulence.
The future still seemed bright during the worldwide boom of the 1920s. When that boom began to fade, Australia quickly felt the results. Wheat and wool prices collapsed, unemployment rose and British loan funds dried up. Bruce claimed the country was "not heading for inevitable disaster" but, by mid-1929, everyone sensed that disaster lay ahead. The October 1929 elections were held only 17 days before the collapse of the Wall Street stockmarket and the onset of the Great Depression. The Bruce-Page coalition also collapsed, abandoned by voters angered and frightened by Bruce's assault on the unions. Bruce lost even his seat, but regained it in 1931. He sat for a couple of years, before appointment as High Commissioner in London.
For most of the rest of his long life he held a ‘roving commission’ which enabled him to serve both Australia and his adopted country, Britain, in a number of official positions in both peace and war. In 1947, created Viscount Bruce of Melbourne, he became the first Australian to sit in the House of Lords.