One of the most striking outcomes of the Australian federal election of 2013 occurred in the Division of Indi in north-east Victoria. In an electoral contest that saw the Liberal/National Coalition under Opposition leader Tony Abbott win government with a majority of 30 seats in the House of Representatives over the incumbent Labor Party and cross-benches combined, it was only in Indi that a sitting Liberal member was defeated—by an Independent.
Such a result was a huge shock to both the defeated member, Sophie Mirabella, and her party. Not only had Mirabella comfortably held the seat since 2001, she was regarded as a heavyweight in the Coalition’s front bench in opposition. Having served nearly four years as shadow minister for innovation, industry, science and research, she could reasonably have expected a portfolio in the ministry formed by Abbott once he became prime minister.
As was realised at the time, the 2013 result in Indi had been brought about by a feeling among voters that Mirabella and the Liberal Party had been taking this rural electorate for granted, leaving it without adequate representation in the national parliament. This was not the first time such a belief had arisen in Indi. The last time this occurred, 55 years before, the same electorate delivered an identical and similarly unexpected rebuff to their Liberal member, William Dowling (“Bill”) Bostock.
Before entering parliament in the 1949 election which brought into office the Liberal-County Party coalition led by R. G. Menzies, Bostock had enjoyed a high profile in national life. A permanent air force officer before World War II, he was the RAAF’s senior operational leader in the South-West Pacific holding the rank of air vice-marshal from 1942. Bostock’s problem was that he resented the way he had been bundled out of uniform at the war’s end, being compulsorily retired six years before his prescribed age as a result of a personal feud between him and the RAAF’s chief of staff, Air Vice-Marshal George Jones, which the wartime Labor government had never properly resolved.
After buying an 800 acre grazing property at Molyullah, near the city of Benalla, Bostock’s thoughts turned to politics, leading to his success at the polls in 1949. The new prime minister, however, evidently did not see Bostock as ministerial material—at least not straight away—when the coalition majority presented such a depth of talent. The new Member for Indi was left on the back bench, although he eventually found a role in the joint committee on foreign affairs. He was left to indulge his continuing interest in defence and spoke in parliament on matters relating to this field.
Unfortunately, Bostock also used his new-found position and status to continue his feud with Air Marshal Jones, who was left in charge of the post-war air force, and to criticise the administration of the Air Board. Writing as a special correspondent, Bostock had already been pursuing his vendetta through the columns of the Melbourne Herald, beginning in June 1946 with a series of articles about the ‘RAAF’s Unhappy Story’ which focused on the command issues that had pitted him against Jones and effectively factionalised the air force. He kept up regular criticism well into the 1950s.
After ten years the voters of Indi had had enough and tipped out Bostock in favour of Rendle McNeilage Holten, a former junior officer in the wartime RAAF then a grocer from Wangaratta, who stood for the Country Party. The outcome of the 1958 election came as a huge surprise to “Mac” Holten. He had beaten Bostock on the primary count by just 98 votes, but the difference in two-party terms was 5,231—representing a massive swing of 28.6 per cent.
By a strange turn of coincidence, when Holten was given a portfolio in 1969 as Minister for Repatriation, he found that the secretary of his department was long-time Canberra identity Richard Kingsland, who during the Second World War had been a RAAF group captain serving as Bostock’s Senior Intelligence Staff Officer. In his autobiography Into the midst of things published in 2010, Kingsland reflected on the political demise of his wartime boss, expressing the view that Bostock ‘basically, just did not take enough care of his electorate’.
That Bostock’s fate contained a lesson to future parliamentary representatives was reflected in an observation made by the ABC’s political commentator Barrie Cassidy when he described events in Indi in 2013 as ‘a warning to the occupants of safe seats everywhere on both sides of politics’. Reinforcing the message was the outcome of the 2016 election, when Mirabella again contested Indi—only to see her nemesis prove the previous poll result was ‘no accident’ by increasing her share of the two-candidate preferred vote.
(Left) Bostock while Member for Indi, 1949-58; (centre) Kingsland (standing right) with Bostock (seated) at RAAF Command, August 1945; (right) Bostock’s successor in Indi, ‘Mac’ Holten