1886 Victorian colonial election

1886 Victorian colonial election
← 1883 5 March 1886 1889 →
All 86 seats in the Victorian Legislative Assembly
  First party Second party
 
Leader Duncan Gillies Alfred Deakin
Party Conservative Liberal
Leader's seat Rodney West Bourke
Seats won 28 38
Percentage 29.86 39.33
Premier before election

Duncan Gillies
Liberal-Conservative coalition

Elected Premier

Duncan Gillies
Liberal-Conservative coalition

The 1886 Victorian colonial election was held on 22 February 1883 to elect the 13th Parliament of Victoria. All 86 seats in 55 electorates in the Legislative Assembly were up for election, though eleven seats were uncontested.[1]

There were 31 single-member, 20 two-member and 5 three-member electorates.[1]

In early 1886 both James Service and Graham Berry had resigned as the Conservative and Liberal leaders in the coalition government. A new ministry was then elected on the eve of the election, which included the Conservative politician Duncan Gillies as Premier, Treasurer and Minister of Railways and the new leader of the Liberals, Alfred Deakin, as Chief Secretary and Minister of Water Supply.[2][3][4] In a widely expected result, the Conservative-Liberal coalition won the majority of seats in the new Parliament.[5]

  1. ^ a b "The Thirteenth Parliament Elected 5 March 1886". Psephos: Adam Carr's Electoral Archive.
  2. ^ The New Ministry, Leader (Melbourne), 27 February 1886, page 27.
  3. ^ The New Ministry, The Australasian Sketcher with Pen and Pencil (Melbourne), 10 March 1886, page 35.
  4. ^ Margot Beever (1972), Duncan Gillies (1834–1903), Australian Dictionary of Biography website, National Centre of Biography, Australian National University; accessed 16 December 2023.
  5. ^ Editorial, The Age (Melbourne), 6 March 1886, page 8.