Herbert Robinson (Queensland politician)

Herbert Freemont Robinson (20 May 1893 – 3 June 1969) was an Australian politician, and a member of the Queensland Legislative Assembly from 1953 until 1957 representing the seat of Sandgate.

Biography

Robinson was born in Comet, Queensland, to Philip Robinson, a school teacher, and his wife Lucy (née Mann). He was educated at Comet State School and subsequently taught as a pupil-teacher. By 1915, he was working as a railway porter in Toowoomba.^[1]

He enlisted in the First Australian Imperial Force on 27 August 1915 as a Private, embarking for active service in Egypt on 31 January 1916 aboard T.S. Wandilla and transferring to the 2nd Pioneer Battalion where he saw service in both Egypt and France. He was wounded in action in May 1917, and was out of the war for much of 1918 due to illness. In April 1919 he joined the AIF Education Service where he worked as a Duty Librarian. He returned to Brisbane in July 1919 and was discharged there with the rank of Sergeant on 27 August 1919. He was awarded the British War Medal and Victory Medal.^[2]

Robinson worked variously in the railways of Queensland for much of his life. He was a porter in Wyreema, Maryborough and Gympie over 1919–1920, and a shunter in Ipswich and Bundamba until 1925. While working in Ipswich, he married Agnes Doran on 14 July 1924, with whom he was to have two sons and three daughters. From 1925 until 1942, Robinson was employed as a guard on the Kingaroy line, and then became a first-class guard at Shorncliffe in 1942, and moved his family to nearby Sandgate.^[1]

He had been involved with the Australian Railways Union during this time, being elected to its executive, and had joined the Australian Labor Party, under whose banner he stood unsuccessfully at the 1950 state election for the seat of Sandgate against the Liberal incumbent, Eric Decker. He achieved a 10% swing to win the seat at the 1953 state election, and held it in 1956.^[1][3]

Premier Vince Gair was expelled from the Labor Party on 24 April 1957, and a number of mostly Catholic Labor MPs, including Robinson, joined him in forming a new Queensland Labor Party. He lost at the state election following.

After his defeat, he worked as a railways clerk in Brisbane until his retirement in 1959. He died on 3 June 1969 in Greenslopes at the Repatriation Hospital, and was buried and cremated at the Nudgee Catholic Cemetery.^[1]

References