Dennis Jones (27 January 1874 – 19 January 1936) was an Australian trade unionist and politician. He was a member of the Legislative Assembly of

Western Australia Western Australia (commonly abbreviated as WA) is a state of Australia occupying the western percent of the land area of Australia excluding external territories. It is bounded by the Indian Ocean to the north and west, the Southern Ocean to th ...

from March to June 1910, in unusual circumstances, and ran for parliament unsuccessfully on two more occasions in the 1920s. Jones was born in

Woodend, Victoria Woodend () is a town in Victoria, Australia. The town is in the Shire of Macedon Ranges local government area on Dja Dja Wurrung country and is bypassed to the east and north by the Calder Freeway (M79), located about halfway between Melbourne a ...

, to Catherine (née Greelish) and Patrick Jones. He moved to Western Australia in the 1890s, and worked as a general labourer and

teamster A teamster is the American term for a truck driver or a person who drives teams of draft animals. Further, the term often refers to a member of the International Brotherhood of Teamsters, a labor union in the United States and Canada. Origi ...

at various locations in the state's

South West The points of the compass are a set of horizontal, radially arrayed compass directions (or azimuths) used in navigation and cartography. A compass rose is primarily composed of four cardinal directions—north, east, south, and west—each sepa ...

. Jones eventually became state president of the Amalgamated Timber Workers' Union, and was involved in a number of industrial disputes in that capacity.Dennis (Joseph) Jones
– Biographical Register of Members of the Parliament of Western Australia. Retrieved 5 January 2017. In May 1907, he and two others (one of whom was MP John Holman) were convicted of illegally aiding a strike, and issued heavy fines. Jones first attempted to enter parliament at the 1908 state election, winning Labor

preselection Preselection is the process by which a candidate is selected, usually by a political party, to contest an election for political office. It is also referred to as candidate selection. It is a fundamental function of political parties. The presele ...

for the seat of Sussex. However, he withdrew prior to the election to concentrate on his work with the union, and was replaced by William Thomas (who was defeated). In March 1910,

Peter O'Loghlen Peter Joseph O'Loghlen (1883 – 25 October 1971) was an Irish Fianna Fáil politician. A publican, he was first elected to Dáil Éireann as a Teachta Dála A Teachta Dála ( , ; plural ), abbreviated as TD (plural ''TDanna'' in Irish, T ...

, the Labor member for the seat of Forrest, resigned from parliament to contest the 1910 federal election. Jones was selected as O'Loghlen's replacement, and won the resulting by-election unopposed. However, O'Loghlen's bid for federal parliament was unsuccessful, and Jones resigned from parliament in June 1910 to allow him to resume his seat, after just over three months in office. Jones did not make another run for parliament until 1923, when he unsuccessfully contested the by-election occasioned by O'Loghlen's death. He was one of three candidates, all of whom were endorsed by the Labor Party."The Forrest Seat."
''The West Australian'', 8 December 1923. He also ran in the seat of Nelson at the 1927 state election, but lost to Jack Smith of the Nationalist Party. Jones moved to

Greenbushes Greenbushes is a timber and mining town located in the South West region of Western Australia. The 2021 population was 365. History Greenbushes was founded as a mining town in 1888 following a surveyor's discovery of tin in 1886. Greenbushes wa ...

in 1928, where he lived until his death in 1936 (aged 61). He had married Alice Dowell in 1914, with whom he had two daughters.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Jones, Dennis 1874 births 1936 deaths Australian Labor Party members of the Parliament of Western Australia Trade unionists from Western Australia Members of the Western Australian Legislative Assembly People from Victoria (state) Timber industry in Western Australia 20th-century Australian politicians