Victor Bruce Sullivan (7 December 1918 – 29 January 1993) was a member of the

Queensland Legislative Assembly The Legislative Assembly of Queensland is the sole chamber of the unicameral Parliament of Queensland established under the Constitution of Queensland. Elections are held every four years and are done by full preferential voting. The Assembly h ...

Biography

Sullivan was born in Launceston, Tasmania, the son of James Bruce Sullivan and his wife Julia Ellen (née Brown). He was educated at

Downlands College , motto_translation = Strong in Faith , city = Toowoomba , state = Queensland , country = Australia , coordinates = , type = Private, secondar ...

Toowoomba Toowoomba ( , nicknamed 'The Garden City' and 'T-Bar') is a city in the Toowoomba Region of the Darling Downs, Queensland, Australia. It is west of Queensland's capital city Brisbane by road. The urban population of Toowoomba as of the 2021 ...

and on leaving school became a grain, beef, pork, and lamb farmer. He served in the

Second Australian Imperial Force The Second Australian Imperial Force (2nd AIF, or Second AIF) was the name given to the volunteer expeditionary force of the Australian Army in the Second World War. It was formed following the declaration of war on Nazi Germany, with an initia ...

as an attachment to the U.S. forces and was engaged in the movement of troops and supplies in

New Guinea New Guinea (; Hiri Motu: ''Niu Gini''; id, Papua, or , historically ) is the world's second-largest island with an area of . Located in Oceania in the southwestern Pacific Ocean, the island is separated from Australia by the wide Torr ...

.Motion of Condolence
–

Hansard ''Hansard'' is the traditional name of the transcripts of parliamentary debates in Britain and many Commonwealth countries. It is named after Thomas Curson Hansard (1776–1833), a London printer and publisher, who was the first official prin ...

. Retrieved 14 May 2016. On 8 April 1948 Sullivan married Gwenneth Joan Becker and together had a two sons and a daughter. His daughter died in 1970 in an automobile accident. He died from a heart attack while surfing at

Caloundra Caloundra ( ) is a coastal town and the southernmost town in the Sunshine Coast Region in South East Queensland, Australia. Geography Caloundra is north of the Brisbane central business district. Caloundra is accessible from Landsborough ...

in January 1993.

Public career

At the

1960 Queensland state election Elections were held in the Australian state of Queensland on 28 May 1960 to elect the 78 members of the state's Legislative Assembly. The election followed the enactment of the ''Electoral Districts Act 1958'' which increased the Assembly from ...

, Sullivan won the seat of Condamine for the Country Party, defeating the sitting member,

Les Diplock Leslie Frank Louis "Les" Diplock Companion of the Order of St Michael and St George, CMG (16 September 1899 – 6 November 1983) was an Australian politician. Diplock was born in South Brisbane to house-painter Louis Diplock and Louisa May ...

of the

Queensland Labor Party The Queensland Labor Party (QLP) was a political party of Queensland, Australia formed in 1957 by a breakaway group of the then ruling Labor Party Government after the expulsion of Premier Vince Gair. In 1962 the party became the Queensland se ...

. He had a long career in the Queensland Parliament and retired at the 1983 Queensland state election. In July 1982 he and fellow National Party member and ministerial colleague, Ken Tomkins, were involved in a scandal that came to be known as the Melbidir affair. They were on a tour in the government vessel the ''Melbidir'' to examine the conditions of Aboriginal communities in the Torres Strait islands when they were photographed from a plane flying overhead leisurely fishing from the vessel. Both men were reluctantly forced to resign from cabinet with Sullivan sitting on the back bench for the rest of his political career. Sullivan didn't mind a drink and during the motion of condolence for him in the parliament in 1993, Tom Burns, the then

Deputy Premier of Queensland The deputy premier of Queensland is a role in the Government of Queensland assigned to a responsible Minister in the Australian state of Queensland. It has second ranking behind the premier of Queensland in Cabinet, and its holder serves as act ...

, reminisced about the time Sullivan fell asleep while giving a speech in the parliament. At one stage he was mooted to take over as

Premier of Queensland The premier of Queensland is the head of government in the Australian state of Queensland. By convention the premier is the leader of the party with a parliamentary majority in the unicameral Legislative Assembly of Queensland. The premier is ap ...

from

Joh Bjelke-Petersen Sir Johannes Bjelke-Petersen (13 January 191123 April 2005), known as Joh Bjelke-Petersen, was a conservative Australian politician. He was the longest-serving and longest-lived premier of Queensland, holding office from 1968 to 1987, during ...

and served as the Acting Premier when both the Premier and Deputy Premier were overseas in 1982. He held several portfolios in the ministry including: * Minister for Lands and Forests 1968–1972 * Minister for Primary Industries 1972–1974 * Minister for Primary Industries and Fisheries 1974–1975 * Minister for Primary Industries 1975–1980 * Minister for Mines and Energy 1980 * Minister for Commerce and Industry 1980–1982

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Sullivan, Victor Bruce Members of the Queensland Legislative Assembly 1918 births 1993 deaths National Party of Australia members of the Parliament of Queensland 20th-century Australian politicians Australian Army personnel of World War II