Margaret Anne Hickey (born 16 October 1946) is a former Australian politician. She represented the

electoral division of Barkly Barkly is an electoral division of the Legislative Assembly in Australia's Northern Territory. It was first created in 1974, and is named after the Barkly Tableland area, which occupies much of the electorate. Barkly is a rural electorate, cover ...

for the Labor Party in the

Northern Territory Legislative Assembly The Legislative Assembly of the Northern Territory is the unicameral legislature of the Northern Territory of Australia. The Legislative Assembly has 25 members, each elected in single-member electorates for four-year terms. The voting method f ...

from 1990 to 2001. She was Leader of the Opposition from 1996 to 1999. Hickey was born in Surrey, England and emigrated to Australia with her husband in 1975. She was a librarian prior to entering politics. In the 1980s, Hickey was a strident campaigner against a proposed toxic waste incinerator in

Tennant Creek Tennant Creek ( wrm, Jurnkkurakurr) is town located in the Northern Territory of Australia. It is the seventh largest town in the Northern Territory, and is located on the Stuart Highway, just south of the intersection with the western termin ...

that was supported by local MLA and Chief Minister

Ian Tuxworth Ian Lindsay Tuxworth (18 June 1942 – 21 January 2020) was an Australian politician, who was Chief Minister of the Northern Territory of Australia from 17 October 1984 until his resignation on 10 May 1986. Early life Tuxworth was born on 18 J ...

from 1984 onwards. She was a member of the Labor Party up until her resignation about six months before the 1987 election, having become disillusioned with a number of stances of the local party branch. At the 1987 election, she challenged Tuxworth, who by this stage had been ousted as Chief Minister and left the governing

Country Liberal Party The Country Liberal Party of the Northern Territory (CLP) is a centre-right political party in Australia's Northern Territory. In local politics it operates in a two-party system with the Australian Labor Party (ALP). It also contests federal ...

for the rival

Northern Territory Nationals The Northern Territory Nationals were a political party active in the Northern Territory in the late 1980s. The party was not affiliated with the National Party of Australia, whose NT affiliate was the Country Liberal Party. The party was howev ...

, as an

independent Independent or Independents may refer to: Arts, entertainment, and media Artist groups * Independents (artist group), a group of modernist painters based in the New Hope, Pennsylvania, area of the United States during the early 1930s * Independ ...

candidate. She was defeated by only nineteen votes, and overturned the result in the Court of Disputed Returns, which found that the Labor candidate had been unqualified to stand. Hickey contested the ensuing by-election as the Labor candidate, but was again defeated by Tuxworth. She contested Barkly again at the 1990 election. A redistribution ahead of that election made Barkly notionally Labor. Tuxworth believed this made Barkly unwinnable, and unsuccessfully tried to switch to the seat of Goyder. This allowed Hickey to take the seat on a large swing. On 16 April 1996, Opposition Leader Brian Ede resigned as territory Labor leader, and Hickey, who had been Ede's deputy, was elected the new leader. Her term as leader saw her deal with Labor's response to the government's controversial

mandatory sentencing Mandatory sentencing requires that offenders serve a predefined term for certain crimes, commonly serious and violent offenses. Judges are bound by law; these sentences are produced through the legislature, not the judicial system. They are inst ...

laws, largely cited as a factor in the CLP's landslide win at the 1997 election, disputes over

native title Aboriginal title is a common law doctrine that the land rights of indigenous peoples to customary tenure persist after the assumption of sovereignty under settler colonialism. The requirements of proof for the recognition of aboriginal title, ...

, and the 1998 statehood referendum. In August 1998, she defeated a leadership challenge by Syd Stirling with a margin of six votes to one. She ardently opposed federal Labor's restrictions on expanding uranium mining, condemning both the "three mines" and "no new mines" policies. On 2 February 1999, Hickey announced that she was resigning as Labor leader and Opposition Leader in order to spend more time with her husband who had been diagnosed with a brain tumour. She stated that she would remain as the member for Barkly in the Assembly until the next election, and

Clare Martin Clare Majella Martin (born 15 June 1952) is a former Australian journalist and politician. She was elected to the Northern Territory Legislative Assembly in a shock by-election win in 1995. She was appointed Opposition Leader in 1999, and won ...

was elected to succeed her as party leader the next day. Asked about her resignation in 2002, following her successor Martin's landmark 2001 election victory, Hickey stated that she had no regrets about the decision. After retiring from parliament in 2001, Hickey moved to

Adelaide Adelaide ( ) is the capital city of South Australia, the state's largest city and the fifth-most populous city in Australia. "Adelaide" may refer to either Greater Adelaide (including the Adelaide Hills) or the Adelaide city centre. The dem ...

, where she studied visual arts at the

University of South Australia The University of South Australia (UniSA) is a public research university in the Australian state of South Australia. It is a founding member of the Australian Technology Network of universities, and is the largest university in South Australi ...

.James, Melinda
Election wash-up
''Stateline'' (ABC TV), 24 June 2005.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Hickey, Maggie 1946 births Living people Members of the Northern Territory Legislative Assembly Australian Labor Party members of the Northern Territory Legislative Assembly Women members of the Northern Territory Legislative Assembly English emigrants to Australia Leaders of the Opposition in the Northern Territory 21st-century Australian politicians 21st-century Australian women politicians