Members of the public service had previously not been eligible to stand as candidates without first resigning.

Under these changes, they could stand while a state employee, and if successful in winning a seat, would have a leave of absence while sitting as an MP.

Ministerialists were a group of members of parliament who supported a government in office but were not bound by tight party discipline.

Ministerialists represented loose pre-party groupings who held seats in state parliaments up to 1914.

Such members ran for office as independents or under a variety of political labels but saw themselves as linked to other candidates by their support for a particular premier or government.