Lang Labor

The faction broke away to form separate parliamentary parties on several occasions and stood competing candidates against the ALP in state and federal elections.

He reached national prominence during the Great Depression by opposing the economic policies of James Scullin's federal ALP government.

Led by Jack Beasley, the Lang Labor members in federal parliament formed a separate party and in November 1931 voted to bring down the Scullin Government.

Lang Labor candidates ran against the official ALP at the 1931 and 1934 federal elections, and at its peak the faction held nine out of 74 seats in the House of Representatives.

In 1940, he and his supporters left the ALP for a second time, forming the Non-Communist Labor Party as an explicitly anti-communist body.

He served a single term in the House of Representatives from 1946 to 1949, while the last Lang Labor MPs in the Parliament of New South Wales were defeated in 1950.

Particular areas of contention were the establishment of a Government Insurance Office and Lang's role in an attempt to increase the party's parliamentary majority through the appointment of Alick Kay as the consumer's representative on the Metropolitan Meat Board.

Conflict within the caucus culminated in a leadership challenge in October 1926 by Peter Loughlin, Lang's deputy leader.

However, the ALP caucus that was elected was firmly under Lang's control, ensuring that he would dominate NSW Labor for the next 12 years.

[1] Most of the Lang members had ultra-safe working class seats and survived, although Ward was narrowly defeated in East Sydney.

This led some members of caucus, including Bob Heffron, to break away to form the Industrial Labor Party.

[4] Many of his old supporters such as Eddie Ward remained loyal to Australian Labor Party leader John Curtin, and Lang candidates polled poorly.

In 1943, having published newspaper articles attacking McKell (NSW's Premier since 1941) and Prime Minister John Curtin, Lang was expelled from the ALP and restarted the Australian Labor Party (Non-Communist).

Although Fowler and Chris Lang were both re-elected in the 1947 NSW election, they were defeated in 1950, leading to the party essentially being defunct.