A by-election

By-election

A by-election is an election held to fill a political office that has become vacant between regularly scheduled elections....

was held for the Australian House of Representatives

Australian House of Representatives

The House of Representatives is one of the two houses of the Parliament of Australia; it is the lower house; the upper house is the Senate. Members of Parliament serve for terms of approximately three years....

 seat of Wide Bay

Division of Wide Bay

The Division of Wide Bay is an Australian Electoral Division in Queensland. The division was one of the original 75 divisions contested at the first federal election...

on 11 December 1915. This was triggered by the resignation of former Labor Party

Australian Labor Party

The Australian Labor Party is an Australian political party. It has been the governing party of the Commonwealth of Australia since the 2007 federal election. Julia Gillard is the party's federal parliamentary leader and Prime Minister of Australia...

 Prime Minister

Prime Minister of Australia

The Prime Minister of the Commonwealth of Australia is the highest minister of the Crown, leader of the Cabinet and Head of Her Majesty's Australian Government, holding office on commission from the Governor-General of Australia. The office of Prime Minister is, in practice, the most powerful...

 and MP Andrew Fisher

Andrew Fisher

Andrew Fisher was an Australian politician who served as the fifth Prime Minister on three separate occasions. Fisher's 1910-13 Labor ministry completed a vast legislative programme which made him, along with Protectionist Alfred Deakin, the founder of the statutory structure of the new nation...

.

The by-election was won by Commonwealth Liberal Party

Commonwealth Liberal Party

The Commonwealth Liberal Party was a political movement active in Australia from 1909 to 1916, shortly after federation....

 candidate Edward Corser

Edward Corser

Edward Bernard Cresset Corser was an Australian politician. Born in Birmingham, England, he was educated at Worcester and migrated to Australia in 1864. He was a sugar worker and bank officer in Maryborough in Queensland, eventually becoming a businessman. In 1909, he was elected to the Queensland...

 by 43 votes, after the party previously did not contest the seat at the 1914 federal election

Australian federal election, 1914

Federal elections were held in Australia on 5 September 1914. All 75 seats in the House of Representatives, and all 36 seats in the Senate were up for election in a double dissolution...

 — instead, the seat was contested by independent candidate John Austin, on 35.7 percent of the vote. Voting was not compulsory in 1915.

Results