Editing Gerrymandering (section)

====Queensland====
{{Main|Bjelkemander}}
In the state of [[Queensland]], malapportionment combined with a gerrymander under [[National Party of Australia – Queensland|Country Party]] Premier Sir [[Joh Bjelke-Petersen]] (knighted by [[Queen Elizabeth II]] at his own request) became nicknamed the [[Bjelkemander]] in the 1970s and 1980s.<ref>{{cite journal|last1=Orr|first1=Graham D.|last2=Levy|first2=Ron|title=Electoral Malapportionment: Partisanship, Rhetoric and Reform in the Shadow of the Agrarian Strong-Man|journal=[[Griffith Law Review]]|year=2009|volume=18|issue=3|pages=638–665|ssrn=1579826|doi=10.1080/10854659.2009.10854659|s2cid=145695031}}</ref>

The malapportionment had been originally designed to favor rural areas in the 1930s-1950s by a [[Australian Labor Party|Labor]] government who drew their support from agricultural and mine workers in rural areas. This helped Labor to stay in government from 1932 to 1957. As demographics and political views shifted over time, this system came to favor the Country Party instead.

The Country Party led by [[Frank Nicklin]] came to power in 1957, deciding to keep the malapportionment that favored them. In 1968, Joh Bjelke-Petersen became leader of the Country Party and [[Premier of Queensland|Premier]]. In the 1970s, he further expanded the malapportionment and gerrymandering which then became known as the ''Bjelkemander''. Under the system, electoral boundaries were drawn so that rural electorates had as few as half as many voters as metropolitan ones and regions with high levels of support for the Labor Party were concentrated into fewer electorates, allowing Bjelke-Petersen's government to remain in power for despite attracting substantially less than 50% of the vote. One district had non-contiguous parts.

In the [[1986 Queensland state election|1986 election]], for example, the [[National Party of Australia|National Party]] received 39.64% of the first preference vote and won 49 seats (in the 89 seat Parliament) whilst the Labor Opposition received 41.35% but won only 30 seats.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://elections.uwa.edu.au/elecdetail.lasso?keyvalue=801|title=Parliament of Queensland, Assembly election, 1 November 1986|author=Australian Government and Politics Database|access-date=17 July 2013|archive-date=12 March 2017|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170312175630/http://elections.uwa.edu.au/elecdetail.lasso?keyvalue=801}}</ref> Bjelke-Petersen also used the system to disadvantage [[Liberal Party of Australia|Liberal Party]] (traditionally allied with the Country Party) voters in urban areas, allowing Bjelke-Petersen's Country Party to rule alone, shunning the Liberals.

Bjelke-Petersen also used Queensland Police brutality to quell protests, and Queensland under his government was frequently described as a [[police state]]. In 1987 he was eventually forced to resign in disgrace after the [[Fitzgerald Inquiry]] revealed wide-ranging corruption in his cabinet and the Queensland Police, resulting in the prosecution and jailing of Country Party members. Before resigning, Bjelke-Petersen asked the Governor of Queensland to sack his own cabinet, in an unsuccessful attempt to cling to power. Labor won the next election, and have remained the dominant party in Queensland since then. The Country Party and Liberal Party eventually merged in Queensland to become the [[Liberal National Party of Queensland|Liberal-National Party]], while the Country Party in other states was renamed as the National Party.