Hon Don Dunstan AC QC

Donald (Don) Allan Dunstan AC QC

21 September 1926

Australian Labor Party

Former Member

Norwood

House of Assembly

07 March 1953

Donald Allan Dunstan was born in 1926 in Suva, Fiji. He moved with his family to Adelaide and after the completion of a Law Degree at Adelaide University he went on to practise law in Fiji before returning to South Australia. As a member of the Labor Party he entered the House of Assembly in 1953 for the seat of Norwood. After Labor's victory in the 1965 election he served as Attorney-General, Minister for Social Welfare and Minister for Aboriginal Affairs in the Walsh government.

Dunstan became Premier of South Australia in 1967 following Walsh's resignation from the post. The Labor Party lost the 1968 election to the Liberals but regained power in 1970 after Steele Hall's alteration of previously malproportioned electoral boundaries. Dunstan became Premier, also taking on the roles of Treasurer and the portfolios of Industrial and Mining Development, Housing, Town and Country Planning and Tourism. Dunstan and his government proceeded to implement a program of massive reform, the consequences of which markedly changed South Australia's political, socio-economic and cultural landscape, with implications for Australia as a whole.

Between the years of 1970 and 1979 the Dunstan government was responsible for policy initiatives in the following areas: incentives for new and small business, industries, tourism and the arts; an increase of government funds for public education, health, transport, housing, aged care, welfare and community services; the introduction of legislation relating to consumer protection, workers compensation, building and construction regulation, women's rights, sex discrimination, racial discrimination, Aboriginal land rights, censorship, juvenile justice, and environmental protection; the abolition of capital and corporal punishment. His influence on the life style of many South Australians was even more far reaching. South Australia's current eminence in the food and wine industries is widely attributed to his championing of a new style of eating that took advantage of the eclectic mix of cultures and the climate of South Australia.

Dunstan resigned from politics in 1979 due to ill health. He went on to head the Victorian Tourism Commission, was the National chair of Community Aid Abroad and chair of the Mandela Foundation and President of the Movement for Democracy in Fiji. Dunstan ran a critically acclaimed Adelaide restaurant, and resided in Norwood, South Australia.

A bust of Dunstan, by artist Janette Moore, unveiled in 2001, is displayed in Parliament House.

06 February 1999