Ray Groom
Encyclopedia
Raymond John "Ray" Groom, AO (born 3 September 1944) is a lawyer and former Australia
n sportsman and politician, representing the Liberal Party
in the Federal Parliament
1975–84 and the Tasmanian Parliament
1986–2001. He was a Federal and state minister for a total of 13 years. He was Premier of Tasmania from 1992 to 1996 and also served as Deputy Premier and Attorney-General.
, a suburb of Melbourne
. His family moved to Tasmania
when he was a young child. He attended schools in both Tasmania and Victoria
.
in Tasmania with the Cooee Football Club commencing at 16 years of age. He represented the North Western Football Union and Tasmania before joining the Melbourne Football Club
in 1963. He played 96 senior games with Melbourne from 1963 to 1968 at centre half forward, as a ruck rover and at centre half back. On Ron Barassi
's retirement, Groom was invited by Melbourne coach Norm Smith
to wear the club's prized Number 31 guernsey. He represented Victoria and won the Keith 'Bluey' Truscott Medal
as Melbourne's Best and Fairest player in 1968. Groom later represented Tasmania at the 1969 Australian Rules National Carnival in Adelaide.
selection squad.
from the University of Melbourne
in 1967 he practised as a barrister
and solicitor
in Melbourne
and later in Tasmania
. He was a partner in the Tasmanian firm of Crisp, Hudson & Mann and appeared regularly in the Supreme Court of Tasmania
on trial and appeal matters and the Magistrates Courts.
seat of Braddon
in 1974
at the age of 29 but was unsuccessful. In 1975
he ran for and won Braddon, and held it until 1984. His 1975 election result was significant in that as a Liberal candidate he outpolled a Labor
opponent on the West Coast of Tasmania, the first time this had ever occurred. In the 1974 and 1983 Australian federal elections, he achieved the largest swing of any Liberal candidate in the nation. Between the election of 1974 and his last election in 1983, the Liberal vote in Braddon increased from 38% to 63%.
He served in the second Fraser Ministry
as Minister for Environment, Housing and Community Development
from December 1977 to December 1978 and then Minister for Housing and Construction
until November 1980.
He retired from the Australian Parliament immediately prior to the 1984 election.
to Hobart
at the end of 1984 and he was then appointed senior advisor to the Tasmanian Premier Robin Gray
.
In 1986 he re-entered politics as a member for Denison
in the Tasmanian House of Assembly
, topping the poll in that electorate. He immediately became the Minister for Forests, Mines and Sea Fisheries. From November 1988 to June 1989 he was Deputy Premier of Tasmania. In 1991, while in opposition, he defeated Gray to become Leader of the Parliamentary Liberal Party.
After that election the Liberal Party lost its majority and the Australian Labor Party
refused to enter into any agreement with the Australian Greens
, so the Liberals were forced into a minority government. Groom resigned as leader of the party and was replaced by Tony Rundle
. He remained in Parliament until 2001, serving as Attorney-General, Minister for Tourism and Minister for Workplace Standards until the 1998 election, when the Rundle Government was defeated.
Since retiring from parliament, he has practised as a barrister
and solicitor
and as an arbitrator and mediator. He was appointed a Deputy President of the Australian Administrative Appeals Tribunal
in 2004 and continues in that position. He is currently a member of the Tribunal's Executive Deputy Presidents Committee and the Practice and Procedure Committee.
Honours of 2010, he was appointed an Officer (AO) of the Order of Australia
.
is currently a member of the Tasmanian Parliament.
Australia
Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...
n sportsman and politician, representing the Liberal Party
Liberal Party of Australia
The Liberal Party of Australia is an Australian political party.Founded a year after the 1943 federal election to replace the United Australia Party, the centre-right Liberal Party typically competes with the centre-left Australian Labor Party for political office...
in the Federal Parliament
Parliament of Australia
The Parliament of Australia, also known as the Commonwealth Parliament or Federal Parliament, is the legislative branch of the government of Australia. It is bicameral, largely modelled in the Westminster tradition, but with some influences from the United States Congress...
1975–84 and the Tasmanian Parliament
Parliament of Tasmania
The Parliament of Tasmania consists of the Tasmanian Legislative Council, Tasmanian House of Assembly and the Monarch represented by the Governor of Tasmania....
1986–2001. He was a Federal and state minister for a total of 13 years. He was Premier of Tasmania from 1992 to 1996 and also served as Deputy Premier and Attorney-General.
Early life
Ray Groom was born in ElsternwickElsternwick, Victoria
Elsternwick is a suburb in Melbourne, Victoria, Australia, 9 km south-east from Melbourne's central business district. Its Local Government Area is the City of Glen Eira...
, a suburb of Melbourne
Melbourne
Melbourne is the capital and most populous city in the state of Victoria, and the second most populous city in Australia. The Melbourne City Centre is the hub of the greater metropolitan area and the Census statistical division—of which "Melbourne" is the common name. As of June 2009, the greater...
. His family moved to Tasmania
Tasmania
Tasmania is an Australian island and state. It is south of the continent, separated by Bass Strait. The state includes the island of Tasmania—the 26th largest island in the world—and the surrounding islands. The state has a population of 507,626 , of whom almost half reside in the greater Hobart...
when he was a young child. He attended schools in both Tasmania and Victoria
Victoria (Australia)
Victoria is the second most populous state in Australia. Geographically the smallest mainland state, Victoria is bordered by New South Wales, South Australia, and Tasmania on Boundary Islet to the north, west and south respectively....
.
Australian rules football career
He initially played senior Australian rules footballAustralian rules football
Australian rules football, officially known as Australian football, also called football, Aussie rules or footy is a sport played between two teams of 22 players on either...
in Tasmania with the Cooee Football Club commencing at 16 years of age. He represented the North Western Football Union and Tasmania before joining the Melbourne Football Club
Melbourne Football Club
The Melbourne Football Club, nicknamed The Demons, is an Australian rules football club playing in the Australian Football League , based in Melbourne, Victoria....
in 1963. He played 96 senior games with Melbourne from 1963 to 1968 at centre half forward, as a ruck rover and at centre half back. On Ron Barassi
Ron Barassi
Ronald Dale Barassi, Jr AM is a former Australian rules football player and coach. During a long and decorated career, Barassi has been one of the most important figures in the history of Australian football. His father, Ron Barassi, Sr., was the first Australian footballer killed at Tobruk during...
's retirement, Groom was invited by Melbourne coach Norm Smith
Norm Smith
Norman Walter "Norm" Smith was an Australian rules football player and coach in the Victorian Football League. After 200 games as a player with Melbourne and Fitzroy, Smith began a twenty year coaching career, including a fifteen year stint at Melbourne...
to wear the club's prized Number 31 guernsey. He represented Victoria and won the Keith 'Bluey' Truscott Medal
Keith 'Bluey' Truscott Medal
The Keith 'Bluey' Truscott Memorial Trophy is awarded to the Melbourne Football Club player judged Best and Fairest for the season.It is named in honor of Keith 'Bluey' Truscott, a former dual premiership player and World War II fighter ace killed in 1943....
as Melbourne's Best and Fairest player in 1968. Groom later represented Tasmania at the 1969 Australian Rules National Carnival in Adelaide.
Athletics
He won state titles in both Tasmania and Victoria as a sprinter and long jumper. in 1962, at 17 years of age, he represented Tasmania at the National Athletics Championships in Sydney, was a nationally ranked athlete and was chosen as a member of the Australian Commonwealth GamesCommonwealth Games
The Commonwealth Games is an international, multi-sport event involving athletes from the Commonwealth of Nations. The event was first held in 1930 and takes place every four years....
selection squad.
Early legal career
After obtaining a Bachelor of LawsBachelor of Laws
The Bachelor of Laws is an undergraduate, or bachelor, degree in law originating in England and offered in most common law countries as the primary law degree...
from the University of Melbourne
University of Melbourne
The University of Melbourne is a public university located in Melbourne, Victoria. Founded in 1853, it is the second oldest university in Australia and the oldest in Victoria...
in 1967 he practised as a barrister
Barrister
A barrister is a member of one of the two classes of lawyer found in many common law jurisdictions with split legal professions. Barristers specialise in courtroom advocacy, drafting legal pleadings and giving expert legal opinions...
and solicitor
Solicitor
Solicitors are lawyers who traditionally deal with any legal matter including conducting proceedings in courts. In the United Kingdom, a few Australian states and the Republic of Ireland, the legal profession is split between solicitors and barristers , and a lawyer will usually only hold one title...
in Melbourne
Melbourne
Melbourne is the capital and most populous city in the state of Victoria, and the second most populous city in Australia. The Melbourne City Centre is the hub of the greater metropolitan area and the Census statistical division—of which "Melbourne" is the common name. As of June 2009, the greater...
and later in Tasmania
Tasmania
Tasmania is an Australian island and state. It is south of the continent, separated by Bass Strait. The state includes the island of Tasmania—the 26th largest island in the world—and the surrounding islands. The state has a population of 507,626 , of whom almost half reside in the greater Hobart...
. He was a partner in the Tasmanian firm of Crisp, Hudson & Mann and appeared regularly in the Supreme Court of Tasmania
Supreme Court of Tasmania
The Supreme Court of Tasmania is the highest State court in the Australian State of Tasmania. In the Australian court hierarchy, the Supreme Court of Tasmania is in the middle level, and is able to both receive appeals from lower courts, and able to be appealed from.The ordinary sittings of the...
on trial and appeal matters and the Magistrates Courts.
Federal politics
Groom first stood for the House of RepresentativesAustralian 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 Braddon
Division of Braddon
The Division of Braddon is an Australian Electoral Division in Tasmania.The division was created in 1955 to replace the abolished Division of Darwin, and is named for Sir Edward Braddon, a Premier of Tasmania and one of Tasmania's five original federal MPs...
in 1974
Australian federal election, 1974
Federal elections were held in Australia on 18 May 1974. All 127 seats in the House of Representatives, and all 60 seats in the Senate were up for election, due to a double dissolution...
at the age of 29 but was unsuccessful. In 1975
Australian federal election, 1975
Federal elections were held in Australia on 13 December 1975. All 127 seats in the House of Representatives, and all 64 seats in the Senate were up for election following a double dissolution of both Houses....
he ran for and won Braddon, and held it until 1984. His 1975 election result was significant in that as a Liberal candidate he outpolled a Labor
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...
opponent on the West Coast of Tasmania, the first time this had ever occurred. In the 1974 and 1983 Australian federal elections, he achieved the largest swing of any Liberal candidate in the nation. Between the election of 1974 and his last election in 1983, the Liberal vote in Braddon increased from 38% to 63%.
He served in the second Fraser Ministry
Second Fraser Ministry
The Second Fraser Ministry was the fifty-second Australian Commonwealth ministry, and ran from 22 December 1975 to 20 December 1977.Liberal Party of Australia–National Country Party Coalition-Cabinet:*Rt Hon Malcolm Fraser, MP: Prime Minister...
as Minister for Environment, Housing and Community Development
Minister for the Environment, Heritage and the Arts (Australia)
The current Australian Minister for Sustainability, Environment, Water, Population and Communities is Tony Burke, who took over from Peter Garrett . The Minister and department change took effect in the Second Gillard Ministry on 14 September 2010...
from December 1977 to December 1978 and then Minister for Housing and Construction
Minister for Housing (Australia)
The Australian Minister for Social Housing and Homelessness is Mark Arbib, who was appointed on 14 September 2010, following the Labor Party's win at the 2010 election...
until November 1980.
He retired from the Australian Parliament immediately prior to the 1984 election.
State politics
He and his family moved from BurnieBurnie, Tasmania
- Sport :Australian rules football is popular in Burnie. The city's team is the Burnie Dockers Football Club in the Tasmanian State League.Rugby union is also played in Burnie. The local club is the Burnie Rugby Union Club. They are the current Tasmanian Rugby Union Statewide Division Two Premiers...
to Hobart
Hobart
Hobart is the state capital and most populous city of the Australian island state of Tasmania. Founded in 1804 as a penal colony,Hobart is Australia's second oldest capital city after Sydney. In 2009, the city had a greater area population of approximately 212,019. A resident of Hobart is known as...
at the end of 1984 and he was then appointed senior advisor to the Tasmanian Premier Robin Gray
Robin Gray (Australian politician)
Robin Trevor Gray is a former Australian politician who was Premier of Tasmania from 1982 to 1989. A Liberal, he was elected Liberal state leader in 1981 and in 1982 defeated the Labor government of Harry Holgate on a policy of "state development," particularly the building of the Franklin Dam, a...
.
In 1986 he re-entered politics as a member for Denison
Division of Denison
The Division of Denison is anAustralian Electoral Division in Tasmania.The division was created in 1903 and is named for Sir William Denison, who was Lt-Governor of Van Diemens Land 1847-55...
in the Tasmanian House of Assembly
Tasmanian House of Assembly
The House of Assembly, or Lower House, is one of the two chambers of the Parliament of Tasmania in Australia. The other is the Legislative Council or Upper House...
, topping the poll in that electorate. He immediately became the Minister for Forests, Mines and Sea Fisheries. From November 1988 to June 1989 he was Deputy Premier of Tasmania. In 1991, while in opposition, he defeated Gray to become Leader of the Parliamentary Liberal Party.
Tasmanian Premier
Groom became Premier of Tasmania after leading the Liberals to victory in the 1992 state election. During the 1996 election, Groom promised he would only govern in majority.After that election the Liberal Party lost its majority and the Australian 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...
refused to enter into any agreement with the Australian Greens
Australian Greens
The Australian Greens, commonly known as The Greens, is an Australian green political party.The party was formed in 1992; however, its origins can be traced to the early environmental movement in Australia and the formation of the United Tasmania Group , the first Green party in the world, which...
, so the Liberals were forced into a minority government. Groom resigned as leader of the party and was replaced by Tony Rundle
Tony Rundle
Anthony Maxwell Rundle AO was the Premier of the Australian State of Tasmania from 18 March 1996 to 14 September 1998. He succeeded Ray Groom and was succeeded himself by Jim Bacon. He is a Liberal who held the seat of Braddon between 1986 and 2002. A former journalist, he is married to...
. He remained in Parliament until 2001, serving as Attorney-General, Minister for Tourism and Minister for Workplace Standards until the 1998 election, when the Rundle Government was defeated.
Life after politics
Groom is actively involved in community affairs and has been a chairman/director of several community organisations since retiring from politics. He is currently Chairman of Southern Cross Care Tasmania and Southern Cross Care Australia.Since retiring from parliament, he has practised as a barrister
Barrister
A barrister is a member of one of the two classes of lawyer found in many common law jurisdictions with split legal professions. Barristers specialise in courtroom advocacy, drafting legal pleadings and giving expert legal opinions...
and solicitor
Solicitor
Solicitors are lawyers who traditionally deal with any legal matter including conducting proceedings in courts. In the United Kingdom, a few Australian states and the Republic of Ireland, the legal profession is split between solicitors and barristers , and a lawyer will usually only hold one title...
and as an arbitrator and mediator. He was appointed a Deputy President of the Australian Administrative Appeals Tribunal
Administrative Appeals Tribunal
The Administrative Appeals Tribunal is an Australian tribunal which provides for quasi-judicial review of administrative decisions by the Australian federal government. It is not a court and not part of the Australian court hierarchy, however its decisions are subject to review by the Federal...
in 2004 and continues in that position. He is currently a member of the Tribunal's Executive Deputy Presidents Committee and the Practice and Procedure Committee.
Honours
In the Australia DayAustralia Day
Australia Day is the official national day of Australia...
Honours of 2010, he was appointed an Officer (AO) of the Order of Australia
Order of Australia
The Order of Australia is an order of chivalry established on 14 February 1975 by Elizabeth II, Queen of Australia, "for the purpose of according recognition to Australian citizens and other persons for achievement or for meritorious service"...
.
Personal life
He is married to Gillian Crisp and they have four sons and two daughters. One of his sons Matthew GroomMatthew Groom
Matthew Groom is an Australian politician. He has been a Liberal Party of Australia member for Denison in the Tasmanian House of Assembly since 2010...
is currently a member of the Tasmanian Parliament.