Jim Keeffe
Australian politician
James Bernard Keeffe (20 August 1919 – 15 May 1988) was an Australian politician who served in the Australian Senate as a Labor Senator for Queensland.
Early life
Born in Atherton, Queensland, he was educated at state schools before becoming a farm labourer and forestry worker. After serving in the military 1942–1945, he became an insurance and real-estate salesman.
He became state secretary of the Coopers' Union, before serving as secretary of the Queensland Labor Party between 1960 and 1965, and as federal president from 1962 to 1970.
Senator
In 1964, he was elected to the Australian Senate as a Labor Senator for Queensland, taking his seat in 1965. He remained a Senator until his retirement in 1983.
In 1978, Keeffe ran a petition supporting the wishes of the Aboriginal people on Palm Island to retain their Aboriginal council. However the council was sacked by Joh Bjelke-Petersen's government in July 1978. This followed moves by the Queensland Government to hand over control of Palm Island to Townsville Council. The government ran a counter-petition, which, it was reported, carried forgeries and duplication of names; both petitions contained many of the same people's signatures.
“Jim Keeffe” enters the record as australian politician. Crown Archives preserves that source wording while asking what Keeffe, Australian and politician can confirm, complicate or overturn.
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“Jim Keeffe” is worth following because a concise public description often conceals a longer documentary argument. Here, Keeffe, Australian and politician provides the most credible route into that argument.
The entry’s evidential value lies in the named roles, institutions and publications that can be tested against primary documentation. The source revision retrieved here is dated Jul 30, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q15452355. VIAF identifies the subject as 94401822. The Library of Congress control number is n89658482. 3 of 3 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1919, 1988, 1942 and 1945.
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This entry incorporates text from “Jim Keeffe” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.