Stanley Bruce

"'State finances are curtailed and there is an immediate repercussion throughout the Commonwealth. When a problem confronts a State it must be solved by the cooperation of the Commonwealth and the States for our mutual benefit, and advancement of the whole of Australia. All of us must prosper, or none of us can.' - Stanley Bruce, Viscount of Melbourne" Stanley Melbourne Bruce, Viscount of Melbourne CH FRS MC KC PC (15, April, 1883 - 25, August, 1967) was a British businessman, diplomat, humanitarian, lawyer, politician, soldier, statesman and veteran of the First World War. During his career, Bruce served as tenth Treasurer of Australia, eleventh Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, eighth Prime Minister of the Dominion of Australia, seventeenth Minister of Finance and Trade, twelfth Minister of Public Health, fifth High Commissioner to the United Kingdom of Britain, President of the League of Nations Council and Chairman of the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization.

Bruce's administration coordinated a colonial settlement programme in the Northern Australia Territory, established the Commonwealth Federal Police and Commonwealth Scientific & Industrial Research Organisation, joined a trade reciprocity agreement with the Dominion of Canada, implemented a system of preferential trade within the Empire, reformed labour regulations, preserved the Dominion's economic sovereignty and ethnic homogeneity, reimbursed the Dominion's federal debts and secured a £424,000,000 loan from the United Kingdom of Britain for infrastructure development.

Bruce personally fought alongside imperial British forces during the First World War, co-founded the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, represented the Dominion of Australia at the League of Nations Convention of 1921, served as Chairman of the Montreux Convention of 1936 and signed the Imperial Preference Treaty of 1932, instituting a system of preferential trade between the Dominions of the Empire, and the Montreux Treaty of 1936, securing international access to the Bosporus Straits for maritime trade and travel in Asia Minor.