Sturt was an electoral district of the Legislative Assembly in the Australian state of New South Wales in the Broken Hill area. It was a single member electorate from 1889 to 1920. In 1920 it was combined with Cobar and Willyama to create a three-member electorate, elected by proportional representation. At the time it was one of the largest electoral districts in the world, said to be 121,000 square miles, with votes having to be brought sometimes 500 miles by the primitive transportation of the time to the central counting place. But proportional representation pundits as far as away as Canada revelled in STV's successful implementation under such conditions. In 1927, it became a single member electorate, but was renamed Broken Hill in 1968. It was recreated in 1971, but abolished in 1981.
On 22 March 1921 Percy Brookfield was murdered while trying to disarm a deranged man at Riverton. Between 1920 and 1927 the Legislative Assembly was elected using a form of proportional representation with multi-member seats and a single transferable vote. The Parliamentary Elections Act, provided that casual vacancies were filled by the next unsuccessful candidate "who represents the same party interest as the late member". Which party interest Brookfield represented was not straightforward. He had been the Labor member for Sturt since the 1917 by-election, however he resigned from the Labor Party in August 1919, and joined the Industrial Socialist Labor Party, which in January 1920 merged with the Socialist Labor Party, retaining the later name. Under this banner Brookfield was the first candidate elected at the 1920 election for Sturt. He was however dissatisfied with the manner in which the affairs of that party have been carried on" and formed a new Industrial Labor Party in February 1921, shortly before his death. There was debate concerning who should be appointed. The Industrial Labor Party said that John O'Reilly should be appointed, while The Sydney Morning Herald stated that Thomas Hynes had the greater number of primary votes and thus he should be appointed. The nomination had to come from the recognised party leader according to votes on any censure motion and Labor leader John Storey nominated Jabez Wright.
