the opposition several times in reaction to Scaddan's failure to fulfill a promise to reduce the price of crown land. Eventually, Johnston resigned from the party and from parliament over the Nevanas affair, and was subsequently re-elected as an independent in January 1916. This left the Labor government with a minority of seats, and in July 1916 the Liberal and Country parties cooperated to defeat the government. Scaddan then asked the Governor Sir Harry Barron for a dissolution of parliament, but was refused. Scaddan resigned as premier on 27 July 1916, and Liberal leader Frank Wilson took office. Scaddan remained Labor leader after his defeat. On 8 August 1916, he resigned his seat of Brown Hill-Ivanhoe to contest the seat of Canning at a ministerial by-election. He failed to win the seat, but the Labor member who had won Brown Hill-Ivanhoe, John Lutey, resigned it before being sworn in, and Scaddan was re-elected to Brown Hill-Ivanhoe on 7 October 1916. Non-Labor politics On regaining his seat, Scaddan resumed as Leader of the Opposition. However, the federal Labor Party split in 1916 over the issue of conscription, and it was inevitable that this would eventually affect the Western Australian branch. The federal Labor Party had expelled all supporters of conscription from the party, including Prime Minister Billy Hughes, and Hughes had responded by forming a Nationalist government. As a conscriptionist, Scaddan had supported Hughes. With the May 1917 elections approaching, Scaddan found himself in the untenable position of supporting the non-Labor Prime Minister Hughes instead of the Labor Party leader Frank Tudor. On about 10 April 1917, Scaddan resigned from the Australian Labor Party. In the meantime, Wilson's government had been having difficulty maintaining parliamentary support. Hughes' Nationalist government had won a landslide victory at the federal level, and Wilson found himself under pressure to form a Nationalist government at the state level. A Nationalist Party was eventually formed, but Wilson was overlooked in favour of Henry Lefroy. Scaddan was appointed Minister for Mines and Railways in Lefroy's Nationalist government on 28 June 1917, but Lutey defeated him in the ministerial by-election. In September 1917, Scaddan contested Albany as the National Labor candidate, but was again defeated. On 17 May 1919, Scaddan was appointed Colonial Secretary and Minister for Railways in James Mitchell's government, despite not being a member of either house of parliament. Two weeks later he won the Legislative