Albert Royle Henry (11 June 19061 January 1981) was the first Premier of the Cook Islands and the founder and first leader of the Cook Islands Party (CIP). First elected Premier in August 1965, he was unseated in the aftermath of the 1978 election after an electoral petition found he had committed electoral fraud. He was later stripped of his knighthood. Early life Henry was born in Rarotonga to an Aitutaki family, and was educated on Aitutaki. At the age of 13 he won a scholarship to New Zealand, but was unable to take it up because he was too young. His parents paid for him to attend St Stephen's College, a boarding school in Auckland, New Zealand. On returning to Rarotonga in 1923 he worked as a student teacher, and then as acting headmaster at Ararua school on Aitutaki. He resigned from teaching when the colonial administration decided to cut his pay, then worked for trading company A.B. Donald. In 1936 he founded a newspaper, Te Akatauira ("Morning Star"). In 1942 he moved to Auckland, where he worked as an agricultural worker and a bus driver. In 1945 he became secretary of the Auckland branch of the Cook Islands Progressive Association. He was a leading figure in the CIPA and drew up its program demanding higher wages, improved shipping, a Cook Islands representative in the New Zealand Parliament, fully elected islands councils, an elected federal islands government, and the abolition of the Resident Commissioner's power to veto legislation. He helped organise the CIPA's industrial campaign in the Cook Islands, and later, its cooperative shipping venture. After the failure of the CIPA he worked at various jobs, including as an interpreter for Cook Islanders in New Zealand courts, while studying economics and philosophy. He later became secretary of the Brown's Bay branch of the New Zealand Labour Party. He also established the Cook Islands – NZ Society, and Polynesian Agencies, a Cooperative trading company. Political career Henry returned to the Cook Islands in March 1964 at the invitation of the remnant of the CIPA, the Industrial Union of Workers and the co-operative movement. On his arrival the three groups agreed to unite, leading to the formation of the Cook Islands Party. He was elected party president in July 1964. A three-year residential requirement meant that he could not stand for the legislative Assembly, so his sister Marguerite Story ran in