Len Reid Politician

Leonard Stanley Reid DFC (21 September 1916 – 22 April 2003) was an Australian fighter pilot and politician, representing the Liberal Party of Australia as a member of the Victorian Legislative Assembly and the Australian House of Representatives.Reid served as a fighter pilot in both the Royal Australian Air Force and on attachment to the Royal Air Force during the Second World War, and was awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross on 4 December 1942. After the war, he ran a dairy farm in Cranbourne, Victoria before being elected to the Electoral district of Dandenong at the 1958 Victorian state election. Reid served as the member for Dandenong for 11 years before resigning his seat to contest the newly created federal Division of Holt, which covered much of the same area as Dandenong, at the 1969 Federal Election. Reid won narrowly, but was defeated at the 1972 Federal Election partly due to the swing that ousted the McMahon government and partly due to demographic changes which saw Dandenong develop as a major industrial centre. Whilst a member of the lower House he crossed the floor and voted with the Labor Party or abstained from voting.Len Reid was avidly connected with people who were marginalised in society and actively concentrated on the poor in India and Bangladesh. His publications included Crusade against Death. He played an important roll with the charity "For Those Who Have Less".Reid married Joan Averill Swallow, daughter of Leonard Swallow and his wife Dorothy Comyn in 1946. She was the niece of Hugh Comyn and William Leslie Comyn. They had children Virginia and Roger.