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He finished a distant third on the primary vote, with 22.8 percent behind former Liberal and Country League Premier Richard Layton Butler and Labor challenger Sydney McHugh.
He finished a distant third on the primary vote, with 22.8 percent behind former Liberal and Country League Premier Richard Layton Butler and Labor challenger Sydney McHugh.
Quirke and the other independent in the legislature, Tom Stott held the balance of power at the 1962 election. They both provided confidence and supply to the Playford Liberal and Country League (LCL) as a minority government in the hung parliament, allowing Playford to remain in power for what would be his final term. Stott became Speaker of the South Australian House of Assembly following the election.
In 1963 Quirke ceased being an independent, joined the LCL, and served in the Playford LCL ministry in the portfolios of Irrigation, Lands, and Repatriation until the LCL lost government at the 1965 election.
A farmer and soldier prior to entering politics, Quirke contested the normally safely conservative federal seat of Wakefield in a 1938 by-election as an independent. However, on the second count, almost 83 percent of his preferences flowed to McHugh, enough for McHugh to decisively defeat Butler with 56 percent of the two-party vote.