Charles Cutler

Lieutenant-Colonel Sir Charles Benjamin Cutler, (20 April 1918 – 23 September 2006) was an Australian politician, holding office for 28 years as an elected member of the New South Wales Legislative Assembly for Orange. Cutler was Country Party leader for sixteen years and became Minister for Education and Deputy Premier for ten years under Premiers Robert Askin and Tom Lewis.

Early life Charles Cutler was born in Forbes, New South Wales, in 1918, the son of George Cutler and Elizabeth Booth Cutler. His cousin, Sir Arthur Roden Cutler, was a Victoria Cross recipient and a long-serving Governor of New South Wales. Charles' ministerial service including as Deputy Premier commenced the year before his cousin's appointment as governor, meaning that Charles was in the cabinet that recommended Roden as governor to the Queen and that later Charles was sworn in as a minister in by his governor cousin. At an early age, Charles moved to the nearby regional city of Orange with his family, where he was educated at Orange Rural School and Orange High School. After completing his schooling he gained employment from 1934 until 1939 as an office worker with the Producers Co-Operative Distributing Society Limited of Orange.

Military service Cutler joined the Citizen Military Forces (CMF) in 1938 and served in the Second World War. He volunteered for the Second Australian Imperial Force in 1940 and served with the 2/17th Battalion at Tobruk and in Syria. He was wounded at El Alamein.

On 13 May 1965, he became Deputy Premier, Minister for Education and Minister for Science under the newly elected Liberal Party Premier Robert Askin, in NSW's first non-Labor government in 24 years. In later years, he also held portfolios as Minister for Local Government, Minister for Highways and Minister for Tourism. For several months in 1968 and 1972, he was Acting Premier and Treasurer in Askin's absence.

On 1 January 2001, Cutler was awarded the Centenary Medal for service to Australian society through parliament.