Joseph Benedict "Ben" Chifley (; 22 September 1885 – 13 June 1951) was an Australian politician who was the 16th Prime Minister of Australia from 1945 to 1949. He became Leader of the Labor Party on the death of John Curtin, and went on to retain a majority in both Houses of the Australian Parliament at the 1946 election, before his government was defeated at the 1949 election. The radical reforming nature of the Chifley Government was such that, between 1946 and 1949, the Australian Parliament passed 299 Acts, a record up until then, and well beyond the previous record of the Labor Government of Andrew Fisher, which passed 113 Acts from 1910 to 1913.