unbury so he could contest the seat of Swan in the first federal election. On 29 March 1901 Forrest was elected to the first Australian Parliament where he remained until he resigned due to cancer in March 1918.
On 6 February 1918, Forrest was informed that he was to be raised to the British peerage as Baron Forrest of Bunbury in the Commonwealth of Australia and of Forret in Fife in the United Kingdom. Forrest died on 2 September 1918 while travelling to London, to receive treatment and hoping to take his seat in the House of Lords. However no Letters patent were issued before his death, so the peerage was not officially created. According to Rubinstein (1991), "his peerage is not mentioned or included in Burke's Peerage, The New Extinct Peerage, the Complete Peerage, or any other standard reference work on the subject
