Why I remain a New England New Stater 8 - the electricity asset grab

Note to readers: This post is one in a series using personal examples to illustrate why I continue to support both agitation for New England self-government and self-government itself. Agitation, because its very existence forces forces the Sydney Government to consider New England interests. Self-government, because there are some things that we cannot achieve without this.

The Sydney media has been full of the Sydney Government's plans to privatise the NSW electricity system. I have very mixed feelings on this one. I suspect that it is both inevitable and desirable. But it also rubs raw a past wound.

Back in the nineteen nineties, electricity distribution was controlled by country councils, some of whom also had generation capacity. The Sydney Government put forward a reform program for the electricity sector.

At the time I was running a consulting business out of Armidale. I was also chair of Tourism Armidale. In the first role, I was interested in the electricity sector as a possible consulting marketplace. In the second, I was interested in the New England County Council as a source of tourism funding.

As part of market scoping I looked at the official Government material on the proposed reforms. Essentially these involved folding the distributors into larger corporatised entities. Two justifications were advanced.

The first lay in the national restructuring of the sector, including introduction of competition and the creation of a national electricity marketplace. This, it was argued, required larger entities. Smaller entities could not compete.

The second justification lay in enhanced efficiency. According to the NSW Treasury, the existing country councils were not subject to proper disciplines to earn returns on the assets they held. So consolidation and corporatisation would increase revenues while benefiting consumers.

Now I had problems with these arguments at the time. The New England County Council was owned by local councils and was formed through the acquisition of Council assets. Its growth had been funded by surpluses plus borrowings. The State had controlled and guaranteed those borrowings, but to my knowledge had never contributed a dollar of funding.

As part of its development, the NECC had built its own small hydro power station. This had been funded by its consumers through higher electricity prices, significantly higher than the state average. This investment had reached pay-back time. The NECC was quite profitable, generating funds for local projects, while its electricity prices were some of the cheapest in NSW.

Local concerns across NSW about the plans, about the Sydney Government's grab for assets, were ignored. So what happened?

The first thing that the Sydney Government did was to increase borrowing against the assets, thus generating cash for its own purposes. The second thing was to strip money out through dividends, creating more cash for its own purposes.

In the drive for efficiency, many jobs were cut, in cases such as linemen over cut, creating later shortages that impeded efficiency. There was also underinvestment.

Did consumers benefit? This is hard work out accurately. Certainly bigger industrial users did.

Did the original local owners of the assets benefit? Almost certainly not in the case of NECC. The area lost higher level jobs, plus access to the surplus that had been available to fund local activities. I also suspect that local electricity prices have increased more than the state average simply because they were low to begin with.

Would self-government have prevented this asset grab? Perhaps not, because the Sydney Government's approach was in part part of a broader trend in public administration. But we would have had a much higher certainty of local benefit since funds would have been spent within New England, not sucked away to help fund the inefficiencies of the broader NSW system.

Return to introductory post

Story of the Northern Separation or New England New State Movement

In recent times I have noticed a quite remarkable increase in interest in the New England New State Movement. Half of the ten most recent searches have been on this topic.

To IP 58...., Mr Whitlam was a member of the Federal Parliamentary Constitutional Review Committee with David Drummond. This Committee recommended changes to the constitution to make the creation of new states easier. In regard to your second search on the New England Movement I have a fair bit of material covering the whole movement from the early colonial period.

The same advice applies to IP c211-30... who was also searching on the New England Movement.

To IP c211-30... who was searching on the Cohen Royal Commission, I can give you the full history here.

More broadly, my own support for separation will be clear from this blog. However, that does not prevent me supplying objective historical information. If you have questions or want info as to sources, please leave a comment.

Postscript

Thinking about it further, perhps the most useful thing that I might do is to put up some more historical material on the New England history blog. I have been slow in posting material to this blog because of the time pressures on me, so far really only starting to sketch out a blog structure.

I will add a further postscript when I have put something up.

Why I remain a New England New Stater 7 - the case of the big river

Note to readers: This post is one in a series using personal examples to illustrate why I continue to support both agitation for New England self-government and self-government itself. Agitation, because its very existence forces forces the Sydney Government to consider New England interests. Self-government, because there are some things that we cannot achieve without this.

Once upon a time there was a big river. Rising in what is now called the New England Tablelands, it wound its way from the mountains to the sea.

To the area's original Aboriginal inhabitants, it was a great resource, giving them access to riverine and maritime resources. The European invaders attracted by land and resources such as timber were also struck by its size - they called it the big river. They founded towns and villages along its length. Grafton, the valley's capital, became a major inland port and one of the four biggest towns in New England.

Early on the valley's people became unhappy. They complained that all the revenue from land sales -a major source of revenue - was spent in the colonial capital of Sydney. They launched an independence movement to establish a new colonial government in Northern NSW. This died down, although they did extract some concessions.

Inland, the new Great Northern Railway snaked its way north, attracting freight. Worried, Grafton's civic leaders agitated for a railway to service the valley's hinterland. This agitation failed many times.

Federation and the new century saw local discontents reach another head.

Following the decision of the Sydney Government to stop the ferry service that linked the two parts of Grafton across the river, a local doctor launched a protest campaign that quickly turned into a new independence campaign for the North. War intervened, but then the campaign resumed centered on the North Coast Development League. This quickly created a sister league inland, laying the base for sustained agitation throughout much of the twentieth century for Northern independence within the Federation.

In 1967 the valley voted for independence from NSW. The overall vote was no because a sustained anti-campaign by the Labor Party led to a very strong no vote in its Newcastle stronghold.

The independence movement went into decline. As it did, so did the valley. What was not properly recognised at the time was that the very existence of the separation movement with its broader linkages was central to political recognition.

Today the river still flows. But the valley itself is much diminished.

Now counted as part of the Mid North Coast instead of the major element in what was called the Northern Rivers, squeezed between the growth of Coffs Harbour in the south and Richmond in the north, the valley has become a postscript.

I find this sad.

Return to introductory post

Sir William Walkley, Ampol and the New England New State Movement

I was doing some research on the Walkley Awards. Named after Sir William Walkley, the Walkleys are Australia's top journalism awards. This reminded me of a New England linkage and a possible explanation to something that has always puzzled me.

Born in New Zealand, Sir William founded what would become Ampol Petroleum. Now how does this link to New England and our fight for self government?

In 1961, the New England New State Movement launched Operation Seventh State, a major fund raising campaign to support a new self government drive. I acted as an usher at the launch, wearing my first ever suit borrowed from my Uncle Jim.

Our target was to raise 100,000 pounds, a very large sum in those days. We were successful, leading to a very major campaign culminating in the 1967 self government vote.

As part of the campaign, the Movement decided to mount a major car drive on Sydney. The aim was to flood Sydney with thousands of demonstrators in the domain matched by press advertising. Because it was a car drive, the decision was also taken to swamp parking spots around the Domain even though this would incur fines.

The drive was organised with military precision by a team headed by General MacDonald from Wallabadah Station as marshall. This was my second New State demonstration - I organised the first at the request of ABC Four Corners to provide them with some TV footage - and I thoroughly enjoyed it. But that's another story.

So what's the linkage with Ampol? While we were asked not to talk about it, and no-one did, Ampol provided free petrol. As I remember it, the company also offered to pay the parking fines.

The thing that has puzzled me? The Australian Soccer Federation acted to separate New England from NSW, creating a Northern NSW State League. I never knew how this happened. Now that I have read Sir William's ADB entry and learned of his connection with soccer, I suspect that I have the answer.

Why I remain New England New Stater 6 - conflicts in NSW tourism branding

Note to readers: This post is one in a series using personal examples to illustrate why I continue to support both agitation for New England self-government and self-government itself. Agitation, because its very existence forces forces the Sydney Government to consider New England interests. Self-government, because there are some things that we cannot achieve without this.

In my first post on tourism, the strange case of Cockington Green, I set out my frustrations at our inability to get proper visitor data as compared to, say, the ACT. This post extends my argument by looking at Tourism NSW.

NSW's size and variety, it's lack of cohesion, makes it hard to promote as a tourist destination. To manage this, Tourism NSW (we are all very much into business speak) has two defined brands, Brand Sydney and Brand NSW.

Tourism NSW describes Brand Sydney in this way:

Sydney is a world city – outward looking, influencing and interpreting global trends. Yet it’s clearly distinct from other global cities, and it epitomises Australia’s exuberant spirit. Sydney’s image is a virtual “brand”, offering powerful benefits for tourism, for business and for attracting investment not just to NSW but to Australia as a whole. While many private and government organisations contribute to the development of Sydney’s image, the custodian of Brand Sydney is Tourism NSW.

At another point Tourism NSW says:

Tourism NSW implements two Brand Sydney campaigns each year, supported by ongoing publicity for the city and its precincts, products and events. These brand campaigns offer tactical promotion and publicity opportunities for the tourism industry and other partners.

It adds:

Tourism NSW promotes Sydney with multi-million dollar marketing and advertising campaigns. The tagline - There's no place in the world like Sydney - sums up the core advertising proposition.

The second brand is Brand NSW. Brand NSW is described in this way:

The proximity to Australia’s biggest city, and the extraordinarily varied experiences a visitor can find in regional NSW, make this an appealing holiday destination. Furthermore, a holiday in regional NSW abounds with opportunities to connect with nature, history and heritage.

What a second run thing. Operators across regional NSW complain, mainly in private, about the focus.

Think I am being unfair? Please visit the Tourism NSW web site and tell me what you think.

My view is that New England needs its own brand if it ever going to attract visitors in its own right. Otherwise, it is just too fragmented.

Best results would be obtained through statehood. But even a revived New State Movement would help by forcing Sydney to listen.

Return to introductory post

Why I remain a New England New Stater 5 - the case of Tasmania

Note to readers: This post is one in a series using personal examples to illustrate why I continue to support both agitation for New England self-government and self-government itself. Agitation, because its very existence forces forces the Sydney Government to consider New England interests. Self-government, because there are some things that we cannot achieve without this.

As I write the Federal election is raging. As always, Tasmania is receiving a fair bit of attention. And cash. Senator Harradine showed what could be done to extract benefits for a state from a position of power

New England is far bigger than Tasmania, yet receives almost no attention. Not for us the Harradine largess .

This is a very clear case where statehood would improve our position through increased bargaining power.

Now one could argue - I have often heard this argument - that Tasmania should not receive these benefits. That is small consolation to those concerned with New England and its neglect.

Return to introductory post

Why I remain a New England New Stater 4 - Cockington Green

Note to readers: This post is one in a series using personal examples to illustrate why I continue to support both agitation for New England self-government and self-government itself. Agitation, because its very existence forces forces the Sydney Government to consider New England interests. Self-government, because there are some things that we cannot achieve without this.

When I was chair of Tourism Armidale, we set ourselves the target of doubling visitor spend to the city and surrounding regions. To do this, we needed to increase visitor numbers and the amount that people spent while visiting. Increasing the average length of stay was critical to the second.

During my time as chair there were a number of examples that I could use as illustrations in this series. This post deals with one, visitor statistics.

Effective planning starts with data about the current position. While out core focus was on the domestic Australian marketplace, we were also interested in international visitors. Here we found almost no usable information at all. The only New England data available was aggregated data on the Hunter and Coffs Habour.

When we investigated this, we found that the international visitor data was based on surveys and that, as part of this, each state or territory was allowed to nominate (from memory) twelve attractions for inclusion in the survey. New England got two of the twelve.

By contrast, Cockington Green (a miniature village in the ACT) was identified as an attraction in its own right. So we had very little information for an entire region, while the ACT obtained information on a relatively small local attraction.

There was no way to overcome this problem other than paying for our own survey, something that we could not afford as a community organisation. Any additional New England inclusions in the exiting system required a Sydney attraction to be dropped, and that was not going to happen.

This type of problem was replicated time and time again during my time as chair and still holds today. Clearly this is a case where self-government would have been a major help since the state of New England would have had its own section in the survey, including twelve attractions.

Return to introductory post

Why I remain a New England New Stater 3 - the conservation laboratory case

More than twenty years ago I was involved in moves to establish a conservation laboratory in Armidale.

I thought that this was a pretty good idea. New England records were rotting away. It was expensive to send them to Sydney. Why not create some local infrastructure?

To make this work, we had to get some economies of scale. Not a problem, I thought. We will treat it as a New England lab servicing the broader New England area including the Hunter, North Coast and Western Slopes and Plains. Those in Newcastle might still prefer to use Sydney because it was closer than Armidale, but overall we should get sufficient scale.

The then conservationist at the New England Regional Art Museum carefully explained that the existing labs in Sydney were underutilised. There was no way the NSW Government would fund an extra lab in those circumstances.

But, I said, New England people are not using this service because of cost and distance. That does not matter, I was told. Looking at it from a state perspective, you cannot justify a new facility when existing ones are underutilised. The idea ultimately died.

Would a New England New State Movement have helped? Probably, because it would have given us additional political strength to overcome the Sydney problem.

Return to introductory post.

Why I remain a New England New Stater 2- Industry Representation

All Government's use advisory bodies of one type or another to provide external input. While the strength of those bodies varies, collectively they have a significant impact on the development of policy.

Recognising that economic activity across NSW varies, one might expect that New Englanders would have membership of those bodies roughly proportional to population. However, it does not work that way.

A number of years ago I was asked by the national president of an industry association to put forward some names for consideration by the NSW Government for membership of a particular body. The aim was to get broader representation.

I deliberately put forward some names from regional NSW, including a New Englander. The New Englander was head of a firm in a new industry area that had been developing an international reputation.

All the names were rejected by the NSW Government Department on the simple, practical grounds that selection of people from outside Sydney would create greater administrative difficulties and also increase costs through payments for travel and accommodation.

Fair enough, perhaps. But this decision had two effects. First, it meant that there was no regional input at all into what was meant to be a body advising on the state as a whole. Secondly, it cost those I nominated the chance to build a broader reputation.

In broad terms, Governments appoint those that they know. Yes, there are now all sorts of policies and procedures intended to ensure fair and representative treatment in appointments. Yet the reality is that the really hard part is to get that first appointment.

This is an example of a systemic weakness, one that compounds with time.

Would New State agitation help? Yes, because it would force Governments to look at ways of accommodating New England representation.

Back to introductory post.

Why I remain a New England New Stater 1 - Introduction

I was asked the other day why I still pursued the dream for New England Statehood. I know that time has moved against me. But I still think that this is the only way to control our future in a meaningful sense.
Let me take a simple, practical, if disguised example.

Note to reader: Upon reflection, I have removed the example because I felt uncomfortable that it might be recognised even though disguised. I will use some other examples in later posts to make the point.

Still later: I have decided to use this post as an introductory post for a series of short posts using a range of examples to explain why I think that New England's future really depends upon the renewal of agitation for self government, the reactivation of the New England New State Movement.

At one level it does not matter whether we get self-government or not, although that remains my personal aspiration. In simple political terms, the very existence of new state agitation forces Governments to recognise and respond to New England needs in a way that does not presently happen.

The examples that I will use are all drawn from my own experience. They show the often unseen ways in which existing structures work against New England interests. Longer term reforms cannot be achieved without changing those structures. In the short term, political pressure can force responses from existing structures.

Some of the examples will seem small, even trivial. But it is the overall pattern that I want to draw out, because the cumulative effects are not trivial in the slightest.

Posts in the series:

• Why I remain a New England New Stater 2 - Industry Representation
• Why I remain a New England New Stater 3 - the conservation laboratory case
• Why I remain a New England New Stater 4 - Cockington Green
• Why I remain a New England New Stater 5 - the case of Tasmania
• Why I remain a New England New Stater 6 - conflicts in NSW tourism branding
• Why I remain a New England New Stater 7 - the case of the big river
• Why I remain a New England New Stater 8 - the electricity asset grab
• Why I remain a New England New Stater 9 - the price of neglect
• Why I remain a New England New Stater 10 - the sad case of Newcastle
• Why I Remain a New England New Stater 11 - capturing local talent
• Why I remain a New England Stater 12 - frustrations with New England tourism
• Why I remain a New England New Stater 13 - the fallacy of the NSW economy
• New States and Ontario
• Sydney's 1995 electricity heist

New England New State Movement - consolidated posts linked to the fight for New England self government

Graphic: New England New State Movement Anthem, National Library

We will raise the banner of New England
Work for New England,
Fight for New England
We will raise the battle cry of freedom
Fight for our Liberty
Part of the New England Anthem

Way up in the north of Northern NSW
There is a new state movement that's sort of on the go
But what will be the capital of this new state of ours?
That is the burning question that's being worrying them for hours
Will it be in Armidale, Tamworth or Bendameer?
Or will it be in Grafton the place where they make beer?
Song, University of New England Student Review, 1960s

I was browsing Wikedpia and I found a talk section on the New England New State Movement. I also found two of my blogs including this one listed as not suitable for citation but as a useful entry point for source material.

I added some information, and then thought that my own writing on the New England New State Movement is all over the place in terms of blogs and post topics. I have been meaning to put up a Wikipedia page on the movement, there is not one at present, but it would sensible to do something about consolidating my own stuff first.

My own biases on this matter will be clear. I was a member of the Movement and was in fact on the Executive for a period representing the University of New England New State Society. I remain a strong supporter of New England self government.

Since the Movement went into decline following the defeat at the 1967 plebiscite, its history and indeed that of New England itself has become lost. I believe that's a pity.

This post is intended to provide a consolidated entry point for my posts on the New England New State Movement. It is broken into two parts. The first simply provides a short overview of New England and the Movement. The second is an annotated list of posts broken up by topic.

I hope that the post is of some use to those interested in the topic. I will try to update from time to time.

The Snapshot

Name: New England was initially called Northern NSW, the North, the Northern Districts or the Northern Provinces. The name New England was originally the name of the Tableland area forming New England's core. The Tablelands are known as the Northern Tablelands, the New New England Tablelands or sometimes just the New England to distnguish them from the broader New England area.

The name New England was adopted for the whole area by the Northern Separation Movement at its 1931 Maitland convention. From there its usage spread, contracting again as the New State Movement went into decline after 1967.

Area: Because New England has never had a formal identity, its boundaries have varied with time. In broad terms, it covers the humid coastal strip from the Hunter Valley to the Queensland border, the New England Tablelands and the immediately adjoining Western slopes and Plains.

In economic and geographic terms, New England forms a natural unit that has survived to the present day. The modern TV aggregation boundaries, as an example, reflect the New England core.

In political terms,the boundaries have varied. The initial separation discussions excluded the Hunter, in part because of tensions between the industrial and mining heartland of the lower Hunter and the rest of the area. The problem with this is that Newcastle and the Hunter are a logical part of New England. The boundaries recommended by the 1935 report of the Nicholas Royal Commission into areas of NSW suitable for self-government included Newcastle and the Hunter. These boundaries were adopted by the New England New State Movement and used as the basis for the 1967 self-government referendum.

New State Agitation. The first separatist agitation occurred during colonial times at the the time of the separation of Queensland from NSW. While this was followed by outbreaks of agitation,these remained sporadic.

This changed in the twentieth century. Agitation began again at Grafton ltowards the end of the First World War led by Earle Page, a local doctor and later a prominent Australian politician. This was picked up a little later by Victor Thompson, editor of the Tamworth Northern Daily Leader who launched a sustained newspaper campaign that involved papers as far south as Cessnock in the lower Hunter. This led to the creation of a formal movement. One outcome was the 1924 Cohen Royal Commission into New States.

The Cohen Commission ruled against to the movement and it went into decline, resurging at the start of the depression. This forced another Royal Commission, the Nicholas Commission. While this recommended in favour, the movement was again in decline as economic conditions improved.

Agitation started again at the end of the Second World War and this time was sustained by permanent staff. In 1961 the movement launched Operation Seventh State, raising over 100,000 pounds. This allowed more staff and greater agitation, culminating in the 1967 referendum.

The no vote was led by the Labor Party who campaigned hard. The very high no vote in the Labor strongholds of Newcastle and the Lower Hunter offset the majority yes vote elsewhere, although the no margin was not high. Exhausted, the movement collapsed.

The Posts

Because of the importance of the topic to me, material about the separation movements and the New England self government cause can be found in many posts. I have tried to select posts that will give the interested reader an entry point. Uou will find the material somewhat fragmented. Looking at the posts reminded me just how many unfinished series and indeed incomplete posts I have.

Geography

New England's geography is central to its story because it both divided and provided a natural unity.

• Geography of New England - Introduction
• On Travel Time and Our Sense of Space. This post explores the relationship between travel modes and our perception of the world, taking New England in 1907 as a key example.
• Geography of New England - Impact of Great Dividing Range
• New England & Queensland - a truncated relationship
• Early European Settlement in New England. Geography, settlement and the formation of long-standing patterns.
• New England & Queensland - a further note

The Changing Definition of New England

As indicated in the introduction to this post, both the names used to describe New England and the meaning attached to New England itself has varied with time.

• New England's Boundaries
• The Changing Meaning of New England

Introduction to the History of New England

The history of Northern NSW has yet to be written, with the area squeezed between the state or national level on one side, the narrow regional or local on the other.

• New England Timelines
• Towards a Course on the History of New England - Introduction
• Towards a Course on the History of New England- The Colonial Period. Includes discussion of the influence of geography
• The Economic Basis of Traditional Aboriginal Life in New England. Part completed post, including discussion on geography.
• History of New England: the impact of transport costs. Fights for better transport form one of the enduring themes in New England's history. Drawing from Geoffrey Blainey, this post looks at the economics of transport.
• New England Australia - Railways Introduction also looks at the influence of transport, this time focused on railways.

Politics - historical

During the colonial period, New England politics was dominated by the Sydney based factional political system, with particular local manifestations. The emergence of the party political system saw the new Labor Party and the Progressive/Country Party compete for influence. Labor influence was strongest in Newcastle and the mining areas of the Lower Hunter, the Country Party came to dominate elsewhere. New England interests dominated the NSW Country Party.

In addition to the political parties, the separation movement exercised varying degrees of influence. There were close links between the separation movement and the Country Party in terms of leadership and aspirations, especially in the period between the wars. This added to Labor's opposition to separation.

Today the National Party (the name the Country Party came to take) is in serious decline in its previous New England heartland, in part because of the rise of the New England independents who better represent continuing local differences.

• The past is always present. A note on the Labor Party.
• The past is always present - the Country Party
• The past is always present: the Country Party continued
• Country Party - annotated bibliography

Separation Movements - history

From sporadic outbreaks in colonial times, the various separation movements came to represent a unique and powerful element in New England's history, creating common views across sectional and parochial interests.

• New England's Boundaries. Includes brief note on the colonial period.
• References Colonial Period New England New State Movement
• New England New State Movement - Reference Sources
• The New England New State Movement and Regional Movements in Australia 1

Current Politics

I have selected a few posts on current politics that contain information linking present and past.

• New England, Australia - State Electorates
• NSW Ten Year Plan - New England's needs
• Does the NSW Ten Year Plan meet New England's needs?
• NSW Ten Year Plan and New England - Conclusions
• NSW Elections 2015 - final Legislative Assembly results
• New England's Federal Electorates - Welcome Visitor 8,000
• New England Australia - Newcastle's decline
• Australia's Water Wars - Introduction
• The Clarence River and the Great Big Water Grab 2 - the issues
• New England Australia Demography - Stocktake of posts as at 28 September 2015
• Regional Variation and Australia's Aborigines
• Why I remain a New England New Stater 1 - Introduction. This is a series of short posts taking examples to show why I remain a new stater.
• Teasing Neil - but with a serious point compares the Sydney and New England Federal electorates.
• New England's Federal Electorates - Cowper
• New England - Federal Election Eve 2015: and the next day

New England Thought

New England developed its own forms of thinking conditioned by its geography and history.

• Sunday Essay - The beliefs of a New England populist
• Saturday Morning Musings - literature, locale and license
• Populism - the New England Tradition: Introduction
• Kansas, Thomas Frank, New England, Jim Belshaw
• Constitutional Change in Australia - the view from 1926: Introduction. This is the first post in a series taking the writings of David Drummond, the New England Movement's main constitutional writer, as a base.
• Constitutional Change in Australia - the view from 1926: Three streams of constitutional thought
• Constitutional Change in Australia - the view from 1926: Constitutional principles
• Water, new states and the intellectual poverty of current Australian discussions on Federalism

To be continued

Why I remain a New England New Stater 10 - the sad case of Newcastle

Note to readers: This post is one in a series using personal examples to illustrate why I continue to support both agitation for New England self-government and self-government itself. Agitation, because its very existence forces forces the Sydney Government to consider New England interests. Self-government, because there are some things that we cannot achieve without this.

I was listening to a radio discussion on the way home from work. A southern commentator compared the favourable treatment (and publicity) that cities like Hobart or Adelaide obtained compared to Newcastle. The reason given was that they were state capitals, whereas Newcastle was treated simply as an extension of Sydney.

I think it true that Newcastle is much neglected.

From the time the Hawkesbury rail bridge was opened to Sydney with rail freight rates set so as to attract freight from elsewhere in New England to Sydney, the city has suffered as Sydney's much smaller and poorer second cousin.

Would Newcastle have benefited from New England statehood, given that it would not have been capital? It is hard to argue otherwise. As New England's major city, Newcastle would necessarily have attracted attention and promotion in a way not possible in NSW.

In 1967 Newcastle voted no to self-government out of loyalty to the then Labor Party who opposed separation. I think that I would challenge those in Newcastle who opposed self-government in 1967 to name a single thing that Newcastle has gained since that the city would not have gained as part of New England.

Since 1967 Newcastle has declined in relative terms. The city is no longer as important or relevant as it was. Some of the decline has been due to broader causes such as industrial change. However, part of it is due to the way that Newcastle has been increasingly sidelined within NSW.

Return to introductory post.

Why I remain a New England New Stater 9 - the price of neglect

Note to readers: This post is one in a series using personal examples to illustrate why I continue to support both agitation for New England self-government and self-government itself. Agitation, because its very existence forces forces the Sydney Government to consider New England interests. Self-government, because there are some things that we cannot achieve without this.

It has been a little while since my last post in this series. I was reminded of the need to start again be a lunch time conversation here in Sydney. It was a work group.

The conversation turned to history. One remarked that the Welsh really just complained, while the Scots had sought independence for a long while. A second, that there had never been an Australian equivalent. I mentioned New England, but was cut off because (to the audience) it seemed odd and irrelevant. Yet the specific example I was giving went back in history to the point at which NSW was on the point of civil war.

Looking round the table, I realised that of the eight of us, only three were born in Australia. Of the three, one had New England links and was interested. Of the overseas born, none had had any access to any form of New England history.

Having one's personal history rejected as not important is obviously a pain. But there is a broader issue.

Those sitting around that table actually make decisions that affect New England. They all see New England in terms of a series of sub-regions with little understanding of the linkages between areas. They also see New England within a metro frame set by NSW statistical divisions and definitions.

There is nothing to force modern decision makers to consider the broader New England interest. Everything becomes fragmented.

In saying this, I am not in any way impugning the character of decision makers in NSW or nationally. Many care passionately about the things they work on. Yet the system they work in works against New England.

In a way we have created this position ourselves.

Since the decline of the New England New State Movement after the 1967 referendum loss, since New Englanders became locked into their narrow local or regional worlds, there has been nothing to force outsiders to consider us as other than a series of small and separate areas.

We cannot expect others to consider our broader needs if we cannot articulate and argue them ourselves.

Return to introductory post.

More UNE Passings - death of Jo Woolmington

Photo; Jo Woolmington, Mary White College, 1979

I was browsing around looking for information on the current floods in the North when I cam across some sad news, the death of Jo Woolimington (23-4-1927 to 6-12-2015 ).

The material that follows is largely drawn from John Farrell's obituary in the Armidale Express (27 December 2015). However, I have added my personal recollections to flesh the story out. You see, Jo spans many of the things that I have been talking about on this and other blogs.

Born Jean Clara Cox at Essex, England, on April 23, 1927, Jo was a daughter of working class parents, Edward and Rose Cox, and a sister of Avis, Fred, Patsy and Celia.

Her secondary schooling was at Paddington and Maida Vale High School in London during World War II, when Jo experienced first hand the Blitz and other war time conditions, including rationing.

Possessing a strong social conscience, John records that Jo was greatly influenced by her robust Christianity which urged believers to go beyond personal moral reform to promoting social reform, and she was a prominent advocate for social justice while qualifying as a teacher at Whitelands College, London.

She graduated in 1947, and the following year married Eric Richard Woolmington, a geographer. As I remember Jo's stories, it was a whirlwind romance that essentially took place over one weekend!

In 1949 .the couple emigrated to Australia where Jo taught in Sydney at Abbotsleigh and Ascham. In 1956, Eric accepted a lecturing position in the Geography Department at the University of New England and the family moved to Armidale where Jo became an active member of the community.

She was active in the Armidale Association for the Assimilation of Aborigines and with the UNE Women’s Association which acted on their concerns about the social and economic conditions and discrimination experienced by Aboriginal people.

With like-minded people Jo was active in promoting education, employment, health and housing for Aborigines in Armidale.

She also used her dramatic talents, being a co-founder of the University Players which would produce two major productions each year in the Armidale Town Hall. Her production of East Lynn was the first to use the stage machinery at the UNE Arts Theatre. I also think that she was active first in the Armidale Theatre Club.

I must have met Jo soon after they arrived in Armidale, because she became friendly with my mother and used to drop in at home for coffee. I thought her a nice person, although I knew Eric better. At that point Jo was very much a compatriot of my mother's in my mind.

John Farrell notes that Jo enrolled at UNE, studying English in 1963 and History in 1964, while simultaneously teaching at NEGS from 1964 to 1967.

Now I think that John's dates are not quite right here, for Jo did History I with me in 1963. One of our first if not the first assignments was to prepare a summary of some work by Gordon Childe on prehistory - Jo did hers in poetry!

From then on I had a lot to do with Jo as she switched from Mum's to my friend. This was an interesting period to be at UNE in general, almost a golden time in the History Department.

The Department was very strong indeed. Mick Williams was one Professor, Russell Ward a second. Among others, Ted Tapp was pursuing his thoughts on the philosophy of history, Len Turner on military history, while Isabel McBryde had begun her pioneering work on the Australian Aborigines.

As a part time student with a family and a job, Jo could not join in all the things that we full time students did, including spending much time at our table in the Union arguing religion, politics, life and society. But she was there a fair bit of the time.

In 1965 Jo offered her house for seminars for the third year history honours group. There in the back room with its open fire, we held our seminars on the American Revolution, often side-tracking into other topics. In 1966 we all did honours together. Somewhere I have a photo of our table at the 1967 Graduation Ball, including Jo.

I mentioned that at first I knew Eric better.

On Sunday 23 February 1958, the Belshaw Block at UNE burnt down. Poor Eric. His PhD thesis was due to be submitted the following day. All copies were stored in the Belshaw Block and all were lost.

He started again. His new topic was an examination of the geographical scope of support for the New England New State Movement. This was finally finished in 1963 and the degree awarded.

In 1961 I did geography honours for the Leaving Certificate, getting into the top group in the state. As part of this, I had to do a local study. Eric helped me here. But as a strong New England New Stater, I was also interested in his geographic analysis of the movement.

Eric's central thesis was that New England was a marchland area, an area of economic competition between Sydney and Brisbane. Using a variety of techniques, he attempted to measure the natural economic boundary and then compared this to the actual boundary. The natural economic boundary lay far to the south of the actual boundat. He suggested that this area of overlap, contested territory, represented the natural heart of the movement.

He then looked at a whole variety of measurements to test movement support, relating this to his original thesis. In doing so, he painted a very accurate picture of the voting patterns that were to happen four years later in the 1967 New State Plebescite.

Eric's thinking was very influential on my own work.

In my 1966 honours thesis on the economic basis of Aboriginal life in Northern NSW. I used his model to postulate that the Northern Tablelands were a marchland area between the powerful and expanding Kamilaroi to the west and the strong Northern Coast tribes.

Later, his work formed an integral element in my own analysis of New Engalnd history. It remains powerful today when I look at the economic fragmentation and decline of Northern New South Wales, despite its apparent natural advantages.

Eric was not a new state supporter. He thought the dream unachievable, some of the logic flawed. But as he said in 1967, nobody in their right mind should vote no because it was the only thing that forced Governments to consider New England interests in any integrated way. I fear that he was right.

At the time that I am writing about, Erica and Jo's marriage was breaking up and Eric would leave Armidale, dieing in 1995.

In 1968 Jo successfully applied for appointment as tutor in the History Department. By then, I was living in Canberra. However, on most of my regular visits back to Armidale I took time to visit her, sometimes meeting with others like Brian Harrison. In fact, the last time I saw Brian was at Jo's house.

In 1972 Jo took up an active role in the Women’s Electoral Lobby. I remember this well, because I ran for Country Party pre-selection for Armidale in that year. Jo therefore interviewed me in my new role as pre-selection candidate.

I actually supported WEL, but I also knew that Jo's support for the Labor Party verged on the theological.

After talking for a bit, I said: "Jo, no matter what I say in answer to your questions, am I right in thinking it doesn't matter so far as your vote is concerned?" She laughed and said "James, I think that's right." We proceeded on that basis.

In 1973 Jo became acting principal of Mary White College at UNE , and was the principal from 1978 to 1982. Here I came in contact with her again while back in Armidale as a postgraduate student.

Jo's sensitivity to the Aboriginal cause, and its ambivalent relationship with Christianity, focused her research for two decades on the Aboriginal situation and the state of religion in the first half of the 19th century.

In 1973 Jo published a book of collected documents, Aborigines in Colonial Society, 1788-1850, still an excellent resource for anyone studying in the field. Her PhD thesis, ‘Early Christian Missions to the Australian Aborigine: a study in failure’ was completed in 1979.

In 1985 Jo was appointed a lecturer, then senior lecturer. She tells her own story up to 1987 in a chapter in a book titled The New England Experience, edited by Margaret Ann Franklin.

Jo joined with Dr Bruce Mitchell in 1988 – the bicentennial of white settlement in Australia – to present the first course on the history of Aborigines and their interaction with whites.

In this last period I was back in Armidale yet again, this time running a consulting business. Busy with business and family, I saw far far less of her than I had in the past.

After retiring from UNE Jo remained in Armidale. The last time I saw her was by accident in the main street on a fleeting trip.

She is survived by her two children, Jonathan and Nicola, as well as some members of her own family. I will remember her.

Postcript

Gordon Smith kindly sent me a link to the obit on Jo on the UNE site. This presents the same picture, but provides more information on her role in Mary White College.

New England's Boundaries

In my last post I referred to the two definitions of New England, the name applied to the Northern Tablelands as compared to the boader area seeking self-government. The boundaries of the second have varied with time.

Moves to create a new state in Northern New South Wales date back to the separation of Queensland from New South Wales. Squatters in the then sparsely populated far north of New South Wales wanted to and indeed expected to be included in Queensland.

When the Sydney merchants persuaded the Government in London to shift the boundary north leaving them in New South Wales, the squatters argued instead for the creation of their own self-governing colony. This initial move died, but then surfaced again in the Clarence Valley driven in part by disputes over the way revenues from land sales were all being spent in Sydney.

The Scottish born clergyman John Dumore Lang played an active role in supporting these agitations. Lang had supported the agitation leading to the previous separation of first Victoria and then Queensland. Now he supported the northen NSW moves in part because it fitted with his vision of the future Federated States of Australia made up of a number of self-governing states each responsible for meeting direct local needs.

These agitations died away, but defined the colonial new state core of New England as the combination of the Northern Tablelands with the nearby Northern Rivers (the valleys of the Tweed, Richmond and Clarence Rivers), the mid North Coast as far south as the Manning River, the Western Slopes and Liverpool Plains. In essence, the Tablelands and immediately surrounding areas minus the Hunter Valley to the South.

This was not the end of the story.

As we shall see later, there were powerful economic and social links between the Hunter Valley, Tablelands and Western Slopes, links that made the Hunter a logical part of New England. These links were recognised by New Englanders and encapsulated in the boundaries of the New England New State as recommended by the Nicholas Royal Commission. Those boundaries form the broader New England as I use the term.