1 ROYAL HISTORICAL SOCIETY OF QUEENSLAND JOURNAL

Volume XIV, No.1 February 1990

Queensland v. The Commonwealth: The State's Objection to the Australian Standard Garratt Programme

by Alan Whiting Presented at a meeting of the Society, 22 June, 1989 The entry of Japan into the Second World War brought massive traffic demands to the government railway system of Queensland (QGR). As a partial resolution to those demands the Commonwealth resolved to construct a number of locomotives for use on some of the narrow (3'6") gauge rail systems, including the QGR. That locomotive type became known as the Australian Standard Garratt (ASG), a name that even now, almost fifty years later evokes acrimonious memories in some circles. The ASG project ultimately cost dearly, not only in the direct losses of millions of pounds of public funds but more importantly in the waste of thousands of tons of fabricated metal, and countless hours of added congestion to valuable workshop resources and, worse still, to overcrowded lines, which became so vital to the defence of Australia. The ASG's most outstanding feature was controversy and what this paper examines is not the public controversy that resulted after the locomotive had proved itself as an horrendous and indeed dangerous mechanical failure, but the bitter, relatively private dispute that raged between the Commonwealth and Queensland primarily before and during the construction of the machine. Essentially, that contest was over who, as between the Commonwealth and the State, had the right to determine how the QGR as the State's largest enterprise was to be managed, as it was Alan Whiting, BA, LLB, is a solicitor who has extensively researched the role of Queensland Railways during World War II and pubUshed Engine of Destruction. suddenly and forcibly transformed into one of the most vital defence items which the Commonwealth possessed. The issue of engine power and roUingstock use was therefore only one issue, although an important one which was fundamental to the operation of the system. The ASG programme is relevant because it was an example, inextricably bound up with others, of the joint decisions that had to be made by both the Commonwealth and the State. The struggle for practicEil as opposed to the legal control of the QGR and the issues related to the operation of the QGR was largely fought out by two people, and it is the relationship of those two people, Harold Winthrop Clapp for the Commonwealth and Percy Robert Turner Wills, for the State, that is so fascinating. Clapp is undoubtedly the most well known railway administrator of this country. Prior to the war he had been Chairman of the Victorian Railway Commissioners for some nineteen years during which he had displayed enthusiasm for that which was modern, efficient and big. The Spirit of Progress was but one manifestation of his thoughts. He had been heavily involved in electric traction. More importantly, he had spent a number of years working in engineering and managerial capacities in railways in the United States. His enthusiasm for innovative ideas resulting in large, fast, powerful locomotives and improved standards of service were not the only factors that made Clapp a legend in his own time — he was a man of grand vision as well as a semi eccentric. Clapp had been selected by the Commonwealth to be the Director-General of the Commonwealth Land Transport Board (CLTB), a statutory wartime creature of the Commonwealth that had the power to control all road and rail transport in Australia. Clapp's power was enormous. Indeed by law, any order or direction by Clapp was deemed to be that of the full Board, which incidentally did not comprise one Queensland representative.' Clapp was no supporter of the States. He is recorded as saying "Australians are just selfish and miserable people. They are not Australians primarily but State-ites."^ In contrast. Wills was a Queenslander by birth and had been employed in various administrative positions in the QGR throughout his working life. Wills had been appointed as Commissioner only a matter of months before the attack on Pearl Harbour. His choice as Commissioner was not popular. Many of his own employees saw him as anti-union and a handicap to the Government.^ Given that the war brought the QGR unions, especially those unions comprised of running crew, into unprecedented hardship and strong demands upon their employer, that opinion of Wills might appear at first glance to be justified. One of the issues of greatest friction between Wills and his unions was that of the ASG and yet a close perusal of Wills' memoranda on this issue reveals an interesting perspective of how he saw his loyalties. At times, he seems genuinely sympathetic to the appalling hours, over 140 per fortnight, worked by many of his running crews. His files do not show him to be critical of his political masters yet, curiously they reveal a prime loyalty not to those political masters but to the public of Queensland. What also emerges is that Wills was a permanent head who was deeply alive to politics and, on the ASG issue as he trod his own path between two governments of the same political philosophy in conflict with each other he was careful to protect himself before using what appears to be a considerable degree of influence amongst persons occupying various public positions during the war. Wills had as his Minister for much of the ASG issue, James Larcombe, from whom he repeatedly sought and obtained support. One word summarises Wills — controversial. He appears as never afraid to speak his mind. This and his obvious belief that he was right (notwithstanding that on some points he wasn't) resulted in bitter, hostile, abusive encounters with his Commonwealth political and military colleagues throughout the war. Even though a public official, his belief that he should speak his mind flowed over to conflict with the media and public of Queensland. Published history has not been kind to Wills but it is clear that Queensland owes much to him for his tireless actions during the war. It is difficult to conceive a greater personal contrast that that which existed between these two public officials whose positions required an urgent and unprecedented degree of co-operation in order to utilise the QGR as an efficient instrument of warfare.

THE WAR SITUATION When the Pacific war broke out, two immensely disturbing facts immediately emerged. The first was that by its position, Queensland was to be the battlefront State. An almost total absence of coastal shipping combiiied with Australia's manufacturing base being in the southern States lead to one inescapable conclusion — that almost all of the military loading would have to be railed to North Queensland ports and military establishments with all of the attendant delay and dislocation of trans-shipping at the Queensland change of gauge locations. The second and more concerning fact was that even before the Japanese entered the war, the Brisbane-Cairns route or North Coast Line (NCL) was already saturated.'* Inquiries by the Commonwealth revealed that the QGR was attempting to meet a task for which it was never designed and with a fleet of ancient, small and largely obsolete locomotives the average age of which in mid 1942 was 24.55 years.' The figure takes on significance when it is compared with the fact that even by QGR admission, the economic life of a locomotive was about 30 to 35 years.* Analysed further, of 688 serviceable machines, some 387 were in classes that had an average age of 28 years or more. The demand for loading was resulting in a dramatic increase in average train loads and average mileage worked per day of the locomotives in service, the latter figure increasing from 83 miles in 1931 to 119 in March 1942.^ As a consequence, the usual mileage of 75,000 between overhauls was being forced for the larger engines to over 188,000. Any organised programme of maintenance had obviously been abandoned. The pressure on locomotives was increased by the shortages of manpower and materials at workshops, where delays of up to three months in servicing were occurring with a resultant figure to March 1942 of almost one fifth of locomotives out of service. As the military traffic demands were unable to be fulfilled it became apparent that Australia was paying the price for decades of mismanagement in the QGR.

A LIGHT-DUTY RAILWAY The system in which Wills had worked was almost unique in the world. At a length of some 6,500 miles, the QGR was the second longest 3 '6" gauge system in the world. But what made it particularly different was the lightness of construction of the railway itself. Even the NCL which accounted for almost one sixth of the entire system was a line of exceptionally light construction for much of its length, again because of the extremely low density of traffic. To work the comparatively small, low speed, light trains on the QGR, a fleet of light and low powered locomotives was developed largely after the turn of the century to designs prepared by the QGR itself. The central theme of the system, its low density of usage, was reflected in the locomotive policy which was conservative to say the least. "Inventive" is certainly not the word. Once four basic designs had evolved through the first quarter century the QGR, when the need for more locomotives became pressing, simply produced more of the same, largely oblivious to modern advances in locomotive practice. One aspect of this becomes relevant to our story. Like many similar colonial systems throughout the world, traffic demands had increased substantially on some sections of track. The use of larger, more powerful locomotives was often not possible because more powerful locomotives as a rule meant heavier locomotives with a consequential need to relay track with heavier rails and new, stronger bridges. Various ingenious European designs had been suggested in Victorian times to overcome this problem of more power being able to be borne by hght lines. Undoubtedly, the most successful was that proposed in 1907 by Herbert Garratt, an English engineer. In essence, Garratt's patented idea was that one boiler and thus one crew of a driver and fireman would supply steam to two separate driving units which would obtain greater power by using the otherwise dead weight of the water and coal storage to bear down on an increased number of driving axles, with a distribution of weight over a much longer, articulated wheelbase. Garratt locomotives were particularly ideal for those sections of line such as Brisbane to Gladstone on the NCL and Brisbane to Toowoomba, both of which were characterised by sharp curves and steeply graded track where the QGR in an effort to obtain greater power had often used two locomotives on trains with all of the resulting inefficiencies. The economy of Garratt's principle was documented and repeatedly proven worldwide, particularly in , and and even in Western Australia and Tasmania, the latter two States having used Garratt locomotives for almost thirty years prior to the Second World War. The QGR's attitude to locomotive efficiency became all too apparent when examined by a Royal Commission in 1929. That Inquiry found that the QGR suflFered from "primitive" design facilities, a lack of research and testing, a lack of encouragement of technical officers to inquire outside Queensland, a policy of not attracting engineers with university training and a failure to subscribe to the most appropriate engineering journals.* Not unexpectedly, the Royal Commission strongly urged that no time be lost in introducing Garratt locomotives. One of the key reasons advanced by the QGR or its government against using the Garratt principle was that it would need to be imported. That was simply a convenient excuse as the QGR had for some time immediately prior to the Inquiry imported locomotives built in the United Kingdom to its own local design. The Great Depression also had a profound and adverse effect on the QGR's readiness for war. In an attempt to minimise expenses during the Depression, the QGR put many of its locomotives into storage and more significantly, ceased construction of new locomotives for four years. Following a massive increase in traffic demands in 1935, the QGR continued to use its pre-Depression designs. In 1937 another Commission of Inquiry was held into the QGR which again recommended the adoption of Garratt locomotives. The QGR had this time even gone to the trouble of attempting to demonstrate from this Inquiry that any such machine would be beyond the capacity of the QGR's track and draw gear. To compound the obvious, gross and almost wilful incompetence of the QGR's management at that time, it was proposed that a locomotive replacement rate of some thirteen units per year in a fleet of over 750 units would be adequate. It was merely one further step in an unreal, utterly unjustifiable policy that was to have almost tragic consequences over the following decade and a half.

THE COMMONWEALTH RESPONSE Clapp lost no time in looking at the QGR's engine power predicament. In April, 1942, he requested Joseph Elhs, the Commissioner of the Western Australian system to report on, amongst other matters, the practicability of using Garratt locomotives on the narrow gauge systems. During this investigation, it has been claimed that Wills objected strenuously to the use of Garratt locomotives, his expressed reasoning being that they would not be suitable for peace time use because of the QGR's low density of traffic and the greater power of the Garratt locomotive.' That represented a ground of objection that proved false as the QGR was to purchase a number of Garratt locomotives from Great Britain less than six years later. Furthermore, Ellis' investigation revealed that the QGR had been discussing the possible acquisition of a Garratt locomotive with its British builders as recently as late 1940. Indeed, those discussions had proceeded as far as an outline drawing which was the basis for the ASG subsequently designed by the Commonwealth. Wills' objections were in vain, as Ellis strongly urged the use of Garratts on various sections of the QGR. Upon receipt of Ellis' report, Clapp convened a meeting of Chief Mechanical Engineers of the various State systems. That meeting was unanimous in its recommendation that an existing QGR type of locomotive which had been in production since 1920, was the most suitable type to build for the narrow gauge systems.'" Presumably, the reason was that production could begin immediately as plans, jigs, patterns and dies were available. Furthermore, the type was well tested both on the QGR and Commonwealth Railways. It was a decision from which Wills was to derive great comfort over the next few years. However, Clapp was unmoved. Within a month. War Cabinet authorised the construction in Australia of the ASG. There is no indication that Wills was consulted in this decision, apart from Ellis' initial investigation. The QGR reaction was extraordinary. It seems unthinkable that a locomotive would be designed to operate on a system which had no input whatever into its design. Nevertheless, despite special appeals being made by the Commonwealth to the QGR, the latter with all of its limiting design features and requirements and entrenched practices, refused to lend any assistance whatever to what was described later by the ASG's designer. Western AustraUan Frederick Mills as a task of "formidable character"." The response by Wills was not just disinterest. Strange as it seems, his attitude was actually hostile. In order to explain why that was the case, one needs to go back to January in the same year and to track the interaction between Wills and Clapp on the lease-lend locomotives issue. In January, Wills had been informed that United 8 States operations in Australia would be "staggering", with all of the consequential transport needs that such a description implied.'^ He had also heard that he might obtain locomotives for the QGR through the American lease-lend scheme. Indeed, according to Wills the Commonwealth positively encouraged the QGR to order sixty such new locomotives, promising delivery in five months, with no payment being necessary for these units." Wills thus could afford at that stage to have but academic interest in Clapp's Garratt proposal. Sadly, however. Wills' locomotive position over the next few months became far worse and delivery of the lease-lend units became uncertain. When the QGR provided rolling stock statistics to Clapp, the latter took a step in May that seems totally tactless. Clapp wrote a mere three sentence letter to Wills asking him to see if he could comb his workshops to obtain materials to meet his desperate wagon shortage. Three days later, Clapp again wrote to observe that Wills was, at a figure of 17.7 per cent, carrying a relatively high percentage of locomotives out of service. "If you were to bring your shopping practices into line with normal standards you could, out of your present motive power, acquire practically as many additional locomotives serviceable as you are now requesting on your lease-lend requirements"."* To Wills, who had lost much of his workshops and staff over to Commonwealth munitions manufacturing and who was unable to obtain sufficient materials with which to repair equipment and whose unique system was generally carrying a burden unlike any other State owned system, these imperious remarks must have seemed personally insulting.

COUNTER ATTACK Wills' three-pronged reply was as pointed, if not as brief. His first step was to write two letters to Clapp, one open and one marked as confidential. The open letter was some eight pages of statistical information on the QGR's grave locomotive and roUingstock position." It admitted that even military orders were then being deferred because of a shortage of roUingstock and trains were seriously delayed because of a shortage of locomotives. The letter demonstrated that on the statistics, nothing could be done by Wills to reduce his out-of-service list to equal the sixty American locomotives that Clapp suggested might be cancelled. At this time, the QGR's engine power problems were being aggravated because twenty of its goods locomotives were then being sent to the Commonwealth for service on the Central Australia Railway. Wills complained to Clapp that he was "pressed" into sending these machines. He denied that the QGR was ordering more locomotives than it needed. As if Clapp did not know. Wills stated that Queensland had "about the lowest population per mile of line of any country in the world" with the consequence of light, cheap lines and high maintenance costs and long dead end single track lines with which no sound comparison could be made of other Australian systems " to say nothing of America". As Wills said, "I do not believe any State in Australia is carrying such a density of train movement on, say, 100 miles of single track as is being carried on our North Coast Line." The letter finished by stating, "If any doubt exists in the mind of any authority in regarding the service performed on the Queensland Railways, 1 suggest that information be sought from officials of the Transport Sections of all Fighting Forces in Queensland. They have expressed to me astonishment at the remarkable job being handled by this State." It is now appropriate to mention that Clapp's CLTB was based in Melbourne, the office of the Director of Rail Transportation for the Australian Army was also based there, and, not surprisingly, Clapp resided there. The second letter was a personal denial by Wills that he was "a mendicant for locomotives and wagons under lease-lend."'* It expressed his deep disappointment with the delay of the lease-lend locomotives, the need for them at their time of ordering being urgent, with the possibility that their need may even have passed by their time of arrival. The third action by Wills is the most interesting. It seems that Wills realised that he could defeat Clapp in only one way, through his own government and ultimately through the politicians in Canberra. Significantly, Wills sent the two letters to Clapp after he had notified Larcombe of what he proposed to tell Clapp. But with Larcombe, Wills went one step further. He alleged "entirely unjustifiable delay" in obtaining the lease-lend engines and because the threat to Australia was then so close and the Commonwealth's demands so great, he proposed that Queensland should refuse to supply the balance then remaining of the twenty locomotives being sent to the Commonwealth.'^ In the event that the Commonwealth should then invoke against Queensland the provisions of the National Security Act, WiUs recommended that representations be then made to Curtin. In his desperation. Wills scored a victory over Clapp. Larcombe agreed that the Commonwealth was asking Queensland to "do the impossible" and that it should have started to obtain locomotives and roUingstock as early as two years before then.'* For the moment. Wills' order for sixty locomotives stood and his eleven locomotives transferred were returned, although not before considerable delay. Unfortunately, the victory was short lived, and it set the tone of the relationship between Clapp and Wills for the duration of the war and beyond. For the record, Clapp's written response to Wills' correspondence was merely that it was interesting to read and that he appreciated Wills' writing to him so fully. Such a response was typical of the 10 disgraceful information flow from the Commonwealth to the QGR through the war. What information that was made available was often grossly misleading. For example, the Army had even informed Wills in writing in February that there was not likely to be any considerable quantity of rail traffic for conveyance over the QGR from the South." By September 1942, Wills could not ascertain how many ASGs he was to be allocated. His despair at not being told either this or when the American engines might arrive is obvious. At that time, with worsening traffic demands and being advised by the Commonwealth that delivery dates of both classes would not be until 1943, he obtained Queensland Cabinet approval to attempt to build more of his own locomotives and to cancel the American lease-lend order. One can only imagine the shock that he received when upon his formally cancelling the American order, he was advised that the Commonwealth had already done that. By early October, Wills had learnt that he might again obtain twenty lease-lend locomotives but that Clapp was opposing this on the basis that the ASG was being built.^° An insight into Wills' method, as well as his opposition to the ASG again becomes apparent when one looks at his response to intelligence imparted to him that the issue of the QGR's locomotive order was to be discussed by Clapp and others from a sub-committee of the Allied Supply Council. Wills sent a memorandum to Larcombe to gain support for his proposal, for which he obtained Queensland Cabinet approval the very next day. Wills' proposal was to lobby either some of those at the meeting (Clapp appears not to be one of the recipients of his lobbying) or those such as the Commonwealth Minister for Supply, Beasley who would be represented at the meeting, with a view to having the Commonwealth Railways take the whole thirty ASGs and the QGR would continue to attempt to build its own locomotives as well as take the forty lease-lend locomotives apparently allocated to Australia.^' Notwithstanding his Queensland political support, he failed. What is more illuminating about this episode is that during it, he set out on paper for what appears to be the first time for Larcombe, his objections to the ASG. He alleged the ASG would have only "limited suitability" in Queensland and would involve "many difficulties". Significantly, he failed to particularise those alleged difficulties, but what he did say, and he continued to say for years afterwards, was that the designing of the ASG "could only be looked upon as an experiment".^^ In this he was to be totally vindicated. This was not the only lobbying that Wills did. On at least one occasion in October, he spoke direct with a general of the U.S. Army in an endeavour to obtain the lease-lend engines.^' 11 A TEMPORARY RESOLUTION By this time. Wills' hostility to the ASG had become so disruptive that an attempt at resolution was proposed through a special conference in Canberra on 15th October 1942 between Wills, Larcombe and two QGR officers and seven Commonwealth officials including the Federal Treasurer, J.B. Chifley and his Minister for Transport, George Lawson. It was later recalled by one Commonwealth official at this meeting, that Queensland's objections were debated at length and with some acrimony, but in the end, the QGR agreed to take ten ASGs on a trial basis only.^ The truce was to be shortlived. In November, Wills attended another meeting on engine power. According to Wills, at that meeting, the Commonwealth through Ellis falsified and misrepresented a number of points on the ASG and lease-lend locomotive issue. These included allegations that Wills had been consulted on the type of roUingstock needed, a failure to mention the Chief Mechanical Engineer's resolution of July and an allegation that the now twenty lease-lend engines were being imported not for the QGR but as a reserve for use on any State system as the need might require.^'

C17 No.45, the type of locomotive Wills wanted, still hauling freight on the Brisbane Valley Line in 1967. — D. Campbell, A.R.H.S. Collection. 12 Wills offered proof to Larcombe that the lease-lend engines were being constructed for the QGR. It seems that it was only then that the Commonwealth advised Wills that War Cabinet had increased the number of ASGs to sixty-five at which Wills questioned the Commissioners of both the Commonwealth Railways and the South AustraUan RaUways on whether they, like him, had not been consulted as to the number of ASGs required. Neither had. Furthermore, both Clapp and Ellis refused to disclose to Wills how they proposed to aUocate the ASGs.^* Throughout the first six months of 1943 the demands on the QGR grew beyond the bounds of all imagination. For example, the net ton miles per route mile for steam hauled goods and mixed trains between Brisbane and Gympie had increased from March 1939 to March 1943 from 49,825 to 104,983. The minutes lost crossing and clearing on the same section rose from 12,719 to 104,634.^^ By July, when the first of the lease-lend locomotives had only just begun to enter service, and when the first ASG was still not completed in Victoria, the crisis point on the QGR had been reached. The QGR was then only able to move army loading which was a matter of extreme urgency, and thus military loading even though of the "very highest priority", as determined amazingly, on at least one occasion not by the Army, but by the QGR, was refused.^* Fourteen thousand tons of military traffic was then stranded in New South because of the inability to trans-ship it to the QGR. The Army wanted sixty-three trains as a minimum each week from the QGR and was getting only forty. The issue brought another clash between Clapp and WiUs, the latter pleading his shortage of engines and manpower. Wills stated that his engines were being worked as he saw it "to death'.^' Clapp's attitude was that despite all of this, the QGR had to do its best which he considered it was not doing at that time. Clapp's resolution of the problem came within days. It was probably the nadir of his relationship with Wills. His response was to advise Wills that civilian traffic to Queensland should be curtailed for three months with any movement to be determined only by permit from the CLTB. A similar restriction for the NCL would also be considered.'° Wills complained immediately to Larcombe, contending there was not "the slightest justification" for Clapp's action, which he saw as causing "an enormous amount of annoyance to the people of Queensland", an "irritation" and "a serious inconvenience", QGR officers knowing far better than the CLTB what restrictions could be best applied.^' Wills reminded Larcombe that he had already stopped essential civilian traffic for days at a time. Still the demands increased. By early August, General Marshall was said to be very concerned at the delay in transporting some five thousand American Army personnel quite apart from another five 13 thousand Australian Army personnel and four hundred vehicles that were stranded in Brisbane, unable to be moved north. Again, Clapp, WiUs and representatives of the American and AustraUan Forces met. Again Wills said he could do nothing unless he got more manpower and roUingstock. The Australian Army's representative. General Cannan, is recorded as stating at the meeting that Wills' attitude was "defeatist".'^

THE GARRATT IN OPERATION The first ASG did not enter service in Queensland until after the peak of the QGR's war loading had passed. It is not proposed to detail here the vast number of design and manufacturing faults with the ASG, some of which had manifested themselves even before the first ASG had run only a few miles in Queensland. All that needs to be said for the present purpose is that the atrocious conditions imposed upon the crews from cut eyes to burning, scalding and heat exhaustion paled into insignificance when in 1945 the machines began to derail, tearing up rail fastenings and crippling rails over distances of hundreds of metres. It was enough to induce fear into some enginemen and within a week of the Japanese surrender the two major enginemen's unions in Queensland refused to work the ASG. Whilst WiUs told the enginemen's unions that such a ban was "drastic" and that he wanted the safer members of the ASG class to remain in service, faUing which he would once more have a shortage of locomotives, there are grounds for believing that his professed objection may not have been his real belief." The ASG had caused substantial disruption to QGR lines and workshops right from the start. Defects in design had created delays at watering points and ashpits along the lines, not to mention obstruction to other traffic as ASGs stranded trains through mechanical problems. The problems were basic and many. Cracking pistons and cyUnders, breaking boiler stays, injectors that would not supply water to the boiler, cracking frames, cracked castings and hot wheel bearings were some of the mechanical problems that beset the ASG, quite apart from its poor ability to raise steam unless fired by good quality coal. The failures showed up in the statistics. Their average monthly mileage in July 1945 was 1937 compared with the QGR's heavier class of locomotive mUeage of 3148.'" By 1944, the then Queensland Minister for Transport, E.J. Walsh, alleged that the ASGs were spending forty per cent of their time in the workshops.'' In 1945, when the enginemen began their bans Wills might have had a locomotive shortage, buj his crisis had passed as had his need for the ASG. When they commenced to crash from the rails. Wills' opinion some three years earlier that the ASG was experimental took on some justification. 14 After the ASG had commenced to run in Queensland, WiUs continued his objection to it. His policy was clearly to utilise ASGs as much as possible, but his opposition was directed to their burgeoning numbers. In late 1943, following complaints by Lt. General Blamey that the congestion on the QGR might gravely disrupt his operational plans, Clapp proposed to increase the capacity of the NCL by, amongst other things, using thirty-five ASGs between Brisbane and Bundaberg. WUls' objection to this aspect of Clapp's plan was that the ASGs were already giving considerable trouble, his enginemen were abandoning them after fifty miles and the solution lay in the Commonwealth providing more manpower to enable the QGR's own engines to be repaired more quickly.'* Larcombe also queried his Commonwealth counterpart, E.J. Ward, on the same point. As late as February, 1944, the Commonwealth was continuing its refusal to reveal how it proposed to allocate the sixty-five ASGs. Wills was at this stage seeking to ascertain if the ASG construction programme could be halted altogether. In the event. Wills and Larcombe both failed and the ASGs continued to flow to Queensland, one even arriving after the war had ceased. In the meantime, Clapp and Wills had again met at the request of Curtin to resolve the terms of payment for the ASG and lease- lend locomotives. Despite Clapp and Ellis having suggested to WiUs in September 1942 and January 1943 that a lease rather than purchase was preferable, and despite the Commonwealth's assurance that lease- lend goods would be free, the Commonwealth now sought and received agreement to be paid 17,250 pounds per American engine and 18,000 pounds per ASG, on the condition that WiUs would certify that the ASG was satisfactory. He never did and all the available evidence indicates that the Commonwealth never received payment for the Queensland ASGs, the resultant loss to the Commonwealth on the entire project running into miUions of pounds.'^ Shortly before Wills' 1945 Annual Report was tabled in the Parliament threats by Western Australian enginemen of banning the ASG had resulted in the Western Australian Government granting one of its Supreme Court Justices, Albert Wolff, a Royal Commission to enquire into the safety, economy and satisfactory working of the ASG. Even before Wolff's commission was granted both the enginemen's unions and Wills had brought the ASG issue to the attention of the Queensland public. As early as November 1944, Walsh was moved to state in the Legislative Assembly when referring to the ASG and the Federal officials then attempting to seU it to Queensland, "We do not care what happens to the engine afterwards. If they do not meet our requirements, we cannot be expected to buy their junk" and "They (the Commonwealth) have been attempting to sell us 15 various pups over a very long period and among them was the Australian Standard Garratt.'"* Wills in his 1945 Annual Report spent more space putting his version of the ASG story than he did in the same report in which he reviewed the QGR's entire war effort. His objections had, he claimed, been "fully borne out by results". As he said, "Unfortunately, our endeavours to obtain engines of a type suitable to Queensland, which could have been constructed quickly, were frustrated by a determination (arrived at by persons unacquainted with the requirements of Queensland, but who possessed certain temporary powers under National Security Regulations) to design and build a new type of locomotive on the Garratt principle."'^ There was no doubt who Wills was referring to in his Annual Report when he gave his evidence to Wolff. He stated that it was Clapp's decision not only to build the ASG but to send a further thirteen ASGs to Queensland despite WUls' objection and disapproval."" Wolff's Report found that the ASG was unsafe, contained numerous defects in design and because of its experimental nature, was not a wise purchase for the Western AustraUan Government. The Report was received by the Queensland Government as a confirmation of the views expressed earlier in opposition to the ASG. The then Minister for Transport, J.E. Duggan, was able to say in November 1947 in reference to the ASG that he had hoped that he had scotched the idea that it would be desirable for the Government to deploy labour and material to the repair of them. Interestingly, when saying this, he made the not unexpected comment that "The design resulted from the obstinate attitude of Sir Harold Clapp . . ."."' Clapp was no stranger to criticism in the Queensland Parliament during these years. When WiUs said to the ParUament that "the State of Queensland has been seriously handicapped by the use of these engines, which was forced upon us by temporary Commonwealth officials possessing Uttle knowledge of the requirements of this State", his words did not fail to fall on receptive ears."^ In September of 1945 Clapp's recommendation on the standardisation of State raUway gauges to 4'81/2" had been debated in the Queensland ParUament. Much of the attack on that proposal was directed personally at Clapp with members of both Government and opposition branding him as unsympathetic and discourteous to Queensland and indeed was not prepared to give Queensland "a fair deal"."' The parallels between Clapp's ASG programme and his standardisation recommendations, and the vigorous, determined opposition to both by Wills and members of the Queensland Government are remarkable. It is no surprise that both Commonwealth proposals rapidly passed into history. 16

NOTES

1. See Regulation 18. Statutory Rules 27 of 1942. 2. Burke, D. Kings of the Iron Horse, Methuen Australia Pty. Ltd., Sydney 1985, p.66. 3. Daddow, V. The Puffing Pioneers and Queensland's Railway Builders, University of Queensland Press, Brisbane, 1975, p.l65. 4. Notes of Meeting 22/4/42 QSA A/9447 Batch 329. 5. Letter Lingard (Secretary of the QGR) to Clapp 14/9/42, QSA, A/9435 Batch 149. 6. Annual Report, Commissioner for Railways. 1948. p.l5. 7. Letter, Wills to Clapp 15/5/42 QSA A/12887 Batch 1. 8. Report of the Royal Commission on Railway Workshops 1929, Queensland Government Printer, p.34. 9. Transcript of Evidence, ASG Royal Commission, p.274. 10. Memo by Wills 30/11/42 QSA A/12887 Batch 1. 11. Transcript of Evidence, Ibid, p.275. 12. Memo Wills to Larcombe 14/1/42 QSA A/12887 Batch 1. 13. Memo of meeting War Railway Committee 29/1/42 QSA A/12887 Batch 1. 14. Letter Clapp to Wills 7/5/42 QSA A/12887 Batch 1. 15. Letter Wills to Clapp 15/5/42 QSA A/12887 Batch 1. 16. Ibid. 17. Memorandum Wills to Larcombe 13/5/42 QSA A/12887 Batch 1. 18. Memorandum Larcombe to Wills 14/5/42 QSA A/12887 Batch 1. 19. Letter Col. W.H. Newman (Director of Railway Transportation) to Wills 22/1/42 QSA A/9454 Batch 413. 20. Memorandum Wills to Larcombe 6/10/42 QSA A/12887 Batch 1. 21. Ibid. 22. Ibid. 23. Memorandum 21/10/42 QSA A/12887 Batch 1. 24. Transcript of Evidence Ibid, p.277. 25. Memorandum Wills to Larcombe 30/11/42 QSA A/12887 Batch 1. 26. Ibid. 27. Memorandum QSA A/9464 Batch 562. 28. Letter Lingard to Stubbs 5/8/43 QSA A/9462 Batch 522. 29. Minutes of Meeting 23/7/43 QSA A/9465 Batch 593. 30. Telegram Clapp to Wills 28/7/43 QSA A/9465 Batch 593. 31. Memorandum Wills to Larcombe 29/7/43 QSA A/9465 Batch 593. 32. Minutes of Meeting 10/8/43 QSA A/9465 Batch 597. 33. The Locomotive Journal, Australian Federated Union of Locomotive Enginemen, North Melbourne, November 1945, p.47. 34. Commissioner's Annual Report 1945, pp.6 and 7. 35. Queensland Parliamentary Debates 14/11/1944, p.l498. 36. Notes of Discussion regarding Additional Manpower for Ipswich Workshops, etc. QSA A/9468 Batch 638. 37. Memorandum by Wills 30/11/42 QSA A/12887 Batch 1 — See also Transcript of Evidence Ibid p.652-653 and Auditor-General's Report for the year ended 30/6/47, Commonwealth Parliamentary Papers — Finance p.1649 at p.l73 of that Report. 38. Queensland Parliamentary Debates 14/11/44 p.l504. 39. Commissioner's Annual Report 45 p.6. 40. Transcript of Evidence Ibid p.651 to 653. 41. Queensland Parliamentary Debates 20/11/47 pp.1552 and 1553. 42. Commissioner's Annual Report 45 p.7. 43. Queensland Parliamentary Debates 11/9/AS pp.507-515.