University of Wollongong Thesis Collections University of Wollongong Thesis Collection University of Wollongong Year 1993 The development of coal trade in the Wollongong district of New South Wales, with particular reference to government and business, 1849-1889 Henry Patrick Lee University of Wollongong Lee, Henry Patrick, The development of coal trade in the Wollongong district of New South Wales, with particular reference to government and business, 1849-1889, Doctor of Philosophy thesis, Department of History and Politics, University of Wollongong, 1993. http://ro.uow.edu.au/theses/1441 This paper is posted at Research Online. CHAPTER 7 A CONFLICT OF PRIVATE INTERESTS: THE NEW SOUTH WALES PARLIAMENT AND THE ILLAWARRA RAILWAY, 1875-1876 Until Henry Parkes' bettayal of the Ulawarra RaUway movement in late December 1875, tiie gaining of Parliamentary approval for the scheme had seemed littie more tiian a formaUty. As tiie Illawarra Mercury had observed when Premier Robertson tabled tiie Estimate for tiie lUawarra Railway at the beginning of December: This grand project... has reached a most important stage of advancement . The item has only to pass one more stage ... the voting of the amount by Parliament, a matter about which there need be littie fear, if the members of the House will only view the great importance of the project in its trae Ught, and smdy the best interests of the colony, as they are in duty bound to do.i Of course, within the shifting sands of factional politics in the New South Wales Legislative Assembly, nothing could be guaranteed. Parkes' Ministry of 1872-1875 had been unable to conttol almost 20 per cent, of all divisions in the House, and Robertson's Ministry of 1875- 1877 would find itself unable to win almost one-third of the divisions called.^ Nevertheless, with both of the Assembly's major faction leaders having become involved in schemes to open mines in the southem coalfield, the Ulawarta Railway seemed to have been elevated above factional considerations and thus secured from defeat. Between diem, Parkes and Robertson commanded the Assembly. By the mid 1870s they were the only two faction leaders of any note; Charles Cowper and James Martin had left poUtics, and WUliam Forster would do so in 1876.3 Littie distinguished them on grounds of ideology or fundamental poUcy as they oversaw the development of liberal capitalism in New South Wales. So littie, in fact that their competition for possession of the Treasury benches 1 Illawarra Mercury. 1 December 1875. 2 G.N. Hawker, The ParUament of New South Wales 1856-1965. Govemment Printer. Sydney 1971, p.67. 3 P. Loveday & A.W. Martin, ParUament Factions and Parties: The First Thirty Years of Responsible Government in New South Wales, 1856-1889. Melboume University Press: Carlton, Victoria 1966, p.85. 239 throughout the 1870s became a 'settled instimtion'."^ In the eightii Parliament, which would sit from January 1875 until October 1877, Parkes and Robertson were each more or less certain of the votes of 26 Members, or 72.2 per cent, of tiie total of 72.^ WhUe this left a sizeable number of independent and uncommitted Members, it still represented a deep pool of support from which both leaders could draw for a common purpose. The 15 Members who represented the coal proprietors and the commercial and agriculttiral interests of tiie Newcastie-Hunter region, centted on tiie harbour of Newcastie and the Great Northem Railway that connected it with the interior, would form the core of the opposition to the Ulawarta Railway within the Assembly.^ On their own, tiiese Members could not be certain of attracting sufficient support to overturn the Robertson Ministry's Estimate. Parkes' judgement that the Ulawarra Railway was no longer identical with his own interests changed all of that His defection deUvered more than just another Member to the anti Ulawarra Railway forces. As Leader of the Opposition, taking, ostensibly, a principled stand against the general financial administration of the Robertson Govemment and its railway policy in particular, he had the capacity to erode significantiy the support that the Railway might be expected to enjoy in the Assembly. Certainly, he would become a focus for the Newcastle Members, who had never considered the Ulawarta Railway to be in tiieir region's best interests, let alone tiiose of the entire Colony. At issue was access to and shares of the markets for New South Wales coal, which were dominated by the Newcastie mines. In 1875 tiiose mines had accounted for 86.1 per cent. of the Colony's coal production, and 83.2 per cent, of its coal exports (94.8 per cent of the AusttaUan Colonial and New Zealand markets, and 68.4per cent, of tiie overseas market).'' Newcastie's primacy rested neither upon more extensive coal seams nor better quality coal, but upon its natural harbour. This had been the initial factor in determining why tiie great bulk of private investment in New South Wales coal was centted there ratiier than on 4 A.W. Martin, Henry Parkes: A Biography. Melbourne University Press: Carlton, Victoria 1980, p.301. 5 Loveday & Martin, op.cit., p.45. From 8 September 1876, when die University of Sydney retumed a Member, there were a total of 73 Members of die Legislative Assembly. 0 For electorates included in die Newcasde-Hunter region, see Table, 'The New Soudi Wales Legislative Assembly and die Illawarra RaUway: Regional Interests in die Division of 8 June 1876', following in diis Chapter. 7 Calculated from figures in Statistical Register of New South Wales, 1875 (Exports) and Annual Report of the Department of Mines, New South Wales. 1876 (Production and Newcasde exports). 240 Wollongong. That ttend was encouraged and sustained by the expenditure of large sums of public money on die improvement of Newcastie Harbour and its coal handUng facilities, which gave northem coal direct access, in quantity, to intercolonial and overseas markets. From the commencement of responsible govemment in 1855 to 30 November 1875, acmal public expenditure on harbour faciUties for Newcastie and the Hunter River amounted to £348,480, plus £427,195 for the constmction and operation of dredges and o±er plant for tiie improvement of navigation, a total of £775,625.8 In tiie same period £61,423 was spent on Wollongong Harbour.^ Between 1860, when the fttst major expenditure of pubUc money on Wollongong Harbour was sanctioned, and the end of 1875, the New Soutii Wales Parliament agreed to allocate a total of £558,457 (£182,970 from Consolidated Revenue and £375,487 in loans) on harbour improvements and associated works in the Newcastie district, while Wollongong was aUocated only £62,493 (£3601 from Consolidated Revenue and £58,902 in loans, the latter including £10,000 for the never commenced BeUambi Harbour improvements of 1862)10 (see Tables following). The failure of WoUongong's businessmen and coal proprietors to secure a greater share of this pubUc largesse lay in their relative economic and political unimportance to the Colony at large. Only rarely had they overcome the dictates of the economics of location and the poUtics of allocation: in the early 1860s when they enjoyed a close relationship with the Cowper- Robertson Ministries, and in the mid-1860s when James Byrnes was Minister for Public Works. These, however, had been political abertations, made possible only by the lottery of factional poUtics. Under 'normal conditions', the demands of businessmen from Uttie regional economies like WoUongong could be ignored. The return of economic buoyancy in tiie early 1870s had again swung the simation in WoUongong's favour. The disttict produced an exceUent and relatively cheap steam coal, the attractiveness of which was increasing as Colonial manufacturing industry began to expand and as saU was coming under chaUenge from steam as a means of ttansporting people and goods 8 Votes and Proceedings of the Ugislative Assembly, 10 December 1875. In Votes and Proceedings of the Legislative Assembly, Session 1875-6, Vol.l. Minister for Public Works' answer to question from George Dibbs, Member for West Sydney. 9 ibid.. 14 December 1875. 10 These figures summarise diose in die Tables which follow immediately in the text (under die heads of ConsoUdated Revenue and Loan Fund allocations). See diese for detaUs and sources. aOHgCUnKTHJ REVHWB FOC ESOPHTOTORE OOMITWHIS Ai/iTixTSED BI THE NB» SOOTH MttfiS PAKLIAMQW EUR HARBODR ICRKS no aCPCRT ndLTTDSJ MBCaSOB AHJ KUIXIXXG MSBUOS, 1860-«3 TO 1872-75 YEARS tmCfSr£ DISTRICT WOUiDNGCNG DISTRICT ftocunt Item (E) Item (£) 1860-63 Dredgiiig 19.300 Placing Moorings in Bellarabi Hartxjur 408 Extension of Dyka on riata. River aunter 2,000 Survey of BellaRt>i i Viollangong Hartxxirs 300 tooamodation for Pilots, Newcastle 885 Stean Cranes, Newcastle 4,9U Laying dcun Msorings, Newcastle 1.425 Purchase of Steam Tug for Dcedgn 2,000 1864-67 Dredging 19,300 under-running » Repair of Maorings. 56 Bellanbi Stean Cranes, Net<caatle 9,196 Buoy for Vtollongong Harbour 37 Screw Msorings, Newcastle 1,000 Building for Pilots * Boat Crew, 60 Newcastle 1868-71 Dredging 30,093 Steam Cranes. NeMstatle 2,900 New Buckets for Stean Dredge 99 Fittings * Stores for ULfeboat, 35 Newcastle Building for Pilots » Boat Crew, 30 Newcastle Recoostmction of Queen's wharf, Morpeth 450 Acoatimodation for Pilots, Newcastle 1,200 Ratcfvai of Lifeboat Shed, Newcastle 100 Buoys 4 Beaoooa foe Hunter River 250 Lighting Lamps, Newcastle ^tyarC ISO 1872-75 Dredging 55.4U Qxicreting Face of Wbllongong Pier 500 Additional Coal Sidings » Staiths, 1,700 Local Marine Board, Newastle 3,000 Wbllongong Repairs to Govemment v*jarf Road, 450 Boat HarbDur, NewcaTtla 1,105 Belmore Basin Ballast Master, Newcastle 600 Lighting Lanps, Newcastle V<harf 528 Mditional Punts for Dredge 5,167 Second Dredge for Newcastle 4,032 Appliances for Discharging Ballast, 3,000 Nev*:astle Boatshed, Newcastle 332 New Tug for Dredge 4,000 Additional Moorings, Newcastle 1,200 i>nounts shown are thoee authorised to be spent.