Understanding Victoria: A Government House Discussion Series

The second session of the 2025 discussion series, “Understanding Victoria”, considers the development and defining elements of welfare policy in our federated nation in the mid-20th century.

This session builds from the first in this series in 2025 which explored the effect of campaigns for wages and conditions in the late nineteenth century in creating a socio-legal and economic landscape that shaped institutions and social policy in the Federation.

This discussion is about the factors that shaped the distinguishing features of social welfare policy in Australia as it developed in the twentieth century. Much of current welfare policy was crafted and based in decisions made in the middle period of the twentieth century, where assumptions and directions were influenced by the particular circumstances in Australia and the lessons we drew from them.

Key among these was the development of conciliation and arbitration as a means of resolving industrial disputes and setting wages and conditions for workers at State and later at the Commonwealth level.

Format

The Governor introduced the event and welcomed participants. You can read the Governor’s full remarks.

The facilitator, Jon Faine AM, then formally called on speakers.

Three speakers each presented a question to the group, which they explored in a short presentation. Following the three presentations, guests were invited to participate in a facilitated discussion to further explore the topic.

Speakers and Topics

Professor John Murphy, Emeritus Professor of Politics, The University of Melbourne: How did welfare policy in the 30s to the 60s contribute to the evolution of the welfare system?

Professor Philip Mendes, Director Social Inclusion and Social Policy Research Unit, Monash University: Who was left behind in our post-war welfare state and why?

Associate Professor Nell Musgrove, National School of Arts and Humanities, Australian Catholic University: What are the legacies of the 'deserving poor' and Victorian-era concepts of charity?

Background Information

Pre-Federation charity and foundations of the Antipodean model

Welfare or charitable support was treated as residual in the Antipodean colonies where labour was scarce, with opportunities for a ‘new life’ including better wages and conditions. Welfare was for those not employed; employment by the turn of the century was presumed to be delivering a ‘living wage’ to provide a ‘civilised’ standard of living for a family.

Welfare support for those ‘outside’ the employment system was seen in the colonies as the domain of private charity and benevolent societies, rather than a responsibility of government, through the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries.

Yet, even in the first decades in the colony in Victoria, this assumption did not prove adequate. In 1864 the Neglected and Criminal Children Act was passed to enable the state to become the guardian of children not adequately provided for by their parents. This led to a system of state- supported industrial and reform schools and orphanages which underpinned much of the ‘care’ provided to these children separated from their families. This was a regime underpinned and administered by the state directly or by proxy through charitable organisations until the first half of the twentieth century.

As the new nation was being debated, government payments and associated policy were created for circumstances in which people could not rely on employment. A model in which payments were ‘means tested’ and paid from general revenue was introduced. This began in the States, such as Victoria and NSW. The major locus for welfare support, as well as institutional care, remained with the States prior to the Second World War.

In Australia, the development of welfare policy around payments, such as pensions and allowances, followed a distinct Antipodean trajectory, diverging from the social insurance and social welfare forms of Europe and Scandinavia. The major change over the course of the twentieth century in Australia was that the responsibility for such payments shifted from State to Commonwealth.

Pensions and Allowances

Before Federation, express reliance on private benevolence and rejection of the British Poor Law regime in the Antipodes was only replaced by government payments with the introduction of old age pensions in Victoria and NSW. After Federation the development of pension payments strongly influenced formation and delivery of social policy by the Commonwealth.

In Victoria, as Murphy (2011) comments, pensions had more restrictive eligibility, tied more closely to a ‘deserving/undeserving poor’ characterization, than to universal citizen rights or entitlement as found in NSW.

The introduction of ‘mean-tested’ pensions at Commonwealth level in 1908 replaced the State schemes, such as those introduced in Victoria in 1900. The Commonwealth added an invalid pension for permanent incapacity, which came into effect in 1910.

Somewhat unexpectedly, a maternity allowance, a lump sum paid to a mother on the birth of each child, was introduced by the Commonwealth in 1912. It was paid to mothers irrespective of marital status.

One key and distinguishing element these first Australian schemes paid pensions and allowances from general revenue - they were not social insurance schemes based on individual contributions. And they had the form of a universal citizen entitlement, with one significant exception.

Despite some opposing parliamentary argument as these new social payments were enacted, the White Australia ‘policy’ excluded Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people from access to these pensions and allowances.

The Great War

The first major change to federal payments came in the wake of the First World War. As Murphy (2011) reminds us, the proportion of Australian soldiers killed or injured in that Great War was disproportionately high - with the permanently disabled estimated at 27 percent of those who went overseas. The number of pensions paid to widows and dependents of veterans and widows, as well as to the permanently disabled, exceeded the number of aged and invalid pensioners in the Commonwealth.

This parallel system of veterans’ welfare support was based on the previously developed Antipodean models, anchored in notions of the male basic or living wage and worker’s compensation for injury. It has continued as a separate system of welfare support from its establishment in 1914.

The Great Depression and World War II

During World War II, following the experience of the Great Depression of the 1930s, the Commonwealth took over responsibility for social security and enacted a series of legislative measures that set in place welfare schemes that created Australia’s modern welfare state.

Key to Commonwealth dominance was its assumption of sole responsibility for income tax in 1942 - which gave financial capacity and levers to determine policies that relied on payments disbursed from general revenue.

The wartime Labor government of Curtin, followed by Chifley led the introduction of a series of welfare initiatives. These initiatives self-consciously rejected social insurance models, determining the trajectory of welfare policy.

First, in 1941, was child endowment (which had bipartisan commitment being first proposed at Commonwealth level by the Menzies government). This was a flat-rate cash payment, not means- tested, to the mother for children beyond the first child.

This was also the first payment which explicitly included Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander mothers and was also able to be paid for children who lived for at least six months per year on a mission station. This latter eligibility criterion underscored the problematic and continuing distinctions between our First Peoples who were deemed to be ‘nomadic’ or entirely dependent on State support and others, largely living in cities and towns.

This first allowance was followed in quick succession by the Widows’ Pension Act 1942, National Welfare Fund Act 1943 (covering health services, sickness and unemployment benefits among other social services), Funeral Benefits and Wife’s Allowance 1943, and the Unemployment and Sickness Benefits Act 1944. In 1947 a single Social Services Act, following a successful referendum to give the Commonwealth explicit constitutional power to legislate in this field, consolidated the various federal benefit payments and allowances.

Not every attempted social benefit proposed in this Curtin/Chifley period was successfully legislated. A push to include pharmaceutical benefits did not prevail - although later such benefits, and others, found their place among universal entitlements.

Importantly, the notion of benefits and allowances which were funded from general revenue rather than social insurance built on contributions was cemented into the fabric of Australian welfare policy in this period.

Conclusion

From today’s standpoint we can see an expansion of ‘universal’ schemes such as Medicare, Pharmaceutical Benefits, Family Allowance or Family Tax Benefit, Child Care Subsidy, National Disability Insurance Scheme, and the Compulsory Superannuation Guarantee. Some are means-tested or tied to our progressive income tax system, a significant number funded from general revenue, and our major and almost uniquely widespread superannuation requires contributions.

It can be argued a significant part of our contemporary social welfare system reflects elements developed over the twentieth century. Certainly, by the close of the twentieth century schemes of universal application had become the touchstone.

There remain questions to be asked about the impact of various exclusions and restrictions on eligibility, as well as stigmatising assumptions tied to race or the ‘worthiness’ of those receiving social welfare supports and benefits.

As well, the relationship between the state and ‘institutionalised’ care, particularly for children, remains one of the most challenging areas of social policy from the nineteenth century to the present day.

The enduring question for our understanding, our policy, our institutions, private and public, and our governments remains how best to ensure “to each according to [their] needs”?

Coined by political scientist Francis Castles, the ‘wage earners welfare state’ refers to a set of industrial standards, labour principles and laws that guarantee an adequate standard of living for those who are gainfully employed.

The notion is that this guarantee of a ‘living wage’ ensures that direct welfare support from the state is only needed for those without employment.

It amounts to a system of universally applied sets of wages and conditions that ensure workers can support themselves, and their families rather than being dependent on other sources.

This discussion focuses on an important era in the development of key economic and social features of Victoria and Australia – of which this was an unusual and significant feature.

From the late nineteenth century, Victoria and other states of Australia introduced forms of labour market regulation that created minimum standards, including minimum wages. On federation, the Commonwealth Court of Conciliation and Arbitration from its first famous Harvester judgement by the President of the Court, Higgins, created what he termed a “new province for law and order”.

It is argued that this foundation and expansion of wage regulation became a primary means to address income inequalities, increasing social protections, and reducing direct dependence on state welfare measures.

Understanding the conditions and features that supported this approach is the key to this discussion and evaluating its relevance to the current shape of our social policies.

Format

The Governor introduced the event and welcomed participants. You can read the Governor’s full remarks.

The facilitator, The Honourable Maxine McKew AM, then formally called on speakers.

Three speakers each presented a question to the group, which they explored in a short presentation. Following the three presentations, guests were invited to participate in a facilitated discussion to further explore the topic.

Speakers and Topics

Professor Marilyn Lake AO, Honorary Professorial Fellow, History, the University of Melbourne: Why did the concept of a ‘living wage’ focus on the needs of workers defined as human beings living in a civilised community?

Professor Sean Scalmer, Professor of Australian History, Historical and Philosophical Studies, the University of Melbourne: How and why did wage-earners win reduced hours of work in the early twentieth century?

Dr Liam Byrne, Honorary Fellow, Historical and Philosophical Studies, the University of Melbourne: How did Victorian workers assert their fundamental humanity and reframe understandings of industrial and economic rights?

Background Information

On 21 April 1856, Melbourne's stonemasons ceased working and left their jobs. This action was a protest against their employers' refusal to grant their demand for shorter workdays.

Over the following months, the works engaged in discussions with their bosses and with the government. Eventually, an agreement was reached: the stonemasons would work an eight-hour day while still receiving the same pay they had previously earned for ten hours of work.

This event was significant in setting workplace standards ahead of those available elsewhere in the world at the time. From this time, trade union organisation in Victoria increased, and along with it, political representation of labour. Through these developments came demands for improved standards of work and wages.

Labour demands and negotiation were intertwined with other social and economic policies being debated, including tariff protection and immigration restrictions. This set of economic and social policies were significant in shaping Victorian, and then Australian, society.

The 'Living Wage'

In the late nineteenth century, Victoria passed the Victorian Factories and Shops Act 1896 to regulate outwork and to set minimum pay rates in specified trades. This legislation, supported by Deakin and Higgins among others, established wages boards which set minimum standards for working conditions and wages for men, women and children in a number of industries.

At the final Melbourne Constitutional Convention, Higgins with Kingston from South Australia (among others) wrote into the constitution the power for the new Australian parliament to legislate for “conciliation and arbitration for the prevention and settlement of industrial disputes extending beyond the limits of any one state”.

In 1904 federal legislation created the Commonwealth Court of Conciliation and Arbitration and in 1906 Deakin appointed Higgins to the High Court, from which position he became the first President of the Court of Conciliation and Arbitration.

In 1907, in his first case in that position, he made what has become known as the Harvester judgement. In it he outlined the basis for a ‘living wage’ for unskilled labourers.

Higgins wrote “I cannot think of any other standard appropriate than the normal needs of the average employee, regarded as a human being living in a civilized community”. He was setting what he believed was a ‘fair and reasonable” wage - a ‘living’ or ‘minimum’ wage.

In so doing, and applying this standard in future judgements, Higgins applied the constitutional power designed to minimise strikes and lockouts to set minimum standards for living for workers in Australia.

Higgins decisions and his promulgation of them were influential in debates in other nations, principally the United States, in shaping progressive approaches to labour market regulation, as Marilyn Lake outlines [Progressive New World: How Settler Colonialism and Transpacific Exchange Shaped American Reform].

The creation of an Antipodean approach to labour market regulation that applied for much of the twentieth century - and still underpins current policy - is one of the keys to understanding the Australian development of social and economic policy.

What are its lessons?

This discussion focused on protest movements during the 1960s and 1970s in Victoria. The protest movements of that period in Australia cover many causes, overshadowing the 1960s with the anti-Vietnam war movement. Recognising the impact of that protest movement, this discussion series focused on Indigenous rights, second wave feminism and gay liberation.

Format

The Governor introduced the event and welcomed participants. You can read the Governor’s full remarks.

The facilitator, Jon Faine AM, then formally called on speakers.

Three speakers each presented a question to the group, which they explored in a short presentation. Following the three presentations, guests were invited to participate in a facilitated discussion to further explore the topic.

Speakers and Topics

Emeritus Professor Dennis Altman AM, La Trobe University: "Why did a gay movement emerge when it did and how successful was it?"

Emeritus Professor Diane Kirkby, La Trobe University: "How are we to understand the dynamics of 1970s protests in the continuum of feminist activism?"

Professor Gary Foley, Victoria University: "Victoria’s key role in the black power movement."

Background Information

Pre-1960s/70s

Although this discussion series focuses primarily on the dynamic protests of the 1960s and 1970s, it's important to recognise that many of these influential movements originated earlier in Victoria's history.

The first recorded protests in Victoria began before Separation, when Melbourne residents discovered that the British Government intended to transport convicts to Port Phillip.

Soon after Separation, events such as the Eureka Stockade and the Stonemasons' march served as notable examples of protests uniting different parts of the community.

The first women’s suffrage society was formed in Victoria in 1884. Women travelled all over the colonies – going door to door with petitions and handing out flyers.

Activists met with politicians, held public debates, and marched in the streets to build support.

The earliest recorded protest organised by First Nations people in Victoria took place in 1876, when William Barak, ngurungaeta (leader) of the Woi Wurrung, led a demonstration against the closure of the Coranderrk reserve.

1960s/70

One of the biggest catalysts for change in the 1960s and 1970s was the Vietnam War. The Congress for International Co-operation and Disarmament (CICD), established in Melbourne in 1959, spearheaded the anti-war movement. Comprising peace activists, unionists, and church leaders - the CICD orchestrated large-scale protests and rallies, alongside groups like the ‘Youth Campaign Against Conscription’ and the women’s movement group ‘Save Our Sons’.

Simultaneously, the second wave of feminism gained momentum. Zelda D’Aprano and three teachers – Thelma Solomon, Alva Geikie and Jessie ‘Bon’ Hull – formed the Women's Action Committee (WAC), tackling issues such as equal pay.

Around this time, Beatrice Faust founded the Women's Electoral Lobby (WEL), aiming to gain political influence to drive change.

WEL played a crucial role in the 1972 election by publishing voter guides that highlighted candidates' positions on women's issues, contributing to Gough Whitlam's historic victory.

As anti-war and women's movements gained momentum, the LGBT community also began to mobilise. Early groups like the Daughters of Bilitis and CAMP (later Society Five) offered support. The Melbourne branch of Gay Liberation – a movement started in New York immediately after the Stonewall Riots – emerged in 1972 at Melbourne University, formed by Dennis Altman and Jude Munro.

This activism, alongside shifting social attitudes, led to the Australian Medical Association declaring homosexuality was not an illness in 1973. Legal reform followed, with decriminalisation in South Australia in 1975 and Victoria in 1981.

The Victorian Aborigines Advancement League (VAAL), formed in 1957, played a crucial role in the struggle for Aboriginal rights – key leaders included Gordon Bryant (later a Minister in the Whitlam Government for Aboriginal Affairs), Pastor Stan Davey, Doris Blackburn and Uncle Doug Nicholls.

VAAL worked with Aboriginal leaders like Margaret Tucker to advocate for basic rights such as citizenship and land rights. Inspired by the Black Power movement, Aboriginal members of VAAL took control of the organisation in the mid-60s, demanding self-determination and establishing vital community-controlled services like the Aboriginal Legal Aid Service and Aboriginal Child Care Agency.

Land rights remained a central issue, with a notable protest led by Rev. Doug Nicholls in 1965 to save Lake Tyers Aboriginal reserve from closure, resulting in its declaration as a permanent reserve. The Aboriginal Lands Act 1970 marked a landmark victory, finally recognising Aboriginal land rights in Victoria after years of activism.

Melbourne in the 60s and 70s was a hub of activism, with people protesting for various causes, including land rights for Aboriginal people, opposing the war, demanding equality for women and the LGBT community.

These interconnected movements had a lasting impact on Australian society, leaving a legacy that continues to shape our society today.

The second discussion in the series, titled “Faith in the people?”: Victoria and Federation, creation and outcomes, was held in September 2024.

This discussion focused on Federation, the creation of the Commonwealth of Australia, from the late 1890s to 1914 and the role of Victoria in this significant moment.

Format

The Governor introduced the event and welcomed participants. You can read the Governor’s full remarks.

The facilitator, Jon Faine AM, then formally called on speakers.

Three speakers each presented a question to the group, which they explored in a short presentation. Following the three presentations, guests were invited to participate in a facilitated discussion to further explore the topic.

Speakers and Questions

Emeritus Professor Judith Brett AM, La Trobe University: From 1901 to 1927 the Federal Parliament and government were located in Melbourne. What, if any, effect did this have on the new Commonwealth of Australia?

Associate Professor Carolyn Holbrook, Contemporary Histories Research Group, Deakin University: Why did Federation in 1901 fail to inspire Australians as a moment of national birth, and what consequences does this failure have for our democracy?

Professor Marilyn Lake AO, Honorary Professorial Fellow, History, The University of Melbourne: When Federation created a new political community called the Commonwealth of Australia what were its ideals and who were imagined as its citizens?

Background information

On 15 December 1900, the Earl of Hopetoun sailed into Sydney Harbour to take up his position as Australia’s first Governor-General. He chose, in what Deakin called “Hopetoun’s blunder”, William Lyne, then Premier of NSW, to be the first Prime Minister and to assemble a Ministry drawn from all States. Lyne (unable to do so in the face of resistance) resigned on 24 December and advised Hopetoun that Edmund Barton from NSW be appointed.

Barton chose the first Ministry he had planned with Alfred Deakin - the prominent proponent of Federation from Victoria. Deakin became Australia’s first Attorney-General with Barton as the first Prime Minister and Barton was successful in winning the first federal election with this team. As history records, Deakin succeeded him as the second Prime Minister of Australia in 1903.

The first celebrations of Federation and swearing in of the Governor-General were held in NSW in January 1901, as agreed, in the first settled and largest colony which had given ambivalent support for this new Commonwealth. In May 1901, Victoria celebrated the opening of the first Federal Parliament in the Royal Exhibition buildings, an event immortalised in the Tom Roberts painting. Federation had been strongly supported by Victorians, where the final Yes vote was over 94 per cent. And the Governor-General took up residence in Government House, Victoria, a residence familiar to him and his family from his time as Governor of Victoria (1889-1895).

Deakin wrote “A federal constitution is the last and final product of political intellect and constructive ingenuity …[t]o frame such a constitution is a great task for any body of men [sic] …[y]et …among all the federal constitutions of the world you will look in vain for one as broad in its popular base, as liberal in its working principles, as generous in its aim, as this measure” (Deakin, 1898).

Through the many debates and conventions that led to the creation of a federal Australia, there was an acute understanding of the significant democratic features of its construction. Much was written, including poetry, to capture the importance of this birth of a nation.

Much was written at the time and since about how this Constitution was shaped by the people of Australia in peace, not by war and conflict; that change to it was to be by the Australian people; and it was argued to be the most democratic in its enfranchisement of those people.

Yet since that creation, Federation as the birth of the nation Australia has not loomed large in the telling of our history. There are many questions to be asked about the Australia that was created at and by Federation and the role of Victoria in that process. And we should question why that peaceful moment has not been the hallmark of our nation - but rather our Anzac moment in the Great War that followed.

The impact of that Constitution and our Federation has remained part of our development. In recent times we have been reminded of the role of the States in our Federation as responsibility for the health of citizens found expression in State regulation of many aspects of our lives and we recognised that State borders were more than lines on a map of Australia.

Recently we have also experienced once more the role of referenda in expressing the will of the people about potential changes to the Australian constitution. Over more than a hundred years very few referenda have been successful, since the Constitution was enacted. Yet the hope of those who argued for Federation was that referenda would allow Australia to respond to change by consulting the people and changing the Constitution as needed (Holbrook, 2017).

In the conventions and debates that led to Federation questions were asked and decided about who should be ‘the people’ enfranchised in this new nation. And those answers continue to resonate in questions we ask about political representation of the Australian people, whether it be by gender, race or citizenship. Questions about the type of democracy being created at Federation were canvassed from how the States should be represented through to the possibility of a republic.

The first decades of the Federation were played on the political stage in what is now the Victorian Parliament in the city of Melbourne in the State that was among the most committed to a federation that became the Commonwealth of Australia.

Looking back on Federation, explanations that seek the driving concerns in bringing this idea of a new nation to realisation have ranged across the economic, political and cultural circumstances of the time and the various conjunctions of these matters. There are particular politicians and activists and organisations that had important roles, as well as the moment in the history of Empire and the colonies that formed Australia.

In asking these questions, we explore the possibilities of the society we have created as we moved from colony to a federation of States in a new nation.

The first discussion in the Understanding Victoria event series, titled "Disturbing the order of things": The impact of the Gold Rush on ideas, identity and society in Victoria, was held in May 2024.

This discussion explored a significant period in the early years of the State of Victoria, Australia. An excerpt of the December issue of the Victorian Historical Journal, which describes the presentations in detail, is available via the attachment below.

Background information

The gold rush in Victoria is generally described as occurring over the period from around 1851 to the late 1860s.

In 1850 the British Parliament passed the Australian Colonies Bill which provided for the establishment of a new colony. The Colony of Victoria was declared on 1 July 1851, marking its separation from the Colony of New South Wales where it had been designated as the Port Phillip District from 1836 to 1850.

The announcement of the discovery of gold on 2 July 1851 in Victoria in Mount Alexander near Castlemaine was coincident with the foundation of the new colony. The role of government was immediately significant, with Lieutenant Governor Charles La Trobe introducing the gold licence system on 23 August 1851.

The first two decades of the new colony, Victoria, were marked by this phenomenal and transformative change. The gold rush brought intense activity and movement of people, changing the landscape through clearing and digging, and changing the development of the colony by the creation of many temporary settlements and eventually a series of new permanent settlements and towns, as well as a burgeoning and marvellous Melbourne.

Victoria’s First Peoples were involved in and materially affected by the rapid expansion of settlement and diggings, coming as it did after the conflicts and displacement of earlier settlement prior to the separation of the colony.

Immigrants from other nations, principally Europe, the UK, Canada and the USA, but also from China, flooded into the new colony. This added to the significant migration of people from other colonies. Between 1851 and 1861 it is estimated that the population of Victoria grew from 75,000 people to 500,000. In 1855, around 19,000 Chinese immigrants were in Victoria.

Art, music and writing attempted to capture and respond to the ferment that the gold rush occasioned. There are bush ballads, many drawings and some paintings created at the time, speaking to the time.

David Goodman (1994:xiv) argues that contemporaries agreed that the gold rushes “were a disturbance to the normal order of things” most particularly the disturbance occasioned by the opportunity to become very wealthy without much work or effort.

There was also a unique event, the Eureka Rebellion, which encompassed the Battle of the Eureka Stockade on 3 December 1854. It is clear this event affected the constitution of the parliament of Victoria, that it was marked by dissemination of Chartist ideas and led to adult male suffrage. However, its long-term significance and its representation is contested.

Was there a lasting impact on Victoria as we know it today? And if there was, how did it affect our society, politically, socially and culturally?