Rise of Australia

Chapter 559 Timor-Leste State

As the time came to September 1921, 9, the scheduled voting time for the new administrative divisions officially ended.

The results were not as expected by Arthur and the government. The highly recognized administrative division design received more than 487% of the 79.4 million votes cast and was officially confirmed by the Australasian government as the new administrative division design.

Now that the new administrative division design has been determined, the next important thing is to improve the governance system of the newly established Northern Australia and the Capital Territory, and to effectively implement the scope of each state and clarify the ownership of the land.

Of all the states in regional Australia, South Australia and South West South Wales are the two that have seen the biggest changes.

Both states have lost more than half of their area and are facing considerable political reforms.

But the good news is that the capitals of the newly formed Northern Australia and the Capital Territory have been determined. Only corresponding state governments need to be established in Darwin and St. Arthur's Castle, and the administrative systems of these two states can be established accordingly.

Fortunately for Northern Australia, Darwin is the largest city in northern Australia, and such changes are completely acceptable.

The Capital District does not have a so-called capital. It is a special administrative district established specifically for the capital. The political core is St. Arthur's Castle, the new capital of Australasia.

But there is a problem. The construction of Fort St. Arthur is still in progress, and there are certain difficulties in establishing the state government.

However, within the current scope of the Capital District, because most of it is in the Murray River Basin plain, the population is not large, and management is relatively simple.

But only a relatively simple state government needs to be established to manage some small cities in the Capital Region.

It is also possible to wait until the construction of St. Arthur's Castle is completed before properly controlling the entire Capital District. After all, the Capital District serves the capital. The capital has not yet been built, and other work will naturally be postponed.

In fact, most of the people who disagree with this new administrative division are from New South Wales and Sydney.

This is actually easy to understand. This new administrative division caused New South Wales to lose most of its land in the west, and also caused Sydney to lose its capital status.

Although this is a change made with the overall interests of the country in mind, the people will not think that much.

Especially the people of Sydney. After Sydney is no longer the capital, but a special economic city, the treatment enjoyed by Sydney will naturally be lower.

Although no city can rival Sydney in a short period of time, Sydney's glory is no longer what it once was.

Even if these people object, they cannot change the fact that administrative divisions are a foregone conclusion.

On September 1921, 9, the Australasian government officially issued a proclamation on changing administrative divisions. Arthur also officially announced the establishment of the Capital Territory and Northern Australia, and changed the Capital Territory to the Territory of Sydney.

Two new state-level administrative districts have been added, correspondingly two new state houses must be added, and the proportional distribution of states in the House of Representatives must also be adjusted.

However, the number of people in the House of Representatives will not change. 298 people is already quite large.

Of course, taking this opportunity, it also took the opportunity to announce the localization of Timor.

Starting from September 9, the Australian Colony of Timor will be officially renamed as the Direct State of Timor. Together with Northern Australia and the Capital Territory, it will establish corresponding state governments and state parliaments to become a new state-level administrative region in Australasia.

This was the first step in the localization of the Australasian colonies. Next, many colonies, including New Guinea, would also become an important part of the localization.

However, colonial localization is not that simple.In addition to having its own industrial scale, the corresponding infrastructure, as well as the popularization of medical care and education must also keep up with the local pace.

I believe that with the vigorous development of the government, the localization of New Guinea, the royal territory, and many nearby islands is inevitable. It is nothing more than the length of time.

Because the capital, St. Arthur's Castle, is still under construction, the capital of the Capital District is temporarily located in Broken Hill, a small city north of St. Arthur's Castle.

Broken Hill was originally a famous mining city in New South Wales and the largest resident in the arid region of eastern Australia.

After being divided into the Capital District this time, Broken Hill has naturally become the largest and most famous city in the Capital District besides the cities under construction.

Of course, because it is a mining city, Broken Hill's population is destined not to be too large, and it currently only has a little over 7000 people.

Setting up the capital of the Capital Region here is only temporary and will be moved as soon as St. Arthur's Castle is built.

In fact, there are many mining cities in Australasia like Broken Hill. Although their populations are not large, they have become internationally famous in terms of minerals.

Broken Hill is the largest silver, lead, and zinc mining center in Australasia, and is also a world-famous silver, lead, and zinc mine producing area.

Most of the minerals produced here are transported by rail to Port Pirie, where they are smelted or exported abroad.

Because of the mineral resources, Broken Hill has a developed railway, which is also the reason why the government decided to make Broken Hill the temporary capital of the Capital Territory.

After all, as the capital of a state, the transportation conditions must be good, and at least it must be able to communicate quickly and effectively with the government.

Other small cities are not included in Australasia's original railway line planning. If they are set as capitals, corresponding railways will have to be built for the temporary capitals, which is not only time-consuming and labor-intensive, but also uneconomical.

In order to show his importance to the three newly established states, Arthur successively participated in the establishment ceremonies of the Capital Territory, Northern Australia and Timor state governments, as well as the election ceremonies of the state houses.

The candidate of the governor also needs to be elected by the state assembly, so it can only be held concurrently by the mayor of the capital city, or like Timor, the former colonial governor temporarily serves as governor, waiting for the final election by the state assembly.

Finally, Arthur, who returned to Sydney, also appeased the people of Sydney.As the largest city in Australasia, Sydney has a population of more than 300 million, and the emotions of these people still need to be taken care of.

Arthur gave a public speech, reassuring that even if Sydney was no longer the capital of Australasia, it would still be the most important city in Australasia.

In addition, Sydney's welfare policies will not be reduced in any way, Sydney Palace will be retained, and Arthur will come to live from time to time.

With Arthur's various guarantees, this was able to appease the hearts of Sydneysiders and allow the administrative division change to proceed smoothly. Sydneysiders also accepted the fact that Sydney would not be the capital in the future.

In fact, for these Sydney people, they still have another option, which is to follow Arthur to St. Arthur's Castle.As a newly developed city, the land value of Fort St. Arthur is naturally not as high as Sydney.

And because the government is vigorously developing the new capital, it encourages the Australasian population to move to the new capital, St. Arthur's Castle. The government will provide land at a lower price to ensure that the population of the new capital has a place to live.

This choice is divided into two types, one is the agricultural population of St. Arthur's Castle and nearby agricultural cities.

Because of the vast Murray River Basin, each agricultural population going to agricultural cities can obtain at least 5 acres of land. This level far exceeds the per capita cultivated land area in Australasia and can also ensure the income of these agricultural populations.

Secondly, it is to purchase real estate in St. Arthur's Castle, including land, built houses, etc.

People can choose to buy ready-made houses or buy land to build their own houses, turning themselves into residents of the new capital through real estate.

The current housing prices in the new capital are far lower than those in Sydney, which also means that some people can easily sell their properties and live in St. Arthur's Castle regardless of losses.

Of course, in order to ensure that St. Arthur's real estate prices will not grow uncontrollably and that Sydney's economy will not fall into a downturn due to the loss of a large number of people, the government also has a number limit for the first batch of people in St. Arthur's. of.

The first batch of residents of St. Arthur's Castle was about 10 people. All of these 10 people immigrated from big cities such as Sydney and Melbourne to ensure that they would not affect the economy and order of other small cities.

The second batch of immigrants will not be considered until the construction and development of St. Arthur's Castle reaches a stable state, but the final resident population of St. Arthur's Castle will not exceed 30.

After the number of people is guaranteed to be at the level of 30, the next development will depend on St. Arthur Castle itself.

However, thanks to its reputation as the capital of Australasia, I believe St. Arthur's Castle is still developing very quickly.

Although it won't become a big city with a population of one million in a short time, it will be no problem to become the largest and most developed city in the Capital District.

At present, the construction of the new capital has been going on for more than two years. Various construction projects have actually taken shape. The construction of the city center has already established a basic framework, and some houses have even begun to be occupied.

However, to serve as the capital of a country, the current construction of St. Arthur Castle is far from enough.

The first is the construction of the State Council, the seat of the national government.At present, more than half of the total construction progress of the Government Affairs Council has been completed, and it is expected to be completed around 1923.

This also means that the cabinet government can move to St. Arthur's Castle as early as 1924, thus effectively moving the capital to St. Arthur's Castle.

The construction of the royal palace will lag far behind.This is not to say that the construction of the palace has been delayed. Compared with the construction of the Government Affairs Council, the construction of the palace is larger and more expensive.

Arthur's budget for the new palace is as high as 1.5 million Australian dollars, which is not much different from the 5 million dollars the government has allocated for the development of the new capital and the Murray River Basin. (US$5 million equals A$2 million)
The funds used to build an entire area were used to build a palace. The luxury and size of the new palace can be seen.

It is precisely because the construction of the New Palace is so huge that the current construction progress of the New Palace is only about one-third, and it is expected to be completed around 1925 at the earliest.

Judging from the construction progress of the new palace and the Government Affairs Council, the government moved the capital around 1926. From the time the decision was made to move the capital, it took at least 8 to 9 years to complete the entire move.

Less than three years have passed so far, and the work of moving the capital still takes longer. This is also a common problem in modern countries.

The relocation of ancient countries was much simpler. After all, the political system of ancient countries was simpler than that of modern times, and the political institutions were not that complex.

However, the relocation of the capital of a modern country needs to take into account the coordination between complex political institutions and the impact on the economy of the two places where the capital is moved.

Generally speaking, relocating the capital within ten years or so is considered relatively fast.Like some who have ambitious goals for the construction of a new capital, moving the capital may take decades to complete.

Arthur had no such goal. Rather than building a new megacity, Arthur preferred a medium-sized vision of a population of 10 for the new capital.

Too much population will also cause problems of one kind or another. A large population will inevitably develop industries and other industries, which will cause serious pollution to the city and the environment.

Although Arthur had attached great importance to environmental protection when developing industry, the industrial equipment of this era was not designed with environmental protection in mind, and the pollution to the environment was quite serious.

Fortunately, Australasia is like those industrially developed cities in Europe and the United States. The air quality and environment are relatively poor, and even water resources are polluted.

You know, for the relatively serious industrial pollution in European and American countries, London has a reputation of nice cars, nice wine, and smelly London.

Arthur didn't want to experience such severe industrial pollution, which not only harmed his physical and mental health, but also severely affected his mood.

After all, the capital is an area where the royal family needs to live for a long time, and environmental protection in the capital still needs to be strictly implemented.

This is the real reason why Australasia's largest industrial area is located in Western Australia, far away from the capital.

In the construction of the capital, St. Arthur's Castle, Arthur took expert advice and completely separated St. Ansel's Castle from industry.

Even if St. Arthur's Castle is fully built in the future, there will be no heavy polluting industries.

The future St. Arthur's Castle will be the administrative center, economic center and cultural center of Australasia.

As for industry and agriculture, according to the government's construction plan, small agricultural cities will be built near Australasia to provide sufficient food supply for the capital.

The distance between industrial cities and the capital is even further, with the nearest being dozens of kilometers away, ensuring that the environment of the capital will not be greatly affected.

With the industry stripped away, the size of the capital is destined not to be too large. Maintaining a medium-sized population and economy can already meet the requirements of the capital.

In most cases, the bigger the capital, the more developed the economy, the better.After comprehensive consideration, Arthur preferred to limit the population and economy of the new capital to a certain range, and not to make it too large.

　The third update of 4000 words, asking for a monthly ticket, asking for support!

　　
　
(End of this chapter)