Chapter 168 Capital Territory
"Your Highness, there are several important matters that I would like to ask your opinion on." Prime Minister Evan said straight to the point: "Both of these matters came from the proposals of the House of Commons. The first thing was proposed by a member of the House of Commons. Build a palace that is in line with Your Highness's status and serve as the official residence of the Australian royal family. At the same time, rebuild a national government building. The current national government building was transformed from the former colonial government building in New South Wales. Its scale and facilities have been None of them are suitable for the current Australia."
"In addition, our current capital Sydney is also the capital of New South Wales, which is not easy to manage. In fact, New South Wales's management of Sydney is also very troublesome. Therefore, some members have proposed to form the Capital Territory near Sydney and make it completely independent from New South Wales, and the capital of New South Wales will also be moved elsewhere." Prime Minister Evan said.
"Currently, these two proposals have gained the approval of many people in the House of Commons and have therefore been sent to the Cabinet for preliminary decision. We investigated the situation in the House of Commons and found that there is not a minority supporting these two decisions. At least half of them have already Members of Parliament support these two proposals, so your Highness’s decision is needed.” After explaining all the circumstances, Prime Minister Evan looked at Arthur, waiting for Arthur’s decision.
"Huh?"
Arthur did not expect that more than three years after arriving in Australia, he and all members of the royal family had not yet considered building a palace, but members of the House of Commons had actually begun to worry about the royal family.
Although the Australian royal family does not currently have a real palace, one of the two places where they can live is a small manor, and the other is a temporary reconstruction of the top floor of the Government Affairs Building, not to mention that the Government Affairs Building is a reconstruction of the previous colonial Government Affairs Building.
Compared with other monarchies in the world, Australia's royal family currently seems to be extremely simple.
In the eyes of European nobles, Arthur's small manor is just a temporary vacation place, and it is not ranked high in the eyes of major European royal families.
This is also a point of concern to members of the House of Commons. It is time for the royal family to have a large-scale palace, which can not only demonstrate the authority of the Australian royal family to the outside world, but also enhance the prestige of Australia.
After all, for a monarchy, the royal family and the country both prosper and suffer. The power and dignity of the royal family can bring a lot of prestige and prestige to the country, while the decline and financial difficulties of the royal family can also damage the country's prestige.
Thinking of this, Arthur said: "It is indeed time to build a palace. At least when entertaining foreign guests, we can have a more solemn place and venue. The same is true for the government. Our current government building is indeed relatively simple. In In the early days of the founding of the country, due to various reasons, we did not build a new government building. Instead, we directly used the government building from the Australian colonial period. Now that Australia is not short of funds and manpower, it is time to build a new government building. "
Prime Minister Evan, let your government decide on the Government Affairs Building. The new palace construction plan is about to begin. I hope that the distance between the Government Affairs Building and the palace will not be too far. This will also facilitate the convening of cabinet meetings and Summoned." Arthur ordered.
If a new palace is to be built, the location will inevitably be far away from the current center of Sydney.
Because the current planning of Sydney's city center has almost been completed, there is not much space to build a complete palace.
There are also many factories near Sydney. Although the current pollution emissions are not too high, Sydney's air quality has begun to decline.
Arthur did not want the palace he had worked so hard to build to face serious problems with poor air quality decades later.
After all, quality of life and safety issues are very important to the royal family, and building the palace in a relatively remote suburb of Sydney is also a good choice.
"Yes, Your Highness. I will have people design the design of the new government building as soon as possible. After the palace site is selected, construction will begin near the palace." Prime Minister Evan nodded hurriedly and responded.
The construction of a new government building is good news for everyone in government. The previous government building was indeed dilapidated, and some of the wooden doors inside even made creaking sounds when they were opened and closed.
Although officials generally do not complain about their office environment, compared with the new government affairs building, I believe all officials will choose the latter.
"As for the establishment of the Capital Territory, Prime Minister Evan, what do your cabinet think?" After the issues of the palace and the new government building are resolved, the only remaining issue is about the establishment of the Capital Territory. But this is currently the biggest change in Australia. The establishment of the Capital Territory also means that the situation in the six states of Australia is about to change. The Capital Territory is at least a political division on the same level as the six states.
"Your Highness, we are a typical immigrant country. This is good news for the growth of our population, but it also creates many hidden dangers." Prime Minister Evan said.
"Although our total population is currently as high as 4.26 million, most of the population actually lives on the southeastern coast, and the rest of the population also lives on the southwest, southern and eastern coasts. Especially in our six states The total population of the capital has exceeded 1.53 million. Especially the capital of New South Wales, which is our capital Sydney and the capital of Victoria, Melbourne, the populations of these two cities have reached 530,000 and 530,000 respectively. Four hundred and seventy thousand, accounting for one-third and nearly one-half of their respective states. Their population can even be compared with ours in Western Australia," Prime Minister Evan explained.
“Although this is a common phenomenon for immigrant countries, it has also brought us many problems. For example, the population of each state is basically concentrated in cities, the population in the interior is too small, and even most areas are currently uninhabited. I think the proposal to establish the Capital Territory is not an option for our current situation. Even, if necessary, I think the current political situation in Australia can be changed. Australia's current six states are too different in size and population. The disparity also makes a huge difference.”
"Excluding the exception of Tasmania, our current situation in Australia is that states with smaller land areas have more people, and states with larger land areas have less people. Western Australia and South Australia together account for most of Australia's The land area is less than one-third of Australia's population. For Western Australia and South Australia, the land area they own is too large, but the population is the smallest among several states. It is difficult to manage such a large land. . However, the urban population in the southeast is so developed that the population of one city is equivalent to that of a state in the west. It is indeed necessary to establish a capital territory to avoid the embarrassment that our capital and the capital of New South Wales are the same city. situation. I believe that a capital territory covering the entire city and suburbs of Sydney should be established south of Newcastle in the north of Sydney and north of Alberst in the south of Sydney. The capital of New South Wales can be moved to the north of Sydney Newcastle, which is the largest city in New South Wales after Sydney, also has a population of more than 200,000." Prime Minister Evan said.
Arthur nodded silently. Prime Minister Evan spoke for a long time, analyzing the immigration situation in Australia, and finally brought up the issue of the huge population gap between southeastern and western Australia.
But this is definitely not something that can be changed in a short time. Australia's coastal population accounts for the majority of the total population and has not changed until later generations. This is also a factor created by Australia's unique environment and climate.
Historically, after the establishment of the federation, Australia's capital was temporarily set in Melbourne. After Sydney developed more than Melbourne, in order to comply with the public opinion of the two cities, the capital was set in the middle of the two cities and a new city name was established. It's called Canberra.
The establishment of the Capital Territory at that time was just after the establishment of Canberra. This was also because Australia's early immigration wave in history was not as vigorous as it is now.
Historically, most of Australia's early immigrants came from England and Ireland within the British Empire. Only a few Europeans from other countries chose to immigrate to Australia.
But it is different now. In addition to the British Empire as a stable source of immigrants to Australia, Australia also has two major sources of immigrants, Germany and France.
In particular, the British Empire and Germany can provide more than 150,000 immigrants to Australia every year. This is why Australia's population is growing so rapidly.
"Well, in order to avoid the conflict between the capital and the capital, it is indeed time to establish a directly affiliated capital territory. This matter is also left to the cabinet. The scope of the capital territory must be considered well, so that the future capital territory It has development potential, but New South Wales cannot lose too much land and population." Arthur finally nodded and handed over the matters of the Capital Territory to the cabinet.
"Yes, Your Highness. We will consider it carefully and hand it over to you as soon as possible after discussing the result." Prime Minister Evan replied.
"Just, Your Highness, what do you think the administrative status of the Capital Territory should be? Should it be placed in a political division at the same level as the state, or should it be treated as a special political unit?" Prime Minister Evan asked.
No matter what political level it is, it is at least an important division on the same level as the state. This also means that Australia is about to add a new position similar to that of a governor, and because the territory has the capital of Australia, the positions of officials in the Capital Territory are higher in status than officials in local states.
"Since it is the Capital Territory, it is not appropriate to place the political level at any level. I decided to make the Capital Territory a new administrative unit and manage it directly under the government." Arthur said with a smile.
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(end of this chapter)