ABSTRACT
Australia was born a bureaucratic state in 1788 when the British government established a colony of settlement in the Antipodes and vested its entire administration in a group of officials appointed by and responsible to the Crown. A key element of this centralized structure was the office of the Secretary to the Colony. During Governor Macquarie’s rule, more concrete steps were taken to improve administrative methods to cope with the increasing volume of business in the colony. Government servants who were not precluded from engaging in free trade served as “a powerful inducement to officials to regard their public duty as secondary”. The remuneration of officers followed the pattern of the parent colony. The Imperial Act of 1823 provided for a Legislative Council in New South wales basically to advise and assist the governor in the exercise of his powers, prerogatives, and responsibilities.
