Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
Postwar Prosperity
When the war ended, the story of modern Western Australia began to unfold. Under the
banner of 'postwar reconstruction', the federal government set about transforming Aus-
tralia with a policy of assisted immigration, designed to populate Australia more densely as
a defence against the 'hordes' of Asia. Many members of this new work force found jobs in
the mines, where men and machines turned over thousands of tonnes of earth in search of
the precious lode. On city stock exchanges, the names of such Western Australian mines as
Tom Price, Mt Newman and Goldsworthy became symbols of development, modernisation
and wealth. Now, rather than being a wasteland that history had forgotten, the west was be-
coming synonymous with ambition, and a new spirit of capitalist pioneering. As union
membership flourished, labour and capital entered into a pact to turn the country to profit.
In the Kimberley, the government built the gigantic Ord River Irrigation Scheme, which
boasted that it could bring fertility to the desert - and which convinced many Western Aus-
tralians that engineering and not the environment contained the secret of life.
There was so much country, it hardly seemed to matter that salt was starting to poison
the wheat belt or that mines scoured the land. In 1952 the British exploded their first nucle-
ar bomb on the state's Monte Bello Islands. And when opponents of the test alleged that
nuclear clouds were drifting over Australia, the government scoffed. The land was big -
and anyway, we needed a strong, nuclear-armed ally to protect us in the Cold War world.
Once bankrupt and convicted of corporate fraud, Alan Bond's wealth was estimated at $265 million by
Business Review Weekly
in 2008.
This spirit of reckless capitalism reached its climax in the 1980s when the state became
known as 'West Australia Inc' - a reference to the state in operation as a giant corporation
in which government, business and unions had lost sight of any value other than specula-
tion and profit. The embodiment of this brash spirit was an English migrant named Alan
Bond, who became so rich that he could buy anything he pleased. In 1983 he funded a
sleek new racing yacht called
Australia II
in its challenge for the millionaire's yachting
prize, the America's Cup. Equipped with a secret - and now legendary - winged keel, the
boat became the first non-American yacht to win the race. It seemed as though everyone in
Australia was cheering on the day Bond held aloft the shining silver trophy.
