The House That Jack Built : Jack Mundey, Green Bans Hero [1 ed.] 9781742247816, 9781742235011

Citation preview

The House that Jack Built

JAMES ( JIM) COLMAN is a Sydney-based architect, planner and part-time university lecturer. From an initial intensive period of architectural practice in Sydney, Papua New Guinea, UK and Ghana he later moved into urban design and town planning. Early heritage studies in New South Wales and Victoria led to what became a long-standing commitment to the protection of built heritage and the natural environment. As a freelancer he has written extensively for the professional and popular press, work for which he was awarded the 1995 George Munster Prize by the Australian Centre for Independent Journalism at the University of Technology, Sydney. He is a Fellow of the Australian Institute of Architects and the Planning Institute of Australia. From 2006–2011 he served as a Vice-President of the International Society of City and Regional Planners. Currently he maintains a small consulting practice coupled with teaching assignments at UNSW, University of Sydney and WSU.

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The House that Jack Built jack Mundey Green Bans hero

James Colman

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This publication was supported by the City of Sydney’s History Publication Sponsorship Program. A NewSouth book Published by NewSouth Publishing University of New South Wales Press Ltd University of New South Wales Sydney NSW 2052 AUSTRALIA newsouthpublishing.com © James Colman 2016 First published 2016 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 This book is copyright. Apart from any fair dealing for the purpose of private study, research, criticism or review, as permitted under the Copyright Act, no part of this book may be reproduced by any process without written permission. Inquiries should be addressed to the publisher. National Library of Australia Cataloguing-in-Publication entry Title: The house that Jack built: Jack Mundey, green bans hero / James Colman. ISBN: 9781742235011 (paperback) 9781742247816 (epdf) Subjects: Mundey, Jack, 1929 Australian Building Construction Employees’ and Builders’ Labourers’ Federation. Labor union members – New South Wales – Biography. Labor unions – Political activity – New South Wales. Conservationists – New South Wales – Biography. Political activists – New South Wales – Biography. Construction industry – Environmental aspects – New South Wales. Labour unions – Australia – History. Dewey Number: 331.8819092 Design Stan Lamond Cover design Xou Creative Cover image Jack Mundey, 1976. Copyright held by Rennie Ellis Photographic Archive. Frontispiece: Jack Mundey by Robert Hanaford, 2001. Reproduced by kind permission of the artist. Printer Griffin Press All reasonable efforts were taken to obtain permission to use copyright material reproduced in this book, but in some cases copyright could not be traced. The author welcomes information in this regard. This book is printed on paper using fibre supplied from plantation or sustainably managed forests.

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Foreword

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t’s impossible to look at Sydney’s streets without mourning the demolition of heritage buildings during an era when destruction of the old was equated with progress; destruction not only of buildings but also whole precincts. Occasionally I think of what might have been if some inspired premier – in the late 1950s or early 1960s – had declared a protection zone over old sandstone Sydney and decreed modern buildings had to be located beyond this core. No … too far-fetched, too sweet a fantasy. The generation that survived the Depression was intent on progress and modernity. Their vision didn’t accommodate heritage zones: ‘You can’t stop progress.’ Every skyscraper was a symbol of Australia Unlimited, and the country’s booming confidence.This thinking was probably a symbol of our insecurity and our desperation to ‘keep up’ with the rest of the world. Then something happened. Enter stage left, a genuine radical who found himself asserting that this doesn’t have to be. Jack Mundey said that we could save our precious urban bushland and our colonial buildings.There are more stakeholders in this city than the developers and their friends in the Town Hall and Macquarie Street. There existed, he implied, a community stake. This was wholly refreshing.

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It was an invitation for governments like Gough Whitlam’s and Neville Wran’s to do things differently, to elevate an agenda of urban conservation. By the time I became NSW Minister for Planning and Environment in 1984, the hard work had been done; there was a Heritage Council backed by a Heritage Act, and an efficient flow of recommendations to the minister’s desk advising further inquiry or the imposition of a temporary or permanent heritage order before a heritage building or a piece of natural environment would be lost. The whole planning system quickly caught up with the community aspiration, one that had been placed on the table by the unlikely intervention of the Builders Labourers’ Federation and its state secretary. I was honoured as premier to acknowledge this history and appoint Jack Mundey as Chair of the Historic Houses Trust. A friend was generous enough to say to me, ‘That showed that politics is about more than public finance; there are other agendas for government.’ The public trusted Jack Mundey as a rare leader who edged onto the public agenda a new notion: saving the urban environment. He countered raw corporate and developer power, and its political influence. It’s worth dwelling on Jim Colman’s account of the abuse directed Jack Mundey’s way – as if to be right before your time is to be wrong. But whenever a citizen’s eye is caught by a row of terraces or a 19th-century church facade or by the occasional grand structure like the Queen Victoria Building – saved not because of green bans but the resultant movement they unleashed – they might spare a thought for the plucky industrial adventurer who stood up and said there is a different way.

Professor the Hon. Bob Carr, Sydney, 2015

Foreword

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Contents Foreword by Bob Carr . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . vi Preface . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xi CHAPTER 1

From the dairy to the big smoke . . . . . . . . . 1

CHAPTER 2

How green was my valley … or was it? . . . 19

CHAPTER 3

A city and a river . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 56

CHAPTER 4

Grass-roots stirrings . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 81

CHAPTER 5

Big issues, big battles . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 152

CHAPTER 6

Strange bedfellows . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 204

CHAPTER 7

After the bans . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 228

CHAPTER 8

Today and tomorrow . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 271

Epilogue by Joan Domicelj . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 296 Endnote by Meredith Burgmann . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 300



Key events in the evolution of the conservation movement in Australia and internationally . . . . . . 302

APPENDIX 2

Jack Mundey – Honours and awards . . . . . . . . . . . 306

APPENDIX 3

Jack Mundey – Life/career chronology . . . . . . . . . 308

APPENDIX 4

Select list of green ban sites c. 1970s . . . . . . . . . . . 312

APPENDIX 1

Acknowledgements . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Notes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Index . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

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318 321 336 343

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Preface

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his book is about a man and a movement. The man is Jack Mundey. The movement is Australia’s heritage: things we want to keep – our treasured urban spaces, buildings and places, and the social values with which those places are associated. It is also about leadership, and the way dedicated individuals like Mundey achieved the impossible in a political climate that was always unpredictable and in which values tended to range from those of the overzealous, save-at-all-costs enthusiasts to those of the cynics, the sceptics, the uninterested. And it is about that indefinable period in the nation’s history during which we came to realise – probably for the first time – that for most us, the city was home.We still loved the bush, but urban statistics told the story. Like it or not, we had largely become a nation of city dwellers. Fifty years ago, heritage had little or no standing in Australian law. Today, though, governments at every level and of all persuasions are bound by statute to engage directly or indirectly in heritage matters and projects. Fifty years ago, civil society had little or no influence in the field of urban conservation.Today we regularly see governments dealing with non-government organisations (NGOs) as a matter of course. But also today, after half a century of progress during which leaders like Jack Mundey were in the vanguard,

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there is strong evidence that the heritage business in Australia is again at a crossroads. Heritage and conservation laws,were put in place as a result of years of dedicated grass-roots action are now being weakened or repealed. Conservation budgets are being cut. Agencies are being emasculated or abolished.The survival of state-based Environmental Defenders Offices (EDOs) – members of a national network of environmental lawyers who provide specialist public interest law advice and who help community groups and individuals to use the law to protect the environment – is under a continuing cloud of uncertainty. The work of NGOs that are seen as excessively green is constantly under threat.1 Meanwhile, the interests of powerful individuals and lobby groups in the property and resources industries continue to capture the headlines – a throwback to the 1970s when the ‘green ban’ movement under Mundey was born. At that time, the movement added weight to incipient reforms in a number of states, and helped to trigger a wave of change that has seen no counterpart in the period to date. Now, though, almost half a century later, warning bells are starting to ring again and, in itself, that unwelcome sound provides another justification for this book. Heritage business is serious business. It is business of a special kind, demanding serious debate about matters that, as often as not, cannot be quantified. Both hearts and minds will be at work. Affairs of the heart tend to be risky, and the outcomes of debate can easily fall prey to the dominance of conservative governments, political pragmatists and economic rationalists, whose influence has the potential to derail or even destroy some of the valuable achievements of other more progressive elements in society. This book deals with some of those achievements and the values that inspired them. In particular it deals with the value system that

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underpins what has come to be known as heritage or urban conservation – somewhat bland, lifeless terms that fail to excite but which nevertheless have become part of the lexicon of contemporary urban planning. This book is also a reflection on how we as city dwellers have adapted to urban life: how we have responded to change in the fabric of our urban habitat and how we have developed certain values about the quality of that habitat. More particularly, it is a reflection on how our affection for certain inherited elements of that habitat can sometimes become so intense that we will go to great lengths to protect them. The business of protecting these treasured bits of our towns and cities has come to be known as heritage conservation. And as the following narrative will make clear, it is a business in which success does not come easily. Lying down in front of a bulldozer to save an old building is not for everyone. Nor is the daunting task of persuading sceptical politicians to pass new laws designed to achieve conservation objectives in the interests of the wider community. Community values lie behind everything that follows as we track the story of Jack Mundey’s influence on the way we in Australia plan and look after our cities. A concern for such values, with an inspirational understanding of the subtle links between those values and the bricks and mortar of our cultural heritage, has been Jack’s driving faith. It is Jack’s story, but it is not the full story – or the only story. If there is continuity here it will be found in the crisscrossing and overlapping of events involving Mundey, his followers, his detractors and his peers and heroes in the local and global conservation arena during the half-century under review. This book had its origins a decade or so ago when the author first approached Jack to discuss a possible biography. He was cautiously sympathetic: ‘Yes … but …’ His caution had two dimensions:

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he saw no need for (and nor did he want) a full-blown ‘life of Mundey’, but he had no quarrel with the suggestion that it was about time the green ban saga and its aftermath were presented to the widest possible audience. After many subsequent meetings and glasses of red the format was agreed. Jack’s career post 1950, when he first arrived in Sydney, would be linked with the subsequent emergence and rapid growth of the Australian heritage movement at local, state and national levels. Without Mundey, Australia and the world would not have seen the first of the green bans – a term he placed in the minds of millions. Without Mundey and his mates we would not have experienced the unprecedented spectacle of a militant left-wing trade union withdrawing its labour from building jobs – not to satisfy union self-interests but to serve the cultural and social interests of society at large. Without Mundey, Australia would have seen Sydney’s only intact and irreplaceable post-colonial townscape, The Rocks, summarily wiped off the map of the city when it was officially scheduled for total redevelopment in the late 1960s, to be replaced by towering new apartments, plush hotels, lifeless citadels of commerce. It was saved for posterity by trade union, resident and community activism. Without Mundey in Sydney and (to some extent Norm Gallagher in Melbourne) the trade union movement would not have been invigorated – if only temporarily – with a new spirit of concern for social and environmental issues that, in Mundey’s eyes, could and should sit comfortably alongside the more traditional priorities of improved working conditions and better wages. As for the green bans, wherever in Australia they were applied they brought breathing space, opportunities for alternatives to demolition, and an awakening of civic responsibility for heritage and urban history – especially in the big cities.

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Progress depends on leaders, and Mundey was a leader by any measure. He stands out as one of the many who provided the strength and inspiration that nourished the infant heritage movement of the 1950s and 1960s. Without their efforts the movement would not have achieved the level of influence and respect that came later and which (despite some worrying signs to the contrary) remains evident today. If there is one person in Australia who anchors this narrative, that person is Jack Mundey. His name has been synonymous with the urban conservation movement for over half a century, and this book is necessarily a tribute to his work. While Mundey the person enlivens most of the story, it is less about the person than it is about the extraordinary way he brought his values into the mainstream of the heritage debate from the 1950s, when he first settled in Sydney, right up to the present day. It is about the way an ordinary bloke from the bush invigorated and elevated the non-government heritage movement to a level at which political and legal reforms became not only feasible but also inevitable. By the mid 1970s part of his story was spreading offshore. London-based journalist Jon Tinker interviewed Mundey and others during a visit to Sydney early in 1974 to cover the green ban movement for New Scientist. Under the headline ‘Tin-hatted conservationist’, the piece described Mundey as ‘both the best-known unionist and the best-known conservationist in Australia’. For good measure – and to avoid accusations of partiality – Tinker also noted that ‘so far as the building employers are concerned, Jack Mundey is the most hated man in Australia’. The article is an incisive piece of reportage for its time, and its publication in a leading international journal is a reflection of the fact that within a few months of its peak, the story of the green bans

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and their leaders had attracted a global readership. But the article is important for another reason, in that it included quotes from Dr Moss Cass and author Patrick White. At the time, Cass was the federal Labor Minister for the Environment in the Gough Whitlam Government. Tinker claims that Cass described Mundey as ‘an intelligent and articulate unionist … a profoundly committed conservationist who exerts an increasing influence in the conservation movement as a whole. Green bans are immensely effective and ought to be supported by every Australian who cares about the environment.’ And White is cited as supportive of green bans, saying that ‘it is a rare thing to find a union with so advanced a social conscience’. These anecdotes say little about Jack Mundey’s personal life, the life of a man of simple tastes and unexceptional background. The ‘tough cookie’ (‘even pig-headed,’ as his friend, Sydney historian Shirley Fitzgerald, light-heartedly says)at the negotiating table, a man of passion when it came to the protection of the values of civil society from the corrosive forces that were often unleashed by big business, big government, big money, was gentle, warm-hearted and generous. 2 Jack Mundey knows only too well what personal tragedy is all about, having lost his first wife Stephanie to an incurable illness and an only son in a horrendous traffic accident. He also knows from direct experience what it is like to be sacked, to be unemployed, to be a leader of a trade union about to be dragged through the courts and ultimately deregistered. His tough and resilient character has always enabled him to survive a crisis and confidently prepare for the next. His love of jazz and live theatre, his sporting interests and his wide reading, as well as the incredibly strong 50-year bond he has with his second wife and soulmate Judy Wilcocks, who he married in November 1965, and his strong commitment to family, have all contributed to the robust

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and courageous leadership that was pivotal in helping the nascent Australian heritage movement to survive its first half century. Mundey’s timely efforts contributed to a revolution in the urban conservation movement and in the wider fields of urban planning and responsible environmental management. His story is an absolutely integral part of the wider saga that witnessed the rise of NGOs into positions of power and influence across many sectors of Australian society during the period under review. As Mundey saw it, the days of the old slash-and-burn philosophy, the roll-outthe-wrecking-balls-and-bulldozers approach to anything old, had served their purpose. Heritage had become a dwindling resource; it was time to take a stand. Society had much to lose when Whelan the Wrecker, a demolition company active in Sydney during the 1960s and 1970s, threatened to take out yet another distinguished building from an earlier time, only to see it replaced by a bland and aesthetically sterile piece of assembly line architecture. And society had much to lose when entire communities were faced with the loss of homes, meeting places, familiar and much-loved environments, the results of misguided and insensitive decisions by remote bureaucracies in the name of material progress. There had to be a better way, and Mundey helped to find it. The signals that came earlier from scattered reform initiatives in Victoria, South Australia and Tasmania, and which reached a peak during the green ban movement in the 1960s and 1970s, reverberated rapidly throughout Australian civil society. They galvanised action at the grass roots, and within the NGOs that shared Mundey’s concerns. The search for ways and means of reshaping the growth-is-good paradigm into a new and more sustainable ethic spread, nationally and globally. In its simplest form, this new ethic would accommodate legitimate development goals while safeguarding precious cultural, social and environmental resources

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and values for the benefit of future generations. And without making any conscious decision to do so, Mundey became a leader in this search. The boy from far north Queensland was finding his feet in the emerging world of environmental politics – and he never looked back. Mundey’s move to Sydney was fortuitous, and could simply be seen as a footnote to the narrative that follows. But a singular consequence of that move was that Sydney became Jack’s stamping ground and, for that reason alone, the story might be seen as lacking balance and fair coverage of important events and influential personalities in other cities and states. That would be a reasonable position to take. But the anchor to this chronicle is Mundey, the Sydneysider. Among all the heritage crusaders of the period under review, it was Mundey, the bloke from Sydney, who consistently captured the headlines. Mundey’s greatest victories were Sydney victories. Alone among the capital cities, Sydney was the scene of major experiments in urban regeneration under the Whitlam Government of the early 1970s – experiments that involved Mundey’s intervention by way of green bans and support for local grass-roots organisations. Mundey’s most formidable opponents tended to be Sydneysiders.3 Mundey served on the Sydney City Council, and he chaired the Historic Houses Trust, a Sydney-based statutory body. While he was never one to shirk an appearance or a challenge in other places, when he returned home it was to Sydney. Mundey and Sydney are inseparable. Inevitably, this narrative presents his career as a heritage activist as seen through the lens of Sydney’s history, Sydney’s politics, Sydney’s civic climate over the half century since his arrival from the far north. Even so, Jack Mundey would be the first to acknowledge that before he rose to prominence in the heritage business in the early 1970s there were other inspirational leaders in other

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cities and states, and that there were important success stories that deserve recognition as part of the overall national heritage mosaic as it was slowly created over this period and before. Mundey never saw himself as an evangelical party politician waving a partisan flag in the cause of radical reform. He showed no interest in climbing the ladder of ambition and was never a member of a mainstream political party. On the contrary, it is doubtful if he ever had a career plan and he certainly knew what it was like to be out of work … on the street, so to speak. Yet his achievements in so many fields, over more than half a century, contributed (to a greater or lesser degree) to major reforms in the law, in urban planning policy and practice, and especially in heritage conservation. History will determine whether Jack Mundey was a primary instigator of reform – and undoubtedly there were many others. But it seems undeniable that in Mundey we had a formidable and popular champion who was in the right place at the right time to pull the triggers of change and get things done.

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Chapter 1

From the dairy to the big smoke Where it all began …

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J

ack Mundey grew up on a farm, but for all of his adult life the city has been his stamping ground, his friendly place. He was born in 1929 in the rural township of Malanda on the Atherton Tableland in far north Queensland. His father was a farmer; his mother taught music. He was one of five children, all brought up and schooled as Roman Catholics. He turned 13 at the outbreak of the Second World War and grew up during the war in the Pacific which at one stage came close to the Queensland coast during the battles in the Coral Sea and Papua New Guinea. In 1950 he was entering his third year as an apprentice plumber when he decided to travel south to Sydney to accept an invitation to play a trial game of Rugby League football with the Parramatta club. By his own admission he was a useful player in the backline, and he played three seasons with that club before moving on to become captain/ coach of the Wentworthville and Riverstone Club. A mainstream job in the construction industry followed. Mundey abandoned his Catholic faith in 1955 and joined the Communist Party of Australia (CPA), as, he says, ‘a militant worker who judged communists … as people who wanted to make life better for ordinary workers.’1 Half a century later his somewhat tentative beginnings in the building industry are largely forgotten while he is increasingly seen as a national hero, honoured and respected as the doyen of the Australian heritage conservation movement. The accolades are numerous, and the list of official and honorary positions, including almost seven years as the chair of the Historic Houses Trust of New South Wales (HHT), is a strong testament to his commitment to the conservation principles that he himself helped to define.2 Today, though, Mundey is a worried man. He can see the values of conservation and heritage as being under attack, yet again. But if there were any bells ringing during the first few decades after

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the end of the Second World War they were not of the warning kind.They were celebratory, reminding us that as a nation we were moving from cultural adolescence to adulthood. The shifts were subtle and unpredictable, and there were obstacles in the way.They coincided with a sustained period of economic prosperity and population growth, augmented by an ambitious federally funded migration program. The political climate was conservative. Progress was unquestioningly seen as the inevitable outcome of wise economic management, sound investment decisions, and development – especially of the real estate kind. The notion that progress might involve something other than tangible benefits to the individual and to society at large was far from the popular mind, although such bestselling authors as JK Galbraith and EF Schumacher were beginning to ask serious questions about the western obsession with material progress and the value system at its base. One robust symbol of the prevailing social aspirations in Australia during this freewheeling post-war era was the name given to the crack railway express service of the day, linking Albury and Melbourne. The best that steam power could offer was The Spirit of Progress – widely advertised as the ultimate in speed, luxury, reliability and efficiency. That was what progress was all about. As with rail transport, so it was with the building industry, architecture, industrial design and civil engineering. Progress meant skyscrapers in city centres, huge new water storages, irrigation schemes to nourish hitherto arid farmlands, and a network of hydroelectric power plants in the Snowy Mountains wilderness, midway between Sydney and Melbourne. It meant the long-delayed transformation of the infant city of Canberra into a modern capital. Closer to home, progress brought big changes in the planning of dwellings and domestic interiors. Some adventurous souls even started living

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Above: The Malanda Hotel, 2015. Left: Malanda road sign. Both images courtesy Timothy Colman

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N

Cairns South

Lake Morris

Pacific

Atherton Tableland

Ocean Gordonvale

Lake Tinaroo

Atherton

Yungaburra

Cairns Malanda

Malanda

0

5

10

15

20 km

QLD

Above: Mundey country – Cairns and Malanda on the Atherton Tableland, North Queensland. Courtesy Cox Richardson Architects, Sydney

Following pages: Malanda countryside. Courtesy Timothy Colman

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in flats, a choice of housing that went against the approved respectability of a detached house on a quarter-acre block. With the Great Depression and Second World War now consigned to history, austerity gave way – it was ‘out with the old, in with the new’. Tiny boutique stores in the smarter parts of the capital cities began catering for those discerning city dwellers who were now turning to ‘contemporary design’, especially Scandinavian furniture and fabrics. Meanwhile, in the suburbs, popular housing design was marked by ‘featurism’, the cosmetic fads and fashions of which mandated the ‘moderne’ as the only way forward. In architecture, age and obsolescence became synonymous. Growth of any kind was good. Progress depended on economic growth and expansion; other values were necessarily secondary. When Mundey arrived in Sydney in 1950, a boom in property development was fast approaching. In a torrent of risk capital, new companies were hastily cobbled together by adventurous yet inexperienced entrepreneurs. Corporate executives were looking eagerly at old properties in the city centre as well as the green field sites that were becoming available on the outskirts as farmland was rezoned for urban use. Planning and environmental laws were nominal at best – local councils lacked skilled staff; enforcement procedures were lax.3 In the rapidly growing outer areas of both Sydney and Melbourne, even human health was at risk, given the widespread absence of sewerage and virtually no controls over air and water pollution.4 At the community level, serious grass-roots opposition to unwanted or uninvited development was likely to be poorly resourced, poorly organised, poorly timed – a situation exploited by developers, and quietly ignored by conservative politicians at a time when there was no statutory obligation for major development proposals to be placed on public exhibition. If it existed

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at all, grass-roots activism was weak and ephemeral. In the typical case it was seen by developers as a temporary irritant that would disappear as soon as the first concrete pour was in place. Even when heritage value was recognised and acknowledged, there was no protection for the properties concerned.

Dear Mr Minister, Further to my letter of November 14, 1950, about the preservation of this historic building …

Sydney cartoonist George Molnar, 1970 – a witty reminder of the official attitudes to heritage conservation that prevailed at the beginning of the green ban era. Courtesy Sydney Morning Herald, Fairfax media

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At stake here were questions that had yet to be given serious attention by any Australian government at any level. The most fundamental of these was the obvious one: what exactly is this thing called ‘heritage’? And assuming an answer to that question could be found, it immediately begged another: who holds responsibility for the management of heritage? It took some time for the first question to be answered definitively, but governments and property owners began to contemplate the second question with varying degrees of interest and concern. Was the management of a heritage property the responsibility of its owner? If so, was that owner thereby obliged to forgo a profitable and legally permissible redevelopment opportunity in order to, for example, save an old, attractive but obsolete structure from the bulldozer? Was the owner to be held responsible for maintaining the fabric of the building simply because it aroused the interest and affection of a few vociferous members of the local historical society? Or did the responsibility lie with government? If so, was the government prepared to buy the property at fair market value and accept the responsibility of maintaining it for posterity to enjoy? Or was it a responsibility for society at large? If so, how would this unusual responsibility be exercised? If, in attempting to answer these questions, you were searching the files for early attempts to define heritage, the trail would almost certainly lead offshore to Britain and the beginnings of a national concern for heritage that led to the establishment in 1895 of the National Trust for Places of Historic Interest and Natural Beauty, and the subsequent National Trust Act (UK) of 1907. Among early disciples were one of that trust’s founders, social reformer Octavia Hill, textile designer William Morris and art critic John Ruskin. And in Australia, as early as 1915 the Tasmanian Parliament enacted the Scenery Preservation Act, which provided for a board

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to undertake the ‘acquisition of lands of scenic or historic interest’.5 But the heritage community had to wait until 1972 – half a century and two world wars later – before the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) met in Paris and provided what was almost certainly the first internationally acceptable definition of ‘the cultural heritage’: • Monuments, architectural works, works of monumental sculpture and painting, elements or structures of an archaeological nature, inscriptions, cave dwellings, and combinations of features which are of outstanding universal value from the point of view of history, art or science; • Groups of buildings, groups of separate or connected buildings which, because of their architecture, their homogeneity or their place in the landscape, are of outstanding universal value from the point of view of history, art or science; and • Sites; works of man or the combined works of nature and of man, and areas including archaeological sites which are of outstanding universal value from the historical, aesthetic, ethnological or anthropological point of view.6 In 1974 in Australia, Prime Minister Gough Whitlam announced the establishment of the Commonwealth Committee of Inquiry into the National Estate, a historic decision that flowed directly from his 1972 pre-election policy speech in Sydney. In the inquiry’s report, the committee saw the UNESCO definition as relating only to cultural heritage; accordingly, it recommended an alternative version that sought to emphasise the global, national and local qualities of both cultural and natural heritage. The three components of the cultural and natural environment forming the National Estate in Australia are those that are:

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• of such outstanding world significance that they need to be conserved, managed and presented as part of the heritage of the world; • of such outstanding national value that they need to be conserved, managed and presented as part of the heritage of the nation as a whole; and • of such aesthetic, historical, scientific, social, cultural, ecological or other special value to the nation or any part of it, including a region or locality, that they should be conserved, managed and presented for the benefit of the community as a whole.7 Definitions aside, debate on the above questions in Australia was largely inconclusive until the advent of the ‘black ban’ and ‘green ban’ eras in the late 1960s and early 1970s, when trade union activists in the Builders Labourers’ Federation (BLF) in Melbourne and Sydney started to take direct action aimed at protecting heritage properties.8 In New South Wales alone, Jack Mundey and his BLF colleagues saved dozens of heritage properties from destruction by withdrawing union labour from projects that threatened those properties. On construction sites in both cities, work came to a standstill. Money stopped flowing. Some contractors attempted to bring non-union workers (‘scabs’) on to their jobs, thereby risking violent stand-offs between unionised and non-unionised labour. Concrete pours were deferred or abandoned. For some observers, especially in Sydney, the problems were exacerbated by one salient fact: Mundey was a paid-up member of the Communist Party of Australia, as well as the staunchly left-wing secretary of the BLF. In their eyes, he was Public Enemy Number One. Among leading operators in the property development industry and their supporters in the NSW Parliament and the big end of town, Mundey was like a latter-day Luddite, only worse; he

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was a redneck from northern parts who was not only opposed to progress, he also seemed to be hell-bent on promoting violence in the streets and pursuing policies ‘completely foreign’ to Australian concepts of law and order.9 And why? To satisfy his socialist ego, perhaps, or to appease the concerns of a privileged minority of well-to-do silvertails who were more interested in saving old monuments and bits of leftover bushland than in creating jobs and keeping the economy on the boil.The fact that he and other union leaders also wanted to improve the appalling working conditions on construction sites, or to negotiate better pay for the army of day labourers that kept the industry moving, was immaterial, beside the point. It cut no ice with those who could not reconcile Mundey’s concern for working conditions with his apparent passion for heritage. In short, he was an enigmatic presence in this turbulent industrial environment and, for the bosses in the Master Builders’ Association (MBA) and in the boardrooms of the big developers, he was bad news and had to go. There was another side to this coin, and its significance soon became apparent to a growing and politically diverse cross-section of Australian society. Its simple message was hammered home by Mundey, and picked up by others at every opportunity. Australian towns and cities were not only places where people made money; they were also places where people actually lived.What was the point of making money on a construction job if you were simultaneously destroying your cultural inheritance, your landmark buildings and community precincts, your local architectural heritage? What would our children say if the city we passed on to them was nothing more than a concrete jungle – bereft of beauty, of handsome buildings from earlier times, and lacking vital connections with our urban past? How could you sleep at night if you had spent the day on a demolition site helping to destroy a fine and well-loved old building,

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knowing that it was shortly to be replaced by a faceless and graceless concrete monstrosity? How could you sit by and see an entire community fragmented and frightened about the future as its houses were demolished, its familiar neighbourhood haunts destroyed? Was there not a moral question at stake here, if scarce working-class housing was to be demolished to make way for commercial development, freeways, luxury high-rise apartments for the rich? During the Mundey era the BLF’s response to these questions was a no-nonsense one: speak with the locals, impose a green ban, sit down, talk it over again, and negotiate. Such initiatives on the job led to moves by others outside the union movement, while in turn generating legal and administrative responses that subsequently became absorbed into the mainstream of government and acknowledged as obligations to be shouldered by all, regardless of ideological or political positions. Nowadays, though, there are signs across the nation that this positive process of absorption is undergoing a reversal with the ascendancy of more conservative ideologies at both state and federal level. Grey clouds are appearing on the horizon as conservative governments reduce environmental budgets and programs, abolish or emasculate environmental and heritage agencies, cut grants for non-government organisations (NGOs), and present clear threats to the survival of grass-roots organisations that dare to question official priorities. As journalist Peter Hammond points out, investment in research and development in the renewable (green) energy sector is being forced offshore because of official disinterest and uncertainty about the nation’s renewable energy potential, despite the country’s vast areas of sunburnt desert, almost endless sunshine and wind-blown countryside.10 While progressive nations worldwide switch to renewables, Australia steadfastly maintains its long-standing affection for fossil

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fuels – a pariah state in the making. Australia’s leading role in the international campaign to stop Japanese whaling in the Southern Ocean could be seen as a rare example of a progressive conservation initiative in a country where climate change is still regarded with scepticism by many in high places, and where green NGOs are often seen as nuisances or troublemakers rather than partners. One bright spot on an otherwise dull political horizon is the fact that the Australian Government, under Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull, was one of the almost 200 signatories to the December 2015 Paris Agreement on Climate Change – evidence perhaps of a tiny shift in official attitudes from scepticism to guarded acceptance. Meanwhile, World Heritage forests in Tasmania are again being threatened by the timber industry, and in New South Wales and other states vast areas of rich, productive farmlands are being surveyed by big corporations looking for new sources of coal seam gas.The endless search for fresh sources of coal, gas and oil is even bringing risks of damage to parts of the world heritage Blue Mountains National Park and the Great Barrier Reef World Heritage Marine Park – surely the jewels in the nation’s environmental crown. If the green environment appears today to be under siege, so too is the ‘brown’. In many towns and cities across the nation, urban heritage remains something of a political football – to be tossed and kicked in the winds of local and state debate. For many, including Mundey, these are worrying times. In the particular case of Bridge Street in Sydney, journalist Elizabeth Farrelly goes further in a trenchant attack on the NSW Government and its announcement that it will be selling off Sydney’s ‘proud sandstone precinct to some global hotel chain.’11 The Bridge Street precinct just happens to house several buildings listed on the Register of the National Estate, two of which are apparently up for sale or long-term lease: the colonial architect James Barnet’s 1892

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Department of Lands Building, and the later Department of Education building by George McRae.12 According to the National Trust NSW, the Lands Department building ‘is one of the most influential and major public buildings ever established during the mid 19th century in Australia’s colonial history.’13 Farrelly also rang warning bells in a more recent article (2015), deploring the state government’s continuing infatuation with roads, roads, and more roads as the vastly expensive WestConnex project in inner Sydney gets under way, bringing threats to valued heritage precincts, bustling shopping streets, and large areas of inner-city housing – while offering no parallel benefits to the city’s overstretched and underfunded public transport system.14 Farrelly’s candid comments on the NSW Government’s plans for Bridge Street are not just about heritage.They are about certain geological qualities of the Sydney basin and, more particularly, about those qualities that from colonial times onward were providing the city with one of its signally important building materials. Philip Thalis and Peter John Cantrill make the confident claim that ‘these grand buildings of the Victorian and Edwardian eras [in Bridge Street and elsewhere] helped to define our understanding of Sydney as a sandstone city … sandstone was a readily available building material, of good quality and easily worked … by the mid-19th century it had become the city’s primary material for buildings of quality and importance.’These writers also provide a telling parallel to Farrelly’s Sydney Morning Herald piece in their anecdote about an earlier and similar event in the history of the Lands Department Building. They record that in the 1990s the building ‘survived an outrageous privatisation proposal to turn it into a casino. Fortunately it remains an exemplar of a long-life, loose-fit, low-energy building a century before this term was coined, and today it continues to accommodate NSW Government agencies.’15

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In this on-going debate it must be accepted that when it comes to comparing green with brown, nature conservation could reasonably be seen as being more important than the conservation of historic buildings. Saving a heritage building is not a survival matter – a matter of life and death – whereas saving a threatened ecological community may have clear biological benefits for humankind.Yes, Jack Mundey was a farmer’s son and grew up with a love for the countryside. His adult career, though, was first and foremost that of an urban person whose interests were largely in urban phenomena and whose energies were largely focused and expended on urban events. Mundey never drew a hard line between green and brown, but the narrative that follows necessarily deals with the latter. Another colour demands comment here. Within the trade union movement, and more particularly within the building and construction sectors, ‘black’ bans were commonly placed on projects that were regarded as unsafe, poorly managed, financially precarious. If negotiations with project managers proved fruitless, union delegates would put a black ban on the job, workers would walk off the site, and work would stop until peace was declared. An explicit concern for the environment was rarely on the agenda, until Norm Gallagher in Melbourne and Mundey in Sydney arrived on the scene. But it was Jack who first saw green as the most appropriate descriptor for union bans on projects that carried threats to the environment or to social values generally, and the term stuck. When he coined the phrase ‘green ban’ during the historic Kelly’s Bush campaign in Sydney he could not have foreseen that within a year or so the term would have travelled the world and become part of international environmental parlance. And half a century later the flow-on from that small but inspirational moment is still with us. It is fair to say that, today, most

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people would know the meaning of green ban even if they had never heard of Jack Mundey. Although BLF black bans had earlier been placed on properties in Melbourne, Mundey was undoubtedly the principal architect of the green ban movement. But in his efforts to energise civil society and stimulate a new conservationist ethic, he went further, into territory where no one else had been before. Back in the 1970s, while support for the pioneering efforts of Mundey and his trade union comrades was growing nationwide, a bridge was quietly being built. As we crossed that bridge, we came to realise that it was leading us towards a new set of cultural paradigms that would permanently change the way Australians viewed their environment. As Jack was fond of admitting, there was another word he used effectively during the various campaigns: he believed that his leadership had helped grass-roots and NGO activism to become ‘respectable’. It is probable that Jack was only vaguely aware of the fact that his efforts in heritage conservation followed those of pioneer reformers in other states, some of which dated back several decades. The efforts of those pioneers are acknowledged. But the thrust of this present chronicle is to examine the bridge-building efforts of Mundey the Sydneysider, and to track the events and campaigns and processes that involved this singular man throughout his long and fruitful life as a key player in the conservation movement in Australia since its first stirrings a century or so ago.

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Chapter 2

How green was my valley … or was it? Post-war priorities in the lucky country

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B

y the end of May 1945 it was all over.The war in Europe, that is. The last bomb had been dropped, the last shot had been fired, the last casualty had been accounted for, the last prisoner taken. After six years of terror and deprivation the ordinary people of Britain and Europe woke up to find that peace had arrived. Across the length and breadth of a dozen war-ravaged countries, life could now return – albeit slowly and perhaps painfully – to a semblance of normality. With the end of the Second World War, society faced a set of challenges and opportunities of a different order to those that were experienced during the dark days of war. After the immediate priorities – the personal ones – had been satisfied, the next step probably involved the painful exploration and survey of what remained of homes and homelands. Millions in Britain and Europe found themselves staring at little but desolation and rubble. Once familiar neighbourhoods had been fractured, gutted. At the individual level, it must have been a traumatic experience trying to find answers to key survival questions: where to live, where to start the rebuilding, how to start, when to start, how to find a job, was help available, was it going to be worth the effort? At the community and national levels there was a different set of questions to be faced. Top priority went to urgent tasks, such as achieving a prompt return to governmental stability, to the provision of housing, to reconstructing health and educational services, and to rebuilding shattered infrastructure. But other questions of a less tangible nature were also emerging and demanding attention. Some of these questions went to the heart of what might today be placed in the heritage basket. Hundreds, perhaps thousands, of villages had seen their cherished chapels and churches, town halls and council chambers reduced to dust and rubble. Ancient towns and cities in Britain and across the length and breadth of Europe

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had lost treasured buildings and monuments with centuries-old links to the past. In many places, entire neighbourhoods and town squares and high streets had been blitzed into oblivion during a single night air raid. And a handful of great historic cities – London, Coventry, Cologne, Rotterdam, Hamburg, Dresden, among others – lost entire central area precincts to insensate carpet-bombing raids and the terrifying firestorms that followed. When it came to determining rebuilding and rehabilitation priorities for such places, perhaps the biggest question facing the civic authorities was the philosophical one that continues to underpin any debate on what today we refer to as heritage or urban conservation. These dull and lifeless words refer to what the French call le patrimoine – an elegant term that means ‘inheritance’. In these war-torn places what, if anything, was to be done to respect or restore or rebuild this inheritance of treasured urban spaces, fine buildings, handsome civic settings? Should the past be faithfully replicated – stone by stone and brick by brick – to create an architectural setting identical to what existed before the bombs fell? Or should sentiment be put aside in favour of a contemporary design approach that eschewed such nostalgic affection for the tattered trappings of the past, and which mandated that henceforward in the modern world our buildings must honestly reflect the values and potentialities of our own age – the modern age. While this debate was occupying the minds of the heritage cognoscenti in Europe and Britain, an entirely different conversation was beginning in Australia, a country that also experienced damage and destruction, but on a much-reduced scale. When Japanese bombers attacked Darwin and Townsville during the early days of the war in the Pacific, a few old buildings and civic spaces were damaged or destroyed but, in the aftermath, it was most unlikely there would have been tears shed over such losses. There

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might even have been some quiet relief in that the bombing had opened the door for some long-overdue rebuilding and renewal. Apart from the raids on Darwin and Townsville and an abortive Japanese submarine attack on Sydney Harbour on 31 May 1942, no capital city or country town was affected in a physical sense by enemy action. When Japan capitulated and the peace treaty with the Allies was signed in Tokyo Bay in September 1945, the priorities back home in Australia were not like those facing the peoples of a devastated Europe. Heritage had barely entered the vocabulary of urban planning. Conservation was something to do with looking after productive soils, forests and farmland. In the lucky country, material growth and progress was what it was all about. With this economic effervescence, there was an unexpected and unplanned but steady shift from cultural adolescence towards a long-awaited adulthood. That shift would, in due course, see some quite revolutionary reforms in the fields of urban planning and conservation, and the rise of the movement’s warriors, like Jack Mundey. This chapter offers a background to the emergence of this movement in Australia, and sets the scene for the unexpected arrival of leaders such as Mundey. But before Mundey became involved in his first political campaign in Sydney in 1953, it was a matter of keeping the foot on the economic accelerator and getting the engines of economic expansion back into top gear. Across the nation and for almost the next three decades the political climate would remain markedly conservative. Progress meant more jobs, more investment, more development. Maintaining that progress was seen as being the unquestioned responsibility of governments at all levels. Their job was to stimulate the private sector and to support it with responsible fiscal management and large-scale investments in roads, airports, water storages, power

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stations, hospitals and energy. It was not until Gough Whitlam and a victorious Labor Party ended the 23-year run of the conservatives in Canberra in 1972 that this notion of material progress would be seriously reassessed and reshaped to embrace the intangibles associated with what today are referred to as quality-of-life issues. The political chemistry that produced this shift came from the crucible of Whitlam’s 1972 policy speech, reflecting as it did this slowly emerging recognition that as a nation we were growing up. Famously addressing the ‘men and women of Australia’ in a packed auditorium in the western Sydney suburb of Blacktown, his statement made it clear that if Labor gained power in the coming election there were real changes in the wind when it came to the cities, to the environment, and to the emerging sector of civil society concerned with heritage. What was life like in urban Australia during those two decades of frenzied post-war reconstruction and development? What forces were at work to shape our national tastes and preferences in fields such as housing, architecture, city planning, the environment, design and the arts? What were we saying to the big property developers and investors? Did the term ‘heritage’ carry any special messages? What fresh cultural influences and ideas arrived as the big ships disgorged their human cargoes of migrants and refugees from Britain (the ‘old country’) and from Europe, and as expatriate Australians returned home with their minds refreshed by the excitement and stimulation of travel?

A t h o m e i n p o s t - wa r A u s t r a l i a War’s end brought relief, hope and confidence, especially for the generation that entered the immediate post-war years looking for

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work, security and accommodation. Tens of thousands of veterans returned home, were demobbed and began their transition back to civvy life. Dreams were slowly realised as people found jobs, a suburban house with a garden, maybe a car. On the edges of the capital cities, raw new suburbs began sprawling towards ever-receding horizons.After nearly six years of austerity, rationing and the day-today travails of a nation at war, it seemed that every self-respecting family wanted a three-bedroom, double-fronted bungalow on a quarter-acre allotment with space for the children to play, a Silent Knight De-Luxe refrigerator to replace the old wooden ice-chest in the ‘moderne’ kitchen, a shiny radiogram in the lounge room, a garage for the Holden and space for the barbecue. If these things were not new (as in brand new), they were not worth having. And unless you were destitute or light-in-the-head or a member of that mysterious species known as ‘intellectuals’ you would never contemplate living in a slummy old house in a rundown inner suburb. No, home and contents had to be new, fashionable and respectable on your own quarter-acre plot in the suburbs. And to help things along you could now pay for your purchases on lay-by, or perhaps take an even more courageous step and sign up to a hire-purchase agreement. But most people either paid cash or deferred the purchase – a generation was to pass before buying household ‘stuff ’ on the never-never became all too common. Careful saving and prudent cash transactions were still the norm. Perhaps Robin Boyd in his classic The Australian Ugliness was inclined to be overly patronising when it came to discussing the suburban dream. Part of his argument was that the typical Australian suburbanite was the willing victim of an architectural style that he dubbed ‘featurism’. He defined featurism as the ‘subordination of the essential whole and the accentuation of selected

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separate features’. His tongue-in-cheek description of a featurist house says it all: The house which is featured in the suburban cul-de-sac is itself a gift-box of features: the living-room thrust forward as a feature of the façade, a wide picture window as a feature of the projecting wall, a pretty statuette as a feature in the picture window, a feature wall of vertical boards inside the featured living-room, a wrought-iron bracket holding a pink ceramic wall vase as a feature on a the feature wall, a nice red flower as a feature in the vase.1

Featurism in Boyd’s view applied not only to the design of the suburban house but also to many other elements in the built environment. It was part of the general urge to escape from the drab austerity of wartime and replace it with the burgeoning spirit of ‘out with the old and in with the new’. The cosmetic fads and fashions of featurism were responses to a mandate to pursue the new and the modern as the only way forward. Paint companies offered free advice on colour schemes to ensure that the dream home was tastefully decorated in the latest style, consistent with what was enticingly presented in the house-and-garden magazines. ‘Interior decoration’ became the focus of a new profession and a new branch of popular journalism. Everything had to be fresh, shiny, tasteful, and above all – new. In popular architecture it was the same story despite the occasional burst of defiance in the face of the creeping featurist malaise so clearly defined by Boyd. In Melbourne, the Victorian Small Homes Bureau was established, with Boyd as its first director following his earlier assignment for developer Contemporary Homes. For those who could not afford a full professional fee the bureau offered a limited collection of architect-designed

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homes, along with discounted professional advice on construction and maintenance. In Sydney, a catalogue of small family houses designed by leading architect Ken Woolley was offered by project homebuilders Pettit and Sevitt for those homebuyers to whom featurism was anathema but who could not afford to retain their own architect for a one-off design. Along with Sunline Homes and their architect Geoff Lumsdaine, this company broke new ground in Sydney during the 1970s with the introduction of design quality into the popular housing market. The same period saw Ken Woolley and other designers give birth to ‘the Sydney School’, whose design philosophy was sensitive to the raw beauty of the city’s bushland, and expressed in an architecture marked by the use of natural timbers, common or clinker bricks (sometimes recycled from demolition sites), simple lines and uncluttered floor plans that invited daily connection to the adjoining bush environment.2 And apart from Boyd’s initiative as referred to above, Merchant Builders Pty Ltd in Melbourne was pioneering a new range of project homes that combined progressive architectural design with landscaping themes based on the use of native floral species.3 The company also took a courageous lead in the design and construction of group homes, townhouses and cluster housing at a time when the general market preference was still firmly focused on the detached suburban bungalow. Most of these forays into a housing market dominated by small, conservative and risk-averse homebuilders tended to be shortlived. People were not yet ready for either modern architecture or anything suggesting nostalgia for the past – the use of fieldstone, recycled materials, undressed timber or common unrendered brickwork. The ‘spec builders’, those who constructed houses for sale to unknown buyers on the open market, knew what their clients wanted: houses that were smart, slick, shiny.

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The use of second-hand materials and the renovation of old houses were nowhere on their radar. The result was that age and obsolescence became synonymous, and the suggestion that old buildings should be protected because of their heritage significance was remote from the popular mind. There was another side to the housing story. Not everyone had the money to put a deposit on their dream home, and not everyone could cover mortgage payments from a basic wage. Pensioners and people of modest means still needed a roof over their heads, preferably close to places of employment and local amenities. Across the nation, post-war governments began to make major investments in welfare rental housing. Public housing authorities were established to provide cottages, townhouses and flats in the older inner suburbs as well as on the city outskirts. In some cases, dwellings that had been constructed originally as ‘workers’ housing’ were absorbed into the general public housing rental portfolio that many assumed would survive into the future as a permanent and inviolable civic asset. It had come to be recognised that the provision of public housing was a government responsibility, no matter which party was in power. In Victoria, and especially in Melbourne, there was another factor at work. Welfare housing projects designed and built by the Victorian Housing Commission were increasingly seen as vital elements in slum-clearance programs that typically involved wholesale demolition and redevelopment of older, inner-city housing areas, many of which contained heritage elements. A preference for high-rise apartments was based largely on the commission’s ownership of a factory that produced prefabricated concrete panels. By 1968, inner-city communities in Fitzroy, North Melbourne, Parkville and Carlton had had seen much of their territory – and long-standing cultural qualities – permanently devastated by crudely designed, mass-produced concrete

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boxes bereft of architectural quality and in violent juxtaposition to their surviving heritage townscapes.4 It is not surprising that some of the nation’s pioneering resident action groups came into being in the areas affected by this controversial program.5 With the arrival of the property boom of the 1960s there was a change of heart, especially in Sydney. Governments began to realise that windfall gains could be made by selling off old publicly owned property in prime localities to the private sector. That change of heart was a trigger for social unrest. The sudden involvement of a building workers’ trade union in protective actions aimed not only at saving welfare housing, but also at conserving the social and community values with which it was associated, was unexpected. It led to the campaigns in Sydney to save The Rocks, and then Woolloomooloo and Glebe in quick succession. After the green ban era, things returned to normal, but not for long. Public housing budgets tightened, and the stock of rental housing in New South Wales in particular began to decline as the sell-off gained momentum and continues today.

At school In the 1940s and 1950s, primary school history was mainly about ancient battles (mostly in England), murderous monarchs, the rise of Empire, Australian explorers, and the gold rush era. It was all ripping yarns in which the goodies were invariably white, carefully dressed, spoke the King’s English and were of Anglo-Saxon origin, while the baddies had coloured skins, did not properly cover their private parts, had barbaric habits and ate their food with their fingers – sometimes eating their enemies. The exploits of Burke and Wills, Sturt, Leichhardt, Oxley, Mitchell and Blaxland, Wentworth and

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Lawson along with other heroic figures were drummed into the minds of the youngsters of the day. Only a rare teacher saw the job as including cultural matters – that vague field of human activity that had to do with the development of the arts. Any youngsters who gained an understanding and appreciation of the rich and ancient heritage of our indigenous peoples were the lucky ones.The Aboriginal people were typically referred to as ‘blacks’ or ‘blackfellas’. Explorers relied on ‘black trackers’ to help them find their way through the bush. Blackfellas fought each other with ‘nulla-nullas’. Their wives were ‘lubras’ or ‘gins’; the children were shiny little naked ‘piccaninnies’ who lived in ‘gunyahs’ or ‘humpies’ down on the ‘reservation’ somewhere – out of sight, out of mind – on the edge of town. Though these shameful and derogatory notions have largely disappeared, and despite advances in law and education, it would be fair to say that the richness of the Aboriginal heritage is still unknown to – if not ignored by – most mainstream Australians. Thus a couple of generations of Australian children grew up not only without any encouragement to find out how our Aboriginal communities organised their settlements, but also to investigate how Australian towns and cities had been planned and built, how our architectural traditions had been forged, how and why we came to be leaders in a worldwide national parks movement, or how and why our great buildings came into being. How many were told about Colonel Light’s deservedly famous 1836 plan for Adelaide and its parklands? How many learned about Surveyor Hoddle’s splendid gridiron plan for Melbourne (1837)? We might have been told that Governor Macquarie founded Bathurst, but we were never told about its splendid courthouse or the other fine historic buildings in the district. John Macarthur and his founding of the Australian merino wool industry were give priority while nothing

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was said of the superb examples of Georgian domestic architecture for which he and other pioneers were responsible out in the Cow Pastures south of Sydney Town. As for Macquarie’s convict architect Francis Greenway, there may have been the odd casual reference to his elegant St James’ Church in Sydney but an inspection of a cathedral or a colonial farmhouse or a piece of Arcadian bushland, or a visit to a national park, or to a grand Georgian mansion on some rambling colonial estate, would have been a rare event indeed. Attitudes began to change in the late 1970s when excursions to The Rocks area in Sydney and to the replica colonial look-alike Old Sydney Town to the city’s north became commonplace. But for those whose primary schooling took place during the immediate post-war period, such excursions into the past were the exception rather than the rule. They came later, if at all. And they probably happened overseas, when first-time travellers from Australia came to the realisation that at home, here in Australia, there were some old places, some areas of natural or ecological value, and some special buildings that were beautiful, grand, and actually worth keeping. So we grew up as heritage illiterates.

A t wo r k a n d i n t h e c i t y In town and in the bush, work was all about making progress in the things that mattered: buying land, erecting the family home and filling it with new furniture. Jobs were plentiful. New schools and universities were being established, as were new hospitals and clinics – especially on the raw outer edges of the big cities. The first of the huge regional shopping centres with their extensive car parks and retail magnets would soon appear in the outer suburbs of Sydney and Melbourne – to be followed by similar enterprises in

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the other capitals. Even in manufacturing at this time there was a degree of vigour and optimism. In virtually every sector there was growth – and growth was good. In metropolitan Sydney the 1950s and 1960s saw the fiscal, political and corporate groundwork being laid for the subsequent property boom.6 When it arrived in the mid 1960s the streets were awash with risk capital and dozens of corporate developers were scrambling to enter the lists as competition for land and money (and government patronage) intensified. In the introduction to his classic description of this period, Maurie Daly reminds us in graphic language of what was happening in the Sydney of the day: Sydney had never experienced a property boom on the scale of that between 1968 and 1974. It involved a frenzy of buying, selling and building that re-shaped the central business district … and accelerated the expansion of the city’s fringe … The boom was the most significant financial happening of the 1970s and the shock waves from the inevitable crash were felt right up to 1980 … Sydney would never be the same again.

He continues: The once-in-a-lifetime rebuilding of [Sydney’s] heart had taken place so rapidly and so boisterously that only after it was over were the mistakes and missed opportunities reckoned. The mish-mash of conflicting architectural styles; the dwindling light and open space; the visible poverty of the architectural and development imaginations responsible – all would smudge the central city’s image for a generation.7

In the same vein, John Shaw noted that in the 1960s, ‘Sydney looked as if it were recovering from bomb damage … with large craters scarring the sites, hoardings marking the streets, and cranes

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puncturing the skyline’.8 According to Shaw, Leo Schofield, a popular Sydney columnist and urbane guardian of good taste, used the same imagery when he wrote, in 1986, that the ‘wholesale destruction’ of his beloved city was comparable to the devastating bombing of Dresden by Allied aircraft during the last days of the Second World War in Europe. Despite the hyperbolic analogy, there is no doubting Schofield’s affection for the city. But not everyone felt the devastation to that extent. The wrecking business was booming, bars and pubs and restaurants were doing a roaring trade, and white-collar jobs were plentiful. But while the average office worker was making the most of this period of plenty, things were rather different at the other end of the workforce. For tradesmen and labourers in the building industry there was no shortage of jobs, but those jobs were frequently short-lived and job security was virtually unknown. An army of day labourers struggled to exist on the barest of wages, with no sick pay, no holiday pay, no security. On big building sites in particular, working conditions were primitive, dangerous and unhealthy. In his 1981 memoir, Jack Mundey refers to the ‘very high accident rate in the building industry … in demolition jobs it was highest of all’.9 And for vivid, indeed frightening close-up images of the risks facing labourers on both demolition and construction jobs during the boom period there is no better source than Pat Fiske’s compelling black-and-white documentary Rocking the Foundations.10 The film covers her entry into the building industry as the first woman to be accepted into BLF membership. More importantly, it provides memorable footage of the green ban movement and of the activities of BLF leaders – Mundey, Mick McNamara, Joe Owens, Tom Hogan and Bob Pringle – as they pushed for better working conditions while simultaneously promoting the urban conservation cause.

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As Mundey used the term, ‘demolition job’ was a collective phrase that covered any building project in which construction of new work was necessarily preceded by demolition of old unwanted structures, and the subsequent clearing and site preparation. But that down-to-earth and value-neutral phrase masked the fact that in Sydney at least, demolition often meant destruction: destruction of grand old buildings whose physical life was still sound but whose economic life had come to an end. Their fate would be summarily decided by the blade of a bulldozer or the crashing thud of a demolition ball. In 1986, a decade or so after the boom, David Latta commented ‘Australia’s architectural heritage continues to be culled at an appalling rate. For every building that has won the battle to survive, another ten fall.’11 The general economic climate of the period up until the 1970s was aptly summed up in part 1 of the seminal 1974 report of the Commonwealth Committee of Inquiry into the National Estate. The committee found, inter alia, that ‘so far, the aims and priorities of Australians and their governments have been directed to the need for expansion of population, settlement, commerce, industry and agriculture. These aims have largely been achieved, but the momentum generated in so doing has not been redirected to the new needs now emerging.’12 As the report later explained, those ‘new needs’ included dealing with the relative absence of legal sanctions to restrain the demolition of historic buildings discussed by Latta in his book Lost Glories.

Architecture and urban design Young architects entering the profession in the 1950s and 1960s were under no illusions that the Modern Movement had arrived and that in due course they would be seen as its beneficiaries.

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The war had almost swept away the stylistic confusions that had survived since Victorian times, when respectable designers could choose from a truly tempting menu that included Egyptian, classic revival, Gothic revival, Italian renaissance, Queen Anne, Tudor, Romanesque, French renaissance, Byzantine, monumentalism, or just plain old Georgian. For some adventurous souls there was the excitement of venturing into other more enticing territory, such as art nouveau or (later) art deco. The occasional excursion into the lowbrow neo-colonial field was seen as a curious admission of inability to handle the much more respectable European styles on offer. Such was the eclecticism that generally prevailed within the architectural profession from Victorian times through to the 1920s and even into the 1930s. It was a spirit with inherent absurdities that provided fertile soil for the inevitable flowering of the Modern Movement in Europe during the decade or so before Germany set the western world ablaze in 1938. If, during the exhilaration of the post-Second World War era, one had been asked to nominate the high priests of the Modern Movement in architecture, the list would have been topped by five great names: Alvar Aalto (Helsinki born), the German-born Walter Gropius and Mies van der Rohe, the Swiss-born le Corbusier and the American Frank Lloyd Wright. Their names and achievements made for fascinating reading in the professional journals of the day. Australian graduates made pilgrimages to their studios and their built works. Books by and about them took prime positions in professional libraries and, internationally, the glossy professional press made the most of their popularity. Among these leaders, Gropius was the only one to ever visit Australia. As a guest speaker at the Royal Australian Institute of Architects Congress in Sydney in 1954, he was a huge drawcard. His invitation was engineered by the young Vienna-born Harry

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Seidler, one of Gropius’ Harvard alumni who, from his Sydney studio, went on to become an internationally recognised and honoured leader of the Modern Movement.13 Gropius had achieved great post-war fame as a teacher and practitioner in the United States, his adopted homeland after the Second World War. His principal place in modern architectural history, though, is anchored in his work at the Bauhaus, the famous German design academy in Weimar of which he became the director after Henry van de Velde in 1919. From the outset of his time at the Bauhaus, Gropius made it clear to his students and to the design world in general that modernism had arrived. Henceforward, architecture and the training of architects would involve a total rejection of historic styles, and the adoption of a design philosophy that saw architects as being equals if not leaders among creative minds in fields as diverse as metalwork, ceramics, photography, graphic design, furniture and industrial design, and sculpture. Within a few years of his taking office at the Bauhaus campus, Gropius had assembled a circle of talented colleagues and students who shared his philosophy and whose professional ambitions were congruent with his. The record says it all: Paul Klee, Wassily Kandinsky, Lazlo Moholy-Nagy, Josef Albers were stars among many others. Later, when the college moved to Dessau in 1925, came Herbert Bayer, Marcel Breuer, and Hannes Meyer. A further (and final) move to Berlin in 1928 saw Ludwig Hilberseimer join the faculty. In 1930 Mies van der Rohe took the directorship that he held until 1933, when Nazi opposition forced the final closure of this famous institution.14 All these events took place a long way from Australia, and it is unlikely that many Australian architects of the period would have included the Bauhaus in their European travel itineraries. But Gropius and his colleagues and protégés exerted a huge, if indirect influence

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Modernist typology for urban housing (Walter Gropius, 1932), exemplifying the rejection of traditional architectural elements in domestic design during the early days of the Modern Movement. Courtesy Conran Octopus London – original dated 1932

on architectural education and practice in Australia during the post-war period. It is for others to speculate on whether the devotees of the Modern Movement in this country at that time should carry any responsibility for the loss of so many gracious old buildings in the name of progress; however, the fact is that the period of the movement’s greatest influence in Australia was roughly coincident with the arrival of the property boom on the east coast, when the bulldozer mentality of leaders in the property development industry was alive and well. It is reasonable to assume that those leaders would have been reluctant to retain the services of architects who were sympathetic to the urban conservation cause, or who wanted to protect historic buildings sitting on prime redevelopment sites. Even if it lacked the fervour and exhilaration that marked the modernist manifestos of the day, sympathy for great buildings and

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monuments and civic places of past eras was starting to surface – both internationally and at home. Such writers as Lewis Mumford, Eliel Saarinen, Steen Eiler Rasmussen, Patrick Geddes, Siegfried Giedion, Kevin Lynch, Jane Jacobs and Ed Bacon expressed great affection for such extant reminders of the past, while simultaneously recognising that the modernist position was logically invulnerable.15 In Australia the writings and research of Miles Lewis, David Saunders, Neil Clerehan, Robin Boyd, Morton Herman, Cyril Pearl, Rachel Roxburgh, Walter Bunning, Helen Baker and the State Planning Authority of New South Wales were beginning to influence the thinking of design professionals and the wider public. A little later came the influence of Jim and Joan Kerr, James Broadbent, Meredith Walker, Sharon Sullivan, Anne Bickford, Jane Lennon, Elsa Atkin, Peter James, Jennifer Taylor, Robert Freestone,

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Helen Coleman, Sheridan Burke and others. Researchers, theorists, and policy-makers were joined by specialist heritage architects such as Howard Tanner, Clive Lucas (2016 president of the National Trust of New South Wales), Hugh Fraser, and Robert Moore in Sydney. As a professional historian, Shirley Fitzgerald has made a significant contribution to heritage literature, especially in Sydney. Louise Cox has promoted the cause of 20th-century architectural heritage through her leadership of the Australian Institute of Architects and the Commonwealth Association of Architects. Architect planner, heritage advisor and currently chair of the Australian World Heritage Advisory Committee Joan Domicelj AM has likewise played a very influential role in heritage organisations at both national and international levels. In the field of Aboriginal heritage, major contributions have been made by Jo McDonald and Kathleen Schilling. The works of these and other influential players in the post-Second World War growth of the heritage movement in Australia helped to signal the doom of the classical orders, of historic styles, of design by text book.That earlier period of the nation’s architectural history had surely come and gone, but that did not mean that the best of earlier periods had to be rejected or destroyed. There was a middle ground here – perhaps best expressed in The Athens Charter.

CIAM, the Athens Charter and t h e M o d e r n M ove m e n t The Athens Charter was the outcome in 1933 of one of the meetings collectively known as the Congrès Internationaux d’Architecture Moderne (CIAM). The meeting – the fourth of its kind – took place on a small one-class steamer that cruised

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the Mediterranean from Athens to Marseilles and back. The list of attendees included several Bauhaus disciples. It led to a clandestine publication in Nazi-occupied Paris in 1943, edited by le Corbusier. The Charter has long been regarded as a milestone in the history of urban planning and urban design as well as a hugely influential modernist manifesto in its own right. It had this to say about the new and the old. Article 65: Architectural assets must be protected, whether found

in isolated buildings or in urban aggregations … the material works of centuries are precious witnesses of the past which will be respected … for their historical value … they form part of the human heritage and whoever owns them or is entrusted with their protection has the responsibility and the obligation to do whatever he legitimately can do to hand this noble heritage down intact to the centuries to come. Article 66: …it is advisable to choose wisely that which must be

respected … if the continuance of certain significant and majestic presences from a bygone era proves injurious to the interests of the city a solution capable of reconciling both points of view will be sought … some will be preserved as documents and others will be demolished … in certain exceptional cases complete transplantation may be envisaged for elements that prove to be inconveniently located …16 Article 67: By no means can any narrow-minded cult of the past

bring about a disregard for the rules of social justice … under no circumstances should the cult of the picturesque and the historical take precedence over the healthfulness of the dwelling …

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Article 69: In certain cases it is possible that the demolition of

unsanitary houses and slums around some monument of historical value will destroy an age-old ambience. This is regrettable but inevitable. The situation can be turned to advantage by the introduction of verdant areas. There, the vestiges of the past will be bathed in a new and possibly unexpected ambience … from which the neighbouring districts will amply benefit …

Corbu and his fellow CIAM members were not all Europeans, but for most of them at that time Europe was their focus, if not their birthplace. For the Europeans, at least, heritage was something to be measured in centuries or millennia – not a few decades. By no stretch of the imagination would they have spent a single second of their time thinking about an appropriate future for old buildings from the colonial period in Australia. Yet the fact that the Athens Charter contained a whole chapter on ‘The Historic Heritage of Cities’ was enough to demonstrate to the world that in the eyes of the modernists, the new could co-exist with the old – provided always that the carefully worded constraints set out in that Chapter were accepted within the overall CIAM Main Points of Doctrine.17 In short, CIAM was flying a flag for a new approach to city planning, urban design and architecture, and the message spread worldwide. Disciples and adherents emerged in Australia as elsewhere. Henceforward, planners and designers were to grasp and exploit to the full the exciting potentialities of the machine age. A sentimental affection for the past (to the point where it determined design or planning outcomes) was largely inconsistent with CIAM doctrine.Yes, CIAM gave birth to the Athens Charter but the influence of that charter’s heritage provisions on day-today architectural and planning practice in Australia was minimal.

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In academia, it says something about the curriculum priorities in the teaching studios in architecture and planning during the interwar period and after that heritage barely rated a mention, with classic texts almost silent on the subject. Sir John Sulman is rightly praised for his monumental 1921 Introduction to the Study of Town Planning in Australia but, for him, heritage does not rate a mention in his index, and his interest in the topic seems to go no further than a few pages of illustrated text on fountains, equestrian statues, monuments, war memorials, and what he calls civic aesthetics. Brown and Sherrard came a little closer to the target in their Introduction to Town and Country Planning, in which they offered brief praise for the British National Trust movement and its Australian counterpart; yet even at a time when tertiary studies in planning were emerging they had nothing to offer the heritage practitioner and made no reference whatsoever to CIAM. A third authority of the period was Lewis Keeble with his comprehensive Principles and Practice of Town and Country Planning. His informative and generously illustrated text was aimed largely at UK professionals still grappling with post-war austerity, the redevelopment of blitzed cities and an adventurous and hugely successful new towns program. These were the priorities and, like Brown and Sherrard, Keeble offered little in the way of guidance to heritage practitioners. It was not until the 1970s that the professional literature in Australia showed evidence of an attitudinal shift in favour of a conservation ethic. The topic started to receive sporadic journal coverage. The author’s Planning and People in 1971 included several paragraphs on heritage, together with the suggestion that conservation, both green and brown, had by then reached the point where it could be seen as a major challenge for urban communities throughout Australia.18 Another 30 years would pass before the next Australian planning text arrived and, inevitably, it contained a full

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chapter on heritage.19 In short, and despite the signal importance of CIAM in such a climate, heritage practice had to take a back seat. In Australia, in the immediate post-war years, it did just that.

Cities and reg ions For the Australian Government, the huge wartime distractions associated with the nation’s involvement in the conflicts in Europe and the Pacific did not prevent serious thought being given to new national priorities for a future when peace had returned and the troops had come home. There were questions about such post-war priorities. What kind of a country did Australia want to be? What role might a post-war national government take in determining the quality of our housing stock, the size of our cities, the provision of basic infrastructure, and the general quality of urban life? As early as 1942, at the height of the Pacific and European conflicts in which Australian forces were engaged, the Curtin Government declared its commitment to pursuing the extension ‘of the Commonwealth’s power to enable it to supervise a great national plan for post-war reconstruction’.20 JB (Ben) Chifley, then a senior minister and a future prime minister, was appointed to direct a newly created Department of Post-War Reconstruction and HC (Nugget) Coombs, who would later be influential in the development of conservation polices in the 1960s and 1970s, was appointed head in 1943. In the same year, a Commonwealth Housing Commission was set up and its 1944 report was seminal in its breadth and influence on later federal and state initiatives in public housing and urban planning at the national, regional and local levels. This theme of a holistic approach to human settlement planning was taken up vigorously three decades later by a subsequent

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Labor Government under Gough Whitlam and his Minister for the Department of Urban and Regional Development (DURD), Tom Uren. On the topic of public participation, which will be discussed in some depth later, Troy and Lloyd make the following observation about the 1944 report: The report advocated strong public participation through the creation of machinery that would allow people to initiate proposals and participate in formulating policy. Planning should be a co-operative process, involving government technicians and the people whose daily lives are affected by planning decisions. Bureaucratic planning behind closed doors was criticised in trenchant terms.21

Uren put these and other revolutionary precepts into practice when DURD became operational in January 1973. DURD’s mandate was expansive, and optimistically predicated on what was referred to as a ‘whole of government’ approach to the resolution of urban problems. These included the question of how to manage urban regeneration – a policy sector that embraced so-called slum clearance, social housing, and the maintenance of historic precincts. Much of DURD’s early work was in the inner-city Sydney localities of Waterloo, Glebe and Woolloomooloo. The new department was breaking new ground in the always vexing field of Commonwealth–state relations, especially given that the Australian Constitution has no specific provisions for federal intervention in urban affairs. DURD projects were seen as experimental, exploratory, ‘laboratories for principles relevant to other places in Australia for a more sensitive approach to inner urban rehabilitation.’22 Of all the Australian capitals, Sydney was the obvious one in which to launch this ambitious and adventurous program. All three of the localities mentioned above contained ageing infrastructure, faced

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freeway threats, provided social housing, had heritage elements and accommodated restive communities that were yearning for a participatory role in the urban regeneration process. As will be discussed later, these conditions sparked the formation of resident action groups and the eventual involvement of Jack Mundey and the NSW Branch of the BLF with its green bans.

N e w f a c e s f r o m f a r away p l a c e s The post-war migrant ships were full of individuals and family groups seeking a new life in a new world.The lucky ones spoke the King’s English, had respectable roots in the ‘old country’, carried British passports, had money and professional or trade skills, and were capable of making a relatively comfortable transition into mainstream Australian life. The others – especially those from eastern Europe, the Baltic states, Greece, Italy, the Netherlands – had little or no English and were ‘foreign’ in every sense of the word. They were of a different ilk, and for most in that group the same transition was not going to be an easy run. The sufferings of the British at the hands of the German airforce, (the Luftwaffe), were bad enough, but they never had to face the enemy on their home turf. Conversely, the European migrants had all experienced the deprivations that came with the Nazi invasion of their homelands. For this group, war had brought a double dose of horror and carnage. For many, their sufferings under German occupation were followed by the deprivations, bombardments and constant disturbances to daily life that had accompanied the victorious Allied invasion of occupied Europe in 1944 through to 1945 and the slow return to normality after the Nazi capitulation in

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1945.These ‘New Australians’ had seen ancient villages turned to dust and rubble within the flash of a bomb burst. They had seen great civic buildings and places of worship destroyed by incendiary bombs and artillery fire. In some cases they had borne witness to the willful annihilation of entire towns with architectural heritage dating back to mediaeval times or even earlier. They had experienced brutalisation, slave labour, incarceration in concentration camps, starvation, the horrors of the Holocaust, and more. Tens of thousands had even lost their national identity, and had to come to grips with the indignity of being dubbed ‘stateless persons’, ‘displaced persons’, ‘reffos’ (refugees). But as they sailed in their thousands to Australia on the bulging migrant ships of the 1950s, both groups would have shared a common dream about a bounteous future ‘down under’. Most would have had direct experience of war, and so their common dream was of a future that above all would be peaceful, free of political discrimination, and full of opportunities for them and their children. Their priorities were finding jobs, housing, access to education and health services. There would have been only a handful among the army of new arrivals whose interests lay (even remotely) in architectural or heritage matters. For them, the past was behind. The future was what mattered. In this raw new place called Australia a concern for the vestiges of its colonial beginnings would have been seen by most of them as being fanciful, unimportant, extravagant, and irrelevant to the more pressing needs of the present. This is not to say that among the migrant population there were no historians, architects, designers or others with an interest in cultural matters. In fact, post-war Australia owes a great debt to the thousands of professionals, teachers, artists and tradespeople who arrived in the country during the immediate post-war years, and went on to inject some cosmopolitan values into the

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sleepy cultural climate that faced them on arrival. Their names are there in the art histories, boardroom reports, furniture catalogues, concert and ballet programs, architectural and design journals of the day. There must have been a level of curiosity about Australian cities, their history and their architecture among some of the new arrivals, but opportunities for those immigrants to contribute their knowledge and experience to the Australian heritage debate had to await the resolution of those more pressing problems to do with housing, jobs, security. For the locals, these desirable possessions were already becoming more readily available as the years of war gave way to peacetime prosperity. Life in post-war Australia was comfortable, challenging yet peaceful. Good things were there for the taking. All that was required was a bit of effort, a bit of dedication, a bit of luck. If you could hang in long enough, the gods would deliver; in other words, concentrate on today, and tomorrow will look after itself.

H e r i t a g e ? W h a t d o yo u m e a n ? Despite the preoccupation with progress, the necessary priorities of post-war reconstruction, and the urgencies of building new futures for Australians new and old, some tentative expressions of concern for Australia’s architectural and natural inheritance had already begun to emerge. As Freestone has written, a ‘fledgling preservation movement’ had been in existence in New South Wales, Tasmania and Victoria since the time of Federation. Against what he calls ‘the backdrop of modernisation’ and a ‘dominant demolish and develop ideology’, an infant heritage movement had been born, to be nourished initially by the Institute of Architects and by writers associated with the Australian Historical Society.23

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Another event that says something about how Australian perceptions of human settlements were maturing during the post-Federation era was the establishment in Victoria of the Town and Country Planning Association (TPCA) in 1914. This community-based NGO was modelled on its English namesake and, surprisingly, it remains today as the only organisation of its kind in Australia, and the only one that can trace its lineage back to the Garden City Association founded in Britain by Ebenezer Howard in 1899. The TCPA pursues objectives that include ‘promoting ecological sustainability, encouraging environmental planning and an effective strategic planning framework, and educating and inspiring popular support for environmental planning’.24 Despite these universally admirable aims, the association remains very much tied to its roots in Victoria and has no counterpart in other states. One might be tempted to say more’s the pity. The TCPA has never presented itself as a heritage lobby group, although heritage matters obviously fall within its overall brief. But its foundation at the outbreak of the First World War suggests that there was an emerging recognition, in reformist circles at least, of a need for a non-professional grass-roots body that could take up broad environmental causes and pursue them at official levels. Meanwhile, ardent individuals were content to pursue cognate causes within their own circles, eschewing the temptation to create a formal organisation or society. Peggy James takes up this same theme of an emerging civic consciousness, of the notion that civil society has a corporate responsibility for looking after its nest in the face of new threats to the ‘green’ environment associated – in large part – with urbanisation.25 While her focus is on the natural environment of the Sydney metropolitan region, her message invites comparison with the predicament faced by other fast-growing cities as green hinterlands are invaded, habitats

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endangered or destroyed and productive farmlands covered with concrete.26 She reminds us that reform is not accidental. It invariably surfaces as a considered response to grass-roots action that in turn occurs because enlightened individuals take initiatives that have been ignored or sidestepped by mainstream players. James’s narrative tracks the influence of a group of conservationists in Sydney in the early 20th century.The list includes people who left their mark in other fields; but her central message is that it was the common interest in conservation that led to their lives and their writings becoming ‘intertwined’ as they searched for answers to commonly experienced problem. Her network includes some of the founders of the green movement in Australia: David Stead, Walter Burley Griffin and Marion Mahony Griffin, Charles Bean, Thistle Harris, Rae Else-Mitchell, Paddy Pallin, Norman Weekes, Marie Byles, Myles Dunphy and Annie Wyatt. Individually, their careers took separate paths. As a group, they shared a passion for the natural environment and managed to achieve some significant reforms, the benefits of which are taken for granted today. James dubbed these early greenies ‘cosmopolitan conservationists’, a description that carries hints of their intellectual capabilities and their concern for the global as well as the local.They did not ignore cultural heritage: indeed, one or two had a foot in both camps. But overall, their concern was for the green rather than the brown. Like James, Freestone properly reminds us that the conservation movement was far from dormant during the inter-war period. The 1920s and 1930s saw the ranks of preservation advocates – both green and brown – augmented by artists, writers and ‘solid businessmen’ who were unafraid to express their alarm at the loss of historic buildings or verdant bush land in the name of progress.27 But until the aftermath of the Second World War it seems that the forces for heritage reform in the urban sector were, at least,

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fragmented, scattered, leaderless. No single champion emerged. An occasional outburst of civic concern, like that associated with the demolition of Burdekin House in Sydney’s Macquarie Street in 1933, saw temperatures momentarily rise, but in general there was little political support for interventions that ran counter to the ‘dominant ethic of growth and renewal’, which had prevailed since the time of Federation.28 It was not until the end of the 1950s that effective political momentum at the grass-roots level was generated. Several significant outcomes of that process are outlined in boxed text.

Burdekin House’s gone, but we have a chance to save the Circular Quay Railway from the vandals of 100 years hence.

Molnar offers diplomatic comment on the National Trust’s post-war urge to compensate for the loss of Burdekin House. Permission of National Library of Australia [PIC 7345/2379]

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RISING POLITICAL MOMENTUM In 1945, the first National Trust state division in Australia was established in New South Wales, where its energies were initially concentrated on saving a few houses and public buildings from the colonial era. Its expansion into urban conservation and other fields came much later. Also in 1945, the NSW Government established the Cumberland County Council, a quasi-metropolitan planning organisation, which had a plan for the Sydney region that incorporated the first tentative moves in New South Wales towards the statutory protection of heritage buildings, scenery and public open space. Under the County Plan, heritage research was commenced by Rachel Roxburgh and Helen Proudfoot, and seven buildings were nominated for protection. Urban heritage work was guided by a new advisory body known as the Historic Buildings Committee, established in 1947. In his classic book on the County Plan Professor Denis Winston29 reminds us that the local government legislation in place at that time gave authority for local councils to protect and acquire historic buildings, and he cites the acquisition by the infant National Trust of the grand property known as St Malo30 in the Sydney suburb of Hunters Hill as an example of progress in this field.31 Ironically, St Malo was demolished in 1960, despite an ardent conservation campaign, to make way for road widening and bridge construction across the Lane Cove River – an event that in hindsight is a reminder that even before the green-ban era, the consequences of a growth in car ownership were already beginning to impact on heritage values and heritage sites. Winston’s quiet invitation to communities in New South Wales to establish historic societies and to ‘actively engage in bringing to the notice of the local council fine old buildings in danger … and in

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But if we demolish the pub instead, won’t we be accused of acting against Australian tradition? Molnar comments on dilemmas facing policy makers during Sydney’s property boom of the 1950s. Permission of National Library of Australia [PIC 7345/2378]

arousing local opinion to help preserve them’ (emphasis added) can be seen as one of the first moments when a leading scholar encouraged the kind of grass-roots action that would be undertaken everywhere within the following decades. During the same period, the Victorian Town and Country Planning Board under its chair Rod Fraser was developing a policy framework for historic non-metropolitan areas such as the old goldfield towns of Maldon and Beechworth. In 1970 a special Advisory Committee on Historic Area Conservation was created to oversee the implementation of this new policy. Feature continued overleaf

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Roxburgh and Proudfoot, after the County Plan was completed, then advised the NSW State Planning Authority on NSW historic buildings in the central area of Sydney, and in the towns of Windsor, Richmond, Liverpool and Campbelltown, first laid out during Governor Macquarie’s era (1810 to 1822).32 In 1954, the Sydney architect and architectural historian Morton Herman published his classic Early Australian Architects and Their Work. To this day, his book remains perhaps the most authoritative (and readable) work on the architecture of the colonial era. Herman’s delightful hand-drawn plans and perspectives were supported by a thoroughly researched narrative that stimulated widespread public interest in the topic. The heritage cause was a major beneficiary of his efforts. Herman’s book is a direct descendant of William Hardy Wilson’s Old Colonial Architecture in New South Wales and Tasmania, published thirty years earlier. Apart from its recognition as a masterpiece of its kind by the cognoscenti of that day, the signal importance of Wilson’s efforts in a contemporary heritage context had to await Cyril Pearl’s dedicated memoir of 1970 – half a century later. In 1955 the Nature Conservation Council of New South Wales (NCC) was established. From the outset, its focus was clearly green. While the National Trust was flexing its muscles in campaigns to save historic buildings and urban spaces, the NCC was moving in a different but complementary direction. Its priority was the protection of native species, habitats and landscapes from threats associated with urbanisation. The story of the NCC and cognate green organisations is for another time and place; but today it can be acknowledged that the Council’s strategic priorities are giving it an influential role in the campaigns against what it sees as inappropriate developments in the mining, coal seam gas extraction, forestry

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and commercial fishing sectors. In the context of today’s global push for a more sustainable future, the NCC – like the ACF (Australian Conservation Foundation) and other similar bodies throughout Australia – is taking a lead in its advocacy of a positive response by governments to the consequences of climate change and the growing opportunities in the renewable energy sector.

These initiatives – mostly New South Wales-based – had counterparts in other states. They can be seen now as significant influences on the post-war growth of interest in heritage, and in what is meant today by ‘sustainable development’. Of those discussed in the box, the establishment of the National Trust (NSW), and its subsequent evolution to its present position of influence and authority, is the most important here. But at that time, in New South Wales alone, much more remained to be done if the already dwindling inheritance of fine historic buildings and fine landscapes was to be saved from the battalions of eager property developers that were mustering on the sidelines. In Sydney in 1968 the conservation campaign was energised by the advent of the frenzied property boom that lasted until the mid 1970s and which saw dozens of heritage buildings lost to posterity.33 The story of that extraordinary boom has been minutely detailed in Maurie Daly’s Sydney Boom, Sydney Bust. At the time of the Trust’s incorporation in 1960 the boom was still in the wind and the bust was yet to come. In the meantime, scattered and plaintive cries of concern for conserving what was left of the state’s architectural and cultural heritage would continue to fall on the deaf ears of political leaders and powerless bureaucrats – powerless because the law was silent on heritage, even if those officials privately supported the

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conservation cause. And for many architects, the boom brought a rush of commissions for bigger and taller buildings. Height limits had been removed. Designers were unencumbered by requirements to undertake environmental or heritage impact assessments of their projects. Adverse shadow and noise impacts on other buildings and on nearby public spaces were largely ignored. And there was the added excitement of working with light weight concrete, flat slab floors, pre- and post- stressing of reinforced concrete structural members – technical advances pioneered by architects such as Harry Seidler and structural engineer Peter Miller in Sydney.These advances in building technology presented new design opportunities for both developers and architects, and those opportunities soon bore rich fruit as the city skyline exploded upwards. There was another dimension to this revolution – one that brought a new threat to those heritage buildings and precincts that had the misfortune to occupy prime real estate locations. The demolition and redevelopment of entire city blocks was now becoming possible if not commonplace – fuelled by big money, the availability of an armoury of big and powerful demolition machines, and imaginative legal and real estate processes. Farsighted and ambitious developers were becoming increasingly interested in site amalgamations and in the commercial opportunities that would flow from the comprehensive redevelopment of small contiguous properties that, by themselves, were unattractive to investors. Bigger was definitely better, and if the project involved the loss of the odd heritage building, or the fine grain of old pathways and precincts, or the displacement of a few pensioner tenants, so be it. That was the price of progress. That was how it was until something quite unexpected happened on the banks of the Parramatta River in Sydney.

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Molnar comments on heritage conservation at the grass roots. Permission of National Library of Australia [PIC 7345/2027]

But officer, I am taking home this piece of national heritage to preserve it.

Sydney’s Australia Square project (1966) involved the amalgamation and total demolition of 19 separate holdings, including unprotected heritage buildings. Reproduced with kind permission of Planning Research Centre, University of Sydney

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Chapter 3

A city and a river The saga of Mr Kelly and his bush ... and what came after

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T

he fight to save Kelly’s Bush at Hunter’s Hill would make headlines and propel Jack Mundey’s name into the spotlight. It would see a leading property developer facing the unlikely pairing of a group of determined local women with a very left-wing trade union. But as Jack Mundey says: In a modern society, trade unions must broaden their vision and horizons and become involved in wide-ranging social, political and environmental activities. The struggle for improvement in wages and conditions must continue, but the broader issues should be addressed. Not only has the trade union movement the right to intervene: it has the responsibility to do so.1

T h e l i e o f t h e l a n d – a c i t y a n d a r i ve r The modern city of Sydney is internationally renowned for its splendid harbour. Of lesser repute is one of that harbour’s upper reaches – a broad and spacious waterway that snakes its meandering path to its source some 16 kilometres to the west of the city’s great arched Harbour Bridge. This is the Parramatta River, named in 1788 by the first colonial governor, Arthur Phillip. In April of that year – the year that saw the birth of modern Australia and the slow, sad, yet inevitable invasion of the country’s indigenous homelands – the governor led an exploratory party up-river from the settlement at Sydney Cove.2 During the first trip they would doubtless have noted the unspoiled condition of this quietly flowing coastal river, its stark if fulsome stands of mangroves, its abundant fish life, its quiet bays and beaches, its bush-clad foreshores and its gently contoured hinterland of open forest.

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N

South Middle Harbour

Pacific

Parramatta Hunters Hill

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4 km

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Port Jackson and the Parramatta River. Courtesy Cox Richardson Architects, Sydney

At the river’s head they found good soil and the promise of productive farmland. In November, a government farm was established there and in June 1790 a town was laid out. A year later the infant settlement was named Parramatta – thought to be from burramatta, ‘the place where eels lie down’ in Aboriginal language – in what was (and remains) the ancestral homeland of the Wallumedagal clan. The river provided direct access by water from the parent settlement at Sydney Cove and Port Jackson, and for several years the new township was the principal focus of colonial agricultural activity. On his later trips along the river, Phillip might have observed the many signs of Aboriginal occupation, but it is unlikely that he would have known that the harbour and its family of creeks and tributaries held deep spiritual significance for the native

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N

outh

acific

cean

people. For them, the ‘spirit of place’ – Tuhbowgule Nangamay – was the force that worked to protect the natural and cultural resources of their waterway and country for posterity. Descendants of those original owners would today agree that posterity has not been kind, either to the river or to its traditional owners. Two centuries after Phillip’s return to England the waterway remains as a recognisable geographical entity, but it is now encircled by a metropolis of more than 4.8 million people. Its banks have hard urban edges. Aboriginal settlements are nowhere to be seen. The river’s extensive catchment spreads to the north and south and is drained by a complex network of concrete pipes and open storm water channels – replacing most of the system’s natural creeks and drainage lines. In many places, industrial pollution and urban run-off have taken a huge and almost irreversible toll on the aquatic environment, with a consequential (terminal?) decline in the yield of edible fish and oyster species and their supporting marine habitats. Bird environments have been degraded or destroyed. Native bush land along the riparian strip has all but disappeared – replaced by exotic landscaped gardens, roads, sea walls, wharves, jetties, warehouses, maritime industry, public utilities, navigation aids, and the occasional green splash of parkland. Thousands of Sydneysiders now live along the river in towering apartments, grand ‘McMansions’ and dwellings of lesser splendour clustered in suburban localities with names occasionally providing a subtle reference to a more untarnished past: Silverwater, Meadowbank, Rydalmere. Other place names – Henley, Putney, Chiswick, Woolwich and Greenwich – stand as reminders of the nostalgic longing for the Thames Valley back in the mother country. Phillip took a day in a jolly boat to make the journey from Sydney Cove to Parramatta; today the same journey takes 40 minutes in a hydrofoil ferry.

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Unexpected visitors Governor Arthur Phillip’s keen interest in the river and in the prospect of establishing productive farms and gardens along its banks was understandable. But during those first few weeks of colonisation there were other pressing matters to occupy his mind. One such matter was the extraordinary and completely unexpected visit of the French navigator Jean-Francois de Galaup, Comte de La Perouse, who led his two ships into Botany Bay (some 15 kilometres to the south of Port Jackson) on the very day that Phillip’s First Fleet of 11 vessels left that bay to sail north and drop their anchors in Sydney Cove at the end of their six-month voyage from Britain.3 For Phillip’s party of over a thousand souls the short trip up the coast to Port Jackson was the end of a long and less than comfortable six-month odyssey via the west coast of Africa, Cape Town and the Indian Ocean, dealing with the ‘roaring forties’ and then the safe transit of the Southern Ocean and up the east coast of Australia to the final landfall in Sydney Cove. On arrival, Phillip’s job was to establish a penal colony. For the French it was an entirely different story.Their five-week stopover allowed for repairs to their frigates, Boussole and Astrolabe, and for the establishment of cordial relations with the colonial administration before their departure for the Loyalty Islands and the fatal shipwreck that abruptly terminated their mission. To this day, the enduring continuity of what has largely been a warm connection between Australia and France finds concrete expression in the La Perouse Memorial, erected in 1825 on the northern shore of Botany Bay by Baron Commander Hyacinthe de Bougainville during his stay as the ‘noble guest’ of Governor Brisbane.4 But that monument, with its sad inscription in French and English at what is now known as La Perouse, is not

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the only reminder of French influence on the early development of colonial Sydney, or on the evolution of a tiny penal colony into the modern state of New South Wales. Another such reminder is to be found on the Parramatta River in the locality known today as Hunters Hill, and which welcomed some of the earliest French settlers in Australia.

The French village A topographic map of Sydney will show Hunters Hill today consists largely of a low peninsula or promontory at the confluence of the Parramatta and Lane Cove rivers, both tributaries of Sydney Harbour that connects to the Tasman Sea and the wider Pacific Ocean some distance further to the east. The area probably takes its name from that of Captain John Hunter, a First Fleet veteran who later served a term as governor of the colony. In the 1840s, a group of French Marist fathers chose Hunters Hill as the base for their missionary efforts in the South Pacific. Of greater importance here, however, was the arrival during the same period of French settlers M. Didiêr Joubert and his brother Jules. They were born in Angouleme – ‘an ancient town built on the summit of a cone-shaped rock towering over the meadows through which the River Charente runs.’5 The nearby Atlantic coast ports of La Rochelle and Bordeaux would have been well known to these adventurous brothers, whose travels to the antipodes eventually led them to positions of influence in Sydney, and in particular Hunters Hill. In his 2004 essay Ivan Barko discusses the Jouberts and Hunters Hill. He applies the sobriquet French Village to the early settlement on the peninsula that at the time was ‘considered to be an unsafe and insalubrious area’.6 This was before the two French entrepreneurs

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Above: Port Jackson and the Parramatta River. Below: Hunters Hill and the Parramatta River. Both images courtesy Cox Richardson Architects, Sydney

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had established their reputation as imaginative developers, and the very salubrious neighbourhood that we see today had begun to emerge. Their hope was to exploit the residential subdivision potential of this attractive harbourside promontory. Barko claims that this ‘bold vision makes them not only the founding fathers of Hunters Hill but also the pioneers of Sydney’s love affair with water views.’ In addition to their subdivision projects, Didier Joubert and his brother employed Italian stonemasons to build a number of fine houses for French settlers and other clients on the new lots flanking the ridge-top road. One such house was Passy, a splendid stone mansion built on one of the highest points on the peninsula for M. Louis Sentis, the second French consul-general to the colony. Another was St Malo, overlooking the Lane Cove River and later to become a National Trust treasure before its controversial demolition. The Joubert brothers were joined in Hunters Hill by other French developers, including Count Gabriel de Milhau and George Fesq. The brothers pursued other interests, such as the establishment of the Lane Cove River ferry service and terms of office in the newly created Hunters Hill municipal council. Their extensive business and civic activities extended into the new century, with Jules Joubert’s involvement in the great Melbourne International Exhibition of 1902.

M r Ke l l y a n d h i s s m e l t e r Not all the peninsula land at Woolwich was taken up for residential use. In 1892, 8.3 hectares of Hunters Hill waterfront real estate was acquired by Mr Thomas Herbert (Bertie) Kelly and his family business – the Sydney Smelting Company. Their intention was to

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use about half of the property for the purpose of establishing a tin smelting works, while reserving the remaining bush land for public enjoyment in perpetuity. According to official records, Mr Kelly’s profession was simply that of a metal merchant.7 But those same records go on to paint a picture of a well-educated man who had a keen interest in yachting, music and literature, held high office in Sydney’s commercial world, and even held commissioned rank as an army reservist. He obviously also had what would be seen as a green streak today, in that he expressed his support for the establishment of a koala sanctuary in the Sydney suburb of Pennant Hills. Since humankind first discovered how to extract pure metal from natural ore, smelting has been an unavoidably dirty business – a noxious industry, in contemporary planning-speak. Its offensive qualities may help to explain Barko’s use of the term ‘insalubrious’. But smelting has also been associated with visionary entrepreneurs, miners, adventurous investors and risk-takers. So within the first half-century of colonial occupation in Australia, pioneering industrialists had managed to obtain a foothold for this grimy industry on the Parramatta River at Woolwich. In 1849 the Rosemorrin Smelting Works were established in the area, to be followed in 1888 by the works of the Atlas Engineering Company on Clarke’s Point. Kelly’s 1892 venture was followed in 1901 by another maritime industrial enterprise, Thomas Sutcliffe Mort’s dock just to the north of Clarke’s Point. Bertie Kelly loved koalas. But he must also have given some thought to the notion that city folk needed to be able to enjoy and experience the ‘bush’ at first hand. The evidence suggests that his company applied this enlightened principle in its plans for the tin-smelting works that were built on the southern foreshore at Woolwich. In the event, the subsequent voluntary dedication of about five hectares of virgin bush land as a recreational and visual

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buffer between industry and the private housing estates up the hill created the area that came to be known as Kelly’s Bush. Seventy years later, the bush was to become the site of the world’s first ‘green ban’. Today, Mr Kelly’s tiny patch of rough and craggy harbourside bush land has long since lost its noxious industrial neighbours. The smoke and grime, the noise and clatter of machines, are gone;

Above: Kelly’s Bush from the water, looking north. Following pages: Kelly’s Bush foreshore in 2014, looking east to Cockatoo Island and Sydney city centre; the view AV Jennings was going to offer prospective buyers. Both images courtesy Simon Colman

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the slag heaps nowhere to be seen. The old industrial workforce – strong, tough, blue-collar lads – has long since relocated to other parts, although the nearby Woolwich Pier Hotel in Gale Street still caters for thirsty workers, mainly of the white-collar variety.To the east of the bush is a small marina, its finger-pontoon projecting into the river to give proud boat owners easy and direct access to their slick and shiny vessels – not a dirty business, this one. To the west, extending for a couple of kilometres, is a spread of magnificent harbourside houses. Certainly the Joubert brothers, as the founding fathers of this very exclusive neighbourhood, would be pleased at this prospect, despite the absence of the small-scale charm and intimacy of a typical French village. To the north, a public playing field is flanked by the Marist Sisters’ Convent, which was founded in 1907 and provides another link to the early efforts of French Marist missionaries who helped to establish the continuing educational assets of modern-day Hunters Hill. The most noteworthy of these is the nearby St Joseph’s College for boys, which was founded by the Marist Brothers in 1881. The Jouberts left their name on one of the Hill’s streets, further to the west beyond the present-day council chambers and civic administration buildings. Didier Joubert was the first president of the newly proclaimed borough in 1861, and Jules held office as the first elected Mayor for the period 1867 to 1869.8 Today, Hunters Hill is staunchly proud of its place as the smallest local government area in metropolitan Sydney, and the oldest on the northern side of the Harbour.The council’s website tells us that ‘there is virtually no industry’ in the Hill.We have no means of ascertaining whether or not the Joubert brothers would be satisfied with this comforting reality, given their strongly entrepreneurial ambitions for the area. However, exactly a century after Jules Joubert’s term as mayor, the Sydney Smelting Company moved out of Woolwich to new

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premises in Alexandria, an inner-city industrial suburb south of the harbour. The move coincided with the formation of the community-based Hunters Hill Trust and the renewed stirrings of serious grass-roots environmental activism in Sydney. This period was a threshold one for conservationists.

The times they are a-chang in’ The exit of the Sydney Smelting Company led to a clean-up program at Woolwich. The factory buildings and managers’ houses were demolished, the slag heaps covered. More importantly, the departure of this unsightly yet friendly neighbour opened the door to a new future for this jewel of a harbourside site.There was a virtual El Dorado waiting for the first property developer who could get his hands on this derelict but splendid slice of real estate. The prospect of clearing a few hectares of scrubby bushland and erecting luxury waterfront housing was seductive, enticing, not to be lightly set aside – it was a once-in-a-generation opportunity. AV Jennings Ltd, one of the country’s biggest housing developers, took a two-year purchase option on Kelly’s Bush, and subsequently released their plans for three eight-storey apartment blocks, a total of 147 units, embellished by trim, delicate patches of lawn, instant landscaping, the obligatory on-site areas of private open space and generous car parking. In the spirit of the Joubert brothers, the project offered harbour views across to Cockatoo Island and beyond. For this development to proceed, Jennings needed the support of the Hunters Hill Council for the bid by the company to have the open space zoning suspended and replaced by a suitable residential zone in the local town planning scheme. But the company’s rezoning application was unanimously refused by the council of

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the day, a decision that was consistent with the council’s stand in 1966 when it had campaigned for the statutory open space zoning to be retained, and the whole area acquired for posterity. Jennings was not prepared to surrender easily. There was much at stake; surely one of Australia’s smallest urban councils could not possibly be allowed to frustrate a prestigious multimillion-dollar housing project in one of Sydney’s most desirable suburbs. The site was nothing more than a piece of unkempt bushland sitting next to an abandoned smelting works. Among the locals, argument and gossip began flowing. Some of the arguments tossed about at the time stuck. The one hurdle that had to be jumped was the official open space zoning: if the AV Jennings’ scheme was to proceed, that zoning had to be revoked. The state government held the ace card, given that the powers governing land-use zonings were embedded in state legislation. However, Jennings’ hopes for a dream run through the complexities of the development approval process struck an unexpected snag when the newly established Hunters Hill Trust – a small but influential community-based organisation of locals – lodged a strong protest against the company’s high-rise proposal.9 In what might, in hindsight, be seen as a somewhat conciliatory response, the state government seemed to have relented when the minister instructed his State Planning Authority to work with Jennings on a compromise scheme that would have seen the high-rise elements replaced by 25 luxury homes on generous plots. About 2.3 hectares would be retained as a waterfront reserve. In November 1970 the Hunters Hill Council agreed to this compromise by a narrow five to four vote, a reflection of a softening of local opposition among a section of the Hunters Hill community. But there was still the matter of the land use zoning in the Hunters Hill planning scheme.

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AV Jennings’ proposal for 25-lot subdivision of Kelly’s Bush for ‘luxury housing’, an alternative to the original scheme for three high-rise tower blocks. Courtesy Cox Richardson Architects, Sydney

Jennings could not lay a single brick until the relevant state minister had given his blessing to a zoning change, notwithstanding that the company enjoyed what must have looked like a dream position in the eyes of an ardently pro-development state government under Premier Askin. And that relationship at last bore fruit when in May 1971 the council endorsed its agreement with Jennings to the amended scheme. This action paved the way for the rezoning to be rubber-stamped into law on 3 June by Minister for Local Government Pat Morton. For AV Jennings, it must have seemed an appropriate moment to open the champagne and begin clearing the site.

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The battle for the bush – the ladies, M r M u n d e y, a n d h i s u n i o n For many determined locals, site clearing was not – and never could be – an option. The fight to save Kelly’s Bush was about to enter a new phase in which Jack Mundey’s name would appear in the headlines for the first time. Over the next couple of years, the site of this flagship project by one of the country’s top developers would unexpectedly become the focus of a hard-fought environmental campaign, and this would lead in turn to further widespread reforms in urban planning and heritage conservation throughout Australia.10 This was fame, certainly, but not the kind of fame that would have been in the minds of the company’s directors when the agreement between Jennings and the council was signed. They could not have imagined that four decades later, on 6 June 2011, Her Excellency Professor Marie Bashir, Governor of New South Wales, would visit Kelly’s Bush and unveil a bronze plaque ‘to commemorate the 40th Anniversary of the World’s first Green Ban’. That plaque carries Jack Mundey’s name, but it is disappointing to find that the inscription provides no clue as to who he is and was, or what his role might have been in the green ban movement. The plaque is silent, too, on the history of that movement. It says nothing about the political infighting of the era or the scandals and corruption linking developers, ministers of the Crown and high-ranking officials. With its reference to the world, it leaves us wondering what might be the connection between the tiny scrap of rough bushland and the wider community outside and abroad. Perhaps intentionally, it also fails to explain the meaning of the term ‘green ban’. And perhaps this is as it should be, because it is an encouragement to look elsewhere for explanations.

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Kelly’s Bush commemorative plaque, 2011. Courtesy Simon Colman

We can begin our inquiries with Meredith and Verity Burgmann’s Green Bans, Red Union – a meticulously researched history of trade union activism published by the University of NSW Press in 1998. In her preface, Meredith Burgmann recalled the last days of the ‘green bans period’ in 1975, when she unexpectedly found herself as the temporary custodian of BLF archival material. At the time she was a member of the Politics Department at Macquarie University in Sydney. Professor Don Aitkin saw an opportunity for a doctoral thesis ‘on an exciting and important subject’, a thesis that was duly completed in 1981 and followed 17 years later by the book, a greatly condensed version of its academic predecessor. Burgmann’s election to the NSW Parliament led to the involvement of her sister Verity – a political scientist and labour historian who (apparently at Jack Mundey’s suggestion) was enlisted to carry the primary responsibility for undertaking further research

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and converting the thesis into a published book. And as might be expected, the first chapter of this richly documented work jumps straight into the story of the world’s first green ban. As recounted by the Burgmanns and others, a group of thirteen local Hunters Hill women – Betty James (President), Kath Lehaney (Secretary), Monica Sheehan, Jo Bell, Kathleen Chubb, Joan Croll, Christena Dawson, Mary Farrell, Marjorie Fitzgerald, Miriam Hamilton, Trude Kallir, Margaret Stobo and Judith Taplin – met in September 1970 to share their anger and concern over the Jennings proposal. Their aim was to map out a strategy for saving the bush. The group became known as The Battlers for Kelly’s Bush, and the values they were promoting were those presented in an opinion piece written by their president, Betty James, and published in the Sydney Morning Herald in July 1970. Politically naive but passionate about their cause,The Battlers sought to use every weapon in their limited armoury to have the rezoning rescinded and the Jennings approval set aside. Hundreds of letters were written. Media releases were organised. Political leaders, ministers and opposition shadow ministers were lobbied. Banners and badges were circulated around the council area. Delegations were sent to state Premier Robert Askin. Petitions were circulated. Conservation groups and professional bodies were approached for support, including the Civic Design Society, the National Trust, and The Royal Australian Institute of Architects. But the government stood firm. On 3 June Minister Morton signed the order authorising the rezoning, at which point it seemed that The Battlers had no-where to go – except to Jack Mundey, Bob Pringle, Jack Cambourn and their comrades in the trade union movement. Why would a group of outwardly conservative middle-class women – ‘liberal ladies’, if you like – from this exclusive residential neighbourhood turn to a staunchly left-wing trade union for

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Kelly’s Bush campaign flyers.

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help?11 Mundey offers his own answer to this when he recalled The Battlers’ predicament and the fascinating interaction between the women of Hunters Hill and the labourers of Sydney during a politically turbulent period in June 1971: [A statement issued by the NSW branch of the BLF] said that as the workers who had raised the buildings, we had a right to express an opinion on social questions relating to the building industry. It was this statement which prompted a group of women from Hunters Hill to talk to me about some open waterfront bushland called Kelly’s Bush … They came to us and said that the time had come for us to put our theory into practice … they gave us to understand that we [the union] were their last and only hope.12

Mundey describes how The Battlers had exhausted all formal channels of protest without success. Polite diplomacy had been getting them nowhere. But the ladies were aware of the BLF manifesto. Monica Sheehan, The Battlers’ secretary, wrote letters – many letters.13 The BLF executive considered The Battlers’ request at some length. Mundey says it was a ‘spirited debate’ in the meeting rooms of the old Trades Hall in Sussex Street, when traditional trade union priorities over wages and working conditions were weighed against this new concept that, if pursued, would see workers holding hands with a group of privileged middle-class people who already had it all.14 For some unionists it seemed to smack of an unholy alliance – totally at odds with orthodox left-wing trade union doctrine. When it came to the vote, the executive resolved to recommend to the rank-and-file membership the imposition of a ban on the deployment of BLF labour on the Kelly’s Bush

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project. That recommendation was subsequently adopted by the rank and file.The executive resolution also carried with it a condition that would subsequently become a crucially important factor in the application of future bans: union support would be offered only if it was sought by way of an open public meeting and a formal resolution involving members of the affected community – which in this case consisted of The Battlers and their supporters. The arrangement meant that, even if an invitation was received by the union, no action would be taken unless and until the request had been supported by a majority at a general meeting of the union rank-and-file. In the event, the executive recommendation for a ban at Kelly’s Bush was endorsed by a meeting of union members, and – to quote Jack Mundey again – ‘the first environmental ban was under way.’ In his history of the company from its formation in the early 1930s through to 1992, Don Garden provided a succinct sketch of the ensuing events as viewed from the Jennings side: Sydney gave Jennings its first major experience with conservation sentiment and the new power being exercised by building unions. The company (had) acquired a bushland area in the prestigious harbourside suburb of Hunters Hill, intending a development of luxury home units and townhouses. Some local residents objected and formed a group … which did all it could to obstruct progress. In 1971 (the group) approached the NSW Branch of the BLF and its Secretary Jack Mundey who, after a struggle with their collective class consciences, agreed that public open space was important for workers, even in an upper class suburb. The Union imposed the first green ban in Australia on the Jennings site. When someone at Jennings threatened to

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bring in non-union labour, the union threatened to blackban all Jennings’ sites. The company wisely dropped the idea and, after failing to find any other solution, was relieved eventually to sell the land to the government.15

When it came, the ban provided much-needed breathing space for The Battlers and their growing number of supporters from Sydney and beyond. Over 600 people attended the stipulated public meeting at Hunters Hill when the ban was requested. The union met on 17 June and the ban was endorsed.16 The Askin Government eventually backed down. AV Jennings withdrew. Years later in 1983 a new Labor State Government under Premier Neville Wran purchased the site for dedication as public open space. The creation of a management committee followed in 1984 and, in 1986, Planning and Environment Minister Bob Carr released a draft management and landscape plan for Kelly’s Bush. In his press release at the time, Carr reminded readers that it was the site of ‘perhaps the most important of the conservation fights of the 1970s … The Battlers who saved Kelly’s Bush from the developers can claim much of the credit for the increased consciousness of and support for environmental protection in the community.’17 In 1993 the ongoing control of the bush was handed to the Hunters Hill Council.The battle was over but, as the Burgmanns and others have made clear, the saga created a powerful and inspiring precedent that saw the Kelly’s Bush campaign take its place in the international environmental movement as the source of the world’s first green ban – a term whose first use is claimed by Jack Mundey. In her 1976 book The Home of Man, leading British environmentalist Barbara Ward described the green ban movement as ‘an unusually effective example’ of citizen action against ‘unpopular intrusions’ – whether public or private. Writing as the doyenne of

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the UK-based International Institute for Environment and Development, she generously acknowledged Jack Mundey’s assistance in her introductory author’s note. In his incisive introduction to Ward’s popular treatise, Enrique Peñalosa (then secretarygeneral of the United Nations Conference on Human Settlements), reminded us that Barbara Ward was (like Mundey) a ‘rallying point’ in a growing international community-based environmental movement.18 In Ward’s discussion of ‘instruments of community’ she provides clear evidence that the Battle for Kelly’s Bush was no local flash-in-the-pan campaign by a parochial minority. Rather, it was one that highlighted the value of grass-roots action, of: communities of small dedicated groups of people who, with or without the backing of their formal representatives (and sometimes indeed against them) are prepared to go to work, form a coalition of interested people, and make enough trouble for authority … Kelly’s Bush would have vanished under steel and concrete if an active group of citizens had not started the protest.

Ward’s message could well have applied to the efforts of the pioneering conservationists of the 1920s and 1930s who are celebrated by Peggy James and whose names stand alongside Mundey’s as battlers of an earlier generation. James (along with Robert Freestone) makes it clear that conservation – especially of the green kind – was far from being a dead issue during the interwar years, and that the sporadic campaigns, protests and occasional victories that add colour to the environmental history of that era were forerunners to the post-war activities in urban heritage.19 But if there is one fundamental difference between the efforts of grassroots conservation activists in the pre- and post-war periods it would seem to be in the field of leadership. James talks about Myles

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Dunphy, Annie Wyatt, the Griffins and others as belonging to a ‘network’ – but it was a network seemingly without a leader. Activities and interventions were sporadic. Collaboration on a major scale was rare. Individuals took initiatives as and when their energies allowed. In comparison, the 1960s and 1970s saw the emergence of strong leaders such as Mundey, Bob Brown, Geoff Mosley and Milo Dunphy, whose personalities and dynamism acted as a powerful unifying force at the level of rank and file membership. Those leaders would have been the first to acknowledge their legacy to the pioneers of the inter-war years, but the game had changed.The emergence of strong NGOs at both state and federal levels during the three post-war decades is testament enough to prove the point that in this new game, the key to success was to find a combination of unity and strong leadership. That simple formula was what lay at the base of the short but successful green ban era. There is no doubt that during the years since Ward’s book – and following bans in other Australian cities and states – the term ‘green ban’ has passed into common usage, consistent with Mundey’s view back in 1973, when he saw the need for a new concept to cover a trade union’s social and environmental priorities and responsibilities. As he says in his autobiography, ‘the adjective “green” was more apt than “black”.’ Half a century later, the term has more than proved its worth. The name Mundey has also become a synonym for enlightened environmental activism – born out of widely shared passions and concerns for the environmental wellbeing of the many rather than the few.The legacy of that 1970s campaign to save a few hectares of bushland on the Parramatta River shoreline can be seen today in the continuing strength and dedication of active conservation groups throughout Australia, and in the extensive body of environmental law that seeks to protect the nation’s stock of heritage assets. Bertie Kelly would be well satisfied.

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BLF banner (1906) designed and crafted by Edgar Whitehead in Sydney, and carried aloft in union processions and May Day parades. The three-storey brick building (built as a post office) is now the Adina Apartment Hotel at Central Station. Courtesy Neale Towart, Unions NSW

Jacket design by le Corbusier for The Athens Charter, Paris, 1973. Reproduced with kind permission of Penguin Random House, NY

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Burdekin House, Macquarie Street, Sydney (c. 1841); demolished 1933. Drawing by author from early photograph (source unknown)

St Malo, Hunters Hill (c. 1836); demolished 1960. Drawing by author from early photograph (source unknown)

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Mundey joins the 1996 reunion of The Battlers for Kelly’s Bush. Photographer: Robert Pearce, courtesy Sydney Morning Herald, Fairfax Media

Kelly’s Bush campaign poster, 1970.

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Jack Mundey named as a National Trust Living Treasure – Sydney Town Hall, 1998. Photographer: Jan Kuczerawy, courtesy National Trust NSW

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Reproduced with kind permission of Sydney City Council

5

GROUPS

POP

VATION

WORLD WAR 2

ION

100

CONSER

DEPRESSION

WORLD WAR 1

150

T

10

200

LA

MILLIONS

15

IN POPULATION

Extract from 1971 statutory plan for the City of Sydney. The red-and-white striped overlay indicates the inner-city localities of Leichardt, Glebe, Ultimo, Pyrmont and Darlington which were scheduled for resumption and expressway construction.

20

U

Illustration courtesy Cox Richardson Architects, Sydney

NUMBER OF CONSERVATION GROUPS

Report of the Committee of Inquiry into the National Estate, AGPS 1974.

50

1900

1920

1940

1960

GLEBE

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0

100

200 m

Portion of a 1979 reprint by the Central Mapping Authority of NSW of the 1836 original, ‘drawn and engraved for the proprietor WG Capoorn’. The area that came to be known as The Rocks is shaded; north is to the right. Reproduced with acknowledgement to the Mitchell Library, State Library of NSW

Cadman’s Cottage, Sydney Cove, c. 1816. Drawing by author

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Above: The Rocks, plan of 1967 proposal by NCDC. Right: The Rocks, model of adopted 1970 scheme. Both images courtesy Sydney Harbour Foreshore Authority

Below: Comparative profiles of The Rocks as viewed from East Circular Quay, 1970 scheme and today. Courtesy Cox Richardson Architects, Sydney

The Rocks, Sydney Cove The dotted red line is a suggestion of the skyline envelope (viewed from the east) which would have been created if the original SCRA scheme had been implemented. The solid blue line is the skyline envelope as currently exists.

Cahill Museum of Expressway Contemporary Art

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Overseas Passenger Terminal

Sydney Harbour Bridge

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PA R K HYDE Low-relief mural of Mundey in Globe Street, The Rocks; sculptor Alexandre Farto, commissioned by Sydney City Council. Photograph by author

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HYDE

PA R K

THE DOMAIN

DA R L I N G H U R ST

Woolloomooloo, scheme for redevelopment by State Planning Authority of New South Wales, 1967. Reproduced with kind permission of City of Sydney Council

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Above: Millers Point, posters opposing the government ‘sell-off ’ of heritage dwellings, 2015. Photographs by author

Opposite page: Woolloomooloo, historic mural beneath railway viaduct depicting events and personalities from the green ban era. Courtesy Simon Colman

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Teatowel designed by Meredith Walker for Sydney Living Museums. Courtesy designer and Sydney Living Museums, 2002

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Chapter 4

Grass-roots stirrings The NGO offensive gets underway

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T

he Kelly’s Bush campaign and its successful conclusion have come to be seen as landmark events in the history of urban conservation in Australia and beyond. There are continuing arguments as to whether, in a strictly historical sense, the place was in fact the site of the first environmental ban, but there seems to be no doubt that it was the place and the campaign that first attracted the designation ‘green’. The place and its associations have passed into folklore, recognised in the literature and commemorated by memorial plaques and anniversary events. Its Battlers are in the history books – honoured as heroines for their determination and pluck in pursuing what at the time must have seemed like an unwinnable battle against daunting odds. Of course, The Battlers would say that without the intervention of Jack Mundey, Bob Pringle and their doughty union comrades their efforts might have come to nothing. One can only wonder at the dilemma facing these women as they met in their Hunters Hill homes or the All Saints Church hall back there in 1970 and pondered their predicament: to contact or not to contact the offices of the communist-led BLF and enlist the union’s help? When it came, that contact turned out to be the catalyst for what became a vigorous upsurge of grass-roots activism across the length and breadth of the nation. It would be wrong to claim that there had been no such activism before Kelly’s Bush, but undoubtedly it would be true to say that prior to the wintery 1971 birth of the green ban movement in Hunters Hill there had been only sporadic outbursts of turbulence in urban conservation activities at a local level in Sydney. This is not to deny that there had been such action in other states: indeed, as the Burgmanns and Roddewig make clear, the Victorian branch of the BLF had been active in placing black bans on certain controversial projects even before Kelly’s Bush. Roddewig cites evidence that some 25 bans

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were placed by the BLF in Melbourne; and the Burgmanns point to a handful of bans in the other capitals.1 As was retrospectively explained in 1975 by Norm Gallagher, the Melbourne-based General Secretary of the BLF, the union’s participation in conservation bans was governed by four important principles: • near city areas must be kept for low-rental housing • the needs of the community as a whole have to be the guide • historical buildings should be retained as ‘part of our heritage’ • parks, native bushland, flora and fauna, must be preserved.2 Other trade unions and their leaders also played their parts in the Kelly’s Bush campaign, and in some of the other battles of the day.3 According to Rodney Cavalier in his letter to Workers Online in 2004, ‘in any fair assessment of the credit for saving Kelly’s Bush, every possible due is owed to Ralph Marsh and John Ducker of the Labor Council, and Jack Cambourn of the FEDFA [Federated Engine Drivers and Firemen’s Association].’ Mundey has a different take on Cavalier’s proposition, saying Ducker and Marsh were ‘second string players’ in the campaign in December 2014. Whatever the facts, it is indisputable that the BLF was the driving force. With the exception of Jack Cambourn, support for the bans from other unions came later – if at all. There were important differences between the prevailing political and industrial contexts in Sydney and those of the other cities. According to the Burgmanns, ‘The NSW Government embodied the worst practices of town planning, accountability to the public, and environmental sensitivity of any government.’4 In Sydney, the BLF did not move until it had been formally approached by a community group and had resolved by vote of its members to place a ban. Most of the major bans were placed because of threats to valued publicly owned properties or community assets; a typical

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Kirribilli N

Balmain

Port Jackson

Opera House

1

KEY Sydney’s major green bans sites, 1970s.

3

Sydney CBD Glebe

Woolloomooloo

1. The Rocks

2

2. Woolloomooloo

4

Haymarket

5

Sydney’s major green ban sites, 1970s.

3. Victoria Street 4. Pitt Street Congregational Church

Paddington

Surry Hills

5. Glebe/Lyndhurst 6. Centennial Parklands 6

Moore Park & Centennial Park 0

1000 m

B ru n sw

ic k R o a d

N

Melbourne‘s innercity black ban sites, 1970s.

R oy al Pa ra de

1

KEY Melbourne’s inner-city black ban sites, 1970s. 1. Gallagher Park

2

2. Lee Street Block 3. City Baths

Universit y of M elbourne

4. Mac’s Hotel 5. Victoria Market 6. The Gothic Bank 7. 333 Collins Street

V ic to ri a

8. The Regent Theatre S tr e e t 5

9. 61 Spring Street 10. The Windsor Hotel

4 3

Sw

11. The Princess Theatre

ton ans t ee Str

Col

Str lins

eet

6

8

11 10 13

12

12. Tasma Terrace 13. 1–5 Collins Street

9

7

r ve Ri

Ya r r a 0

84

1

2 km

Both maps courtesy Cox Richardson Architects, Sydney

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case would involve an entire neighbourhood, while in Melbourne, for example, the focus tended to be more on specific sites. Because of the combination of corruption in high places, lax planning laws, and the unprecedented flow of risk capital into the development industry, the gates in Sydney were open for systemic abuse of the regulatory system, and for an all-too-common spirit of official disdain for grass-roots positions on urban heritage qualities and associated social values. In Sydney it was the serendipitous use of the term ‘green ban’ by Jack Mundey that helped to elevate the public’s perception of this new environmental movement to a more respectable, more socially acceptable plane. Further, Mundey’s unorthodox humanitarian interpretation of trade union responsibilities meant that the benefits of the green ban movement flowed on to a wider constituency. Irving and Cahill describe the BLF as: ultra-democratic … with rank and file control and limited tenure for office-holders. It encouraged women to enter the building industry … most radically, it insisted that the union had a right to determine how the labour of its members was used, and a responsibility to use its industrial power to defend working-class interests in the community.5

Civil society, in all its shapes and colours, was the ultimate beneficiary of this revolutionary view – and of the bans that, in the first instance, had been seen by many on both left and right as outside the law. It was probably the element of respectability that helped to set off the wave of action and reaction that followed the events around Kelly’s Bush. Other grass-roots conservation organisations began to undertake their campaigns with greater vigour and determination. They learned how to share their resources, intelligence

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and experience with like-minded bodies elsewhere. Academics, lawyers, writers, tradespeople, local business folk, professionals and others (including increasing numbers of women) belonging to that vaguely defined group Mundey called the ‘enlightened middle class’ emerged from newly-gentrified areas like Sydney’s Paddington and Melbourne’s Carlton as well as the older, prosperous locales such as Sydney’s smart eastern suburbs and North Shore, Melbourne’s South Yarra and North Adelaide. These folk were quite happy to go public, join a demonstration or attack a politician on proposals they saw as being against the public interest. Some were on the political left, some were on the right, some were apolitical. But overall, the emerging view seemed to be that if the ladies of Hunters Hill can do it, so can we! While there was always going to be an impression, valid or not, that this movement was driven by elitist middle-class values, it nevertheless opened doors for new alliances of concerned groups and individuals who were finding common ground on conservation issues. In an interview with Fairfax journalist Helen Pitt in March 2011, Jack Mundey neatly summed up the prevailing spirit of the 1970s: ‘this was the first time the enlightened working class teamed with the enlightened middle class to fight for the environment – anywhere in the world’.6 Jack never saw this as being a typical political fight between left and right. Indeed, he would have been the first to acknowledge that there were strong advocates for the conservation cause in both political camps. In the interview, Mundey alluded to teamwork. It should be remembered that the teamwork he was talking about took place during the precomputer/pre-mobile phone era, when even a simple task like organising a successful street-corner meeting was no mean achievement. Now, a single email or text message or blog item can activate a widespread virtual response within a few seconds.

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The message star ts to spread If at the time there were vague stirrings of environmental radicalism in urban localities around the nation, so too there was the unexpected phenomenon of concern for environmental values emerging at state and national levels. Perhaps for the first time since Australia became a federation in 1900, people began to think seriously – at a national level – about cultural and natural resources outside the local and parochial. Within a decade or so, places like Fraser Island, the Gordon–Franklin rivers in Tasmania, the great Mallee forests of Western Australia, the Great Barrier Reef, and the rainforests of north Queensland were in the news – not because of their intrinsic geographical or scenic values, but because there were threats to those values. In urban areas in particular, it was at last becoming acceptable to support the preservation of treasured old buildings and historic places.Victoria took a lead in 1981 with the nation’s first Historic Buildings Act, although the first heritage act setting up an advisory body and establishing protection protocols was in New South Wales in 1978.7 In and around threatened heritage properties, there was action of another kind as demonstrators faced the bulldozers or the police or both, and in doing so became the subject of blaring front-page stories in the daily press. And while some conservative forces tended to remain scathingly suspicious of such anti-progressive behaviour, a recognition was emerging on both sides of politics that perhaps there was some useful political mileage to be gained by aligning with the greenies. Mundey clearly recognised that a concern for conservation (green or brown) was being seen as an issue that was shifting towards the political middle ground. One did not have to be a communist to support the preservation of a native forest for public enjoyment,

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or to argue for the retention of low-income housing threatened by the bulldozer. Nor did your business as a property developer, for example, bar you from helping to save a historic building, even if that meant forgoing a higher profit. Thankfully you could now be seen marching in a demo without automatically being struck off the social A-list. Conservation was becoming respectable, despite Robin Boyd’s realistically astute comment to a Canberra seminar in 1967 that many people, ‘thoroughly good citizens to all appearances’ still saw conservation as an expression of a meaningless sentimentality, ‘anti-progressive, reactionary, irritating’.8 While Boyd was attending the Canberra seminar, another event that was later seen as one of singular importance for the heritage movement globally was making waves in Britain. English architect and town planner Roy Worskett published his comprehensive ‘approach to conservation’, an erudite and profusely illustrated work that rapidly became required reading for anyone involved in urban heritage and urban design generally. Worskett’s primary readership was English professionals, local authorities and nongovernment community organisations, but his message had universal appeal. Speaking of historic towns and urban precincts, he argued that their: archaeological, architectural and visual qualities … can make a considerable contribution to the quality of our environment if we realise their value and urgently take action to conserve them. This involves everyone – not only the architects and planners but also everyone with eyes to use and the will to make a fuss [emphasis added].9

Some 45 years after its publication, Worskett’s bibliography provides an unexpected insight into the limited conservation literature that was available at that time – even in Britain. He cites a mere

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twelve sources under the heading ‘Conservation’. His equally short list of ‘non-official organisations concerned with preservation’ now looks embarrassingly frugal. It included the Ancient Monuments Society, the Civic Trust, the National Trust, and the Society for the Protection of Ancient Buildings – all supportive of the growing international interest in and concern for heritage during the 1960s, and which exploded through the following decades.10

M u n d e y a n d t h e N a t i o n a l Tr u s t ( N S W ) At the time of Worskett’s book the National Trust (NSW) had already been in business for more than 20 years. Its formation in 1945 by Annie Wyatt in Sydney’s quiet and peaceful North Shore can today be judged as a remarkably far-sighted initiative, even if it took another three decades for the Trust and other parties, including Mundey’s BLF, the design professions and local history societies, to successfully lobby the NSW Government to introduce heritage legislation and thereby provide some legal muscle to support the conservation cause. Initially a community-based organisation without legal standing, the Trust was modelled in part on the precedent of the National Trust in the United Kingdom. It was the only organisation of its kind for more than a decade after its creation. Branches in all the other states and territories were established over the next 30 years, and each branch today is fully autonomous, responsible for its own affairs and campaigns, while operating under the umbrella organisation of the Australian Council of National Trusts.The council provides a forum at a national level for information exchange and co-ordination of the activities of the constituent state and territory bodies. Collectively, the Trusts own or manage over 300 heritage properties across the nation.

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In the founding state, trust activities were initially aimed at bringing to the notice of state and local governments the need for some form of statutory protection for a handful of historic buildings that, in the particular case of New South Wales, meant an initial preoccupation with items in the Sydney region. Clem Lloyd provided a neat description of the growth of the Trust movement in his 1977 work on the National Estate: a modest beginning; incorporation through Government legislation; leadership of public battles to save historic buildings and the natural environment; gradual acquisition of property; management of the property, restoring it … building up of [heritage] registers; creation of expert advisory committees … encouragement of the technical skills needed for restoration.11

Although its records are vague on the matter, it seems that Jack Mundey joined the National Trust some time in 1974, or perhaps earlier. He may well have renewed his membership during later years, but there is no doubting the fact that he was made a Life Member in 2006.Whatever the case, it is clear that during the early days of the lengthy and turbulent campaign to protect Sydney’s historic Rocks area on the northern edge of the city centre from the bulldozer, relations between the Trust and the BLF were ambivalent, even frosty. As will be explained in the next chapter, The Rocks campaign was no picnic. The decision (and its aftermath) to redevelop the city’s oldest and most intact historic precinct and quietly resettle its people to other pastures triggered a reaction across the entire metropolitan region and beyond. Initially, debate was polarised. The union, backed by the residents and such outside parties as the design and planning professions, was totally opposed to the state government’s plans for comprehensive redevelopment.

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The National Trust, on the other hand, was cautiously supportive, noting the official commitment to selective preservation. Conservative forces within the Trust council were far from comfortable with the prospect that they would be seen as allies of a communist-led trade union. For a time there was a standoff but by 1978 the Trust had changed tack in recognition of widespread community support for the heritage case. In that year the Trust decided to list The Rocks, including Millers Point and Dawes Point, as an Urban Conservation Area – a concept that by then had already been tacitly acknowledged by the redevelopment authority as an appropriate alternative to the original 1970 scheme that had triggered the whole controversy.The somewhat uneasy relationship between the Trust and the BLF was referred to obliquely in a Commonwealth submission to the Hope Committee of Inquiry into the National Estate (1973). According to Lloyd, ‘the involvement of the strategically-placed BLF was an important agent in the broadening of the base of concern for Australia’s heritage and environment.’12 Lloyd goes on to quote the DURD (Department of Urban and Regional Development) submission to the Inquiry: This body [the BLF] has, unexpectedly and somewhat to the embarrassment of the more conservative and establishment members of the [National] Trusts, provided teeth for the conservationist cause. Where pleas and reasonable requests could be ignored or summarily dismissed by Governments, and especially by private developers, the threat of direct action by workers on the site is a matter of immediate concern and negotiation.

In his memoirs of 1981, the same theme is evident as Mundey makes the wry comment about the Trust and BLF relationship

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during The Rocks campaign, ‘Somewhat strangely, it [the Trust] chose actually to oppose our [that is, the BLF’s] efforts.’ 13 Presumably the Trust did not want to look like a supporter of a left-wing trade union. Later in his book Jack blithely and confidently claims that, ‘without union help in stopping demolition, the list of the buildings marked for preservation by the National Trust would be meaningless.’14 That assertion was another way of confirming the January 1972 announcement by the BLF that it would refuse to demolish any historic buildings the Trust had identified as being worthy of preservation. An amusing and intriguing anecdote in the same memoir throws further light on the early days of this relationship between the radical red union and the politically cautious Trust when it came to the latter’s reluctance to become embroiled in explosive and highly contentious controversies over conservation issues. The Burgmanns quote BLF activist Bob Pringle as claiming that at the time, the Trust had ‘no teeth’.15 Mundey came face to face with the Trust’s reluctance to be seen as radical when he was secretly contacted by John Morris, a senior Trust executive who was seeking an informal meeting with the BLF during the green ban era. In the event, a clandestine meeting took place in a Sydney pub, a rendezvous apparently chosen to avoid the risk of the Trust officer being seen by colleagues in the company of the by now notorious BLF leader.16 That quiet assignation was the precursor to the later period of collaboration and the eventual 1997 Trust nomination of Mundey as a National Living Treasure. Living Treasure or not, the record shows that Mundey never sat as an elected member of any National Trust board or committee. However, as a long-standing member of the Executive Committee of the Australian Conservation Foundation (ACF) and as a leader of the urban conservation movement generally, he was

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frequently in the public eye as an ardent, informed and articulate speaker – available for public meetings, seminars, conferences and media events.The conservation cause was generally the central theme of his contributions on such occasions, but he was never far from expressing his strong views on related topics: environmental responsibilities within trade unions, the links between green and brown heritage, the ever-present need for vigilance in the face of official ineptitude or developer pressure. The diversity of his interests and commitments is evident in the boxed examples. Some of these were for trust functions, others were organised by residents’ associations, academic groups, professional bodies and the like.

MUNDEY: INTERESTS AND COMMITMENTS 1982: Gave annual Sterling Lecture on ‘Green Bans and Beyond’

to Department of Continuing Education at the University of Adelaide. 1989: Attended ecopolitics conference at Adelaide University

– urges the SA Government to recognise important links between grass-roots activism, urban planning, and environmental management. 1990: Wrote opinion piece in ACF Conservation News, rejecting

claim by Sydney columnist Gerard Henderson that green movement ‘is invariably composed of middle-class, tertiaryeducated city dwellers’. 1991: Joined 105 prominent Australians (including Nugget

Coombs, Peter Garrett, Rob Gell, Kate Grenville, Caroline Jones, Ian Lowe, Keith Suter, Phillip Toyne and Tom Uren) in open letter to federal Cabinet, urging government to incorporate Coronation Hill and adjoining lands into the Kakadu National Park in the Northern Territory. Feature continued overleaf

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1996: As chair of NSW Historic Houses Trust, joined with

National Trust to save significant heritage buildings in Parramatta. 1997: Introduced Pat Fiske’s documentary Rocking the Foundations

in Hobart, urging Tasmanian Government to legislate protection for city’s heritage. 1997 As chair of the Save East Circular Quay Committee, to

1999 led campaign to protect the Sydney Opera House World Heritage precinct from the visual degradation of the

‘Toaster’ and neighbouring high-rise buildings.17 Strong support from National Trust and Director Elsa Atkin, as well as huge local and international public support, with a petition of more than 60,000 signatories raised. In May 1998, spoke to an overflow meeting in Sydney’s Lower Town Hall, moving a motion calling on prime minister ‘to initiate an immediate meeting ... to facilitate the preparation of a comprehensive rescue strategy’, that was carried unanimously. Campaign failed as approvals were already in place and no government was prepared to intervene, although Lord Mayor Frank Sartor was supportive. 1998: Threw weight behind 1998 campaign to prevent what the

National Trust saw as unsympathetic extensions to the Sydney Conservatorium of Music in Macquarie Street. The colonial building commissioned by Governor Macquarie (1817) to accommodate offices and stables, and designed by Colonial Architect Francis Greenway was converted to present educational use in early 1900s.18 2001: As chair of the NSW Historic Houses Trust, wrote

opinion piece in April edition of National Trust magazine, Reflections, urging all governments to accept primary responsibility for heritage protection, saying they have

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‘abdicated that responsibility’ … there needs to be more pressure on developers and investors to give a much higher priority to our heritage’. 2005: Helped to launch appeal for funds to assist purchase of

Patrick White’s house in Centennial Park and establish an independent Patrick White Centre.19 2005: Joined campaign opposing loss of heritage buildings within

the Kangaroo Point redevelopment precinct in Brisbane, urging state government to purchase historic 1887 Yungaba. 2005: Spoke at the Adelaide Festival of Ideas. 2006: Delivered inaugural Heritage Lecture to a National Trust

(SA) meeting in Adelaide when future of Port Adelaide heritage precinct was being hotly debated. 2007: Supported campaign to save historic central coast (NSW)

village of Catherine Hill Bay and its endangered flora and fauna from a multi-unit resort development. 2008: Led Rally Against Inappropriate Development rally and

march in Sydney to prevent redevelopment of Currawong workers’ holiday retreat at Broken Bay, and to focus political attention on threatened coastal, bushland and heritage sites. 2010: Addressed rally in Sydney Town Hall opposing the

development of the Barangaroo site on Darling Harbour, in which then president of the Trust and former Supreme Court judge, the late Barry O’Keefe, was also involved. According to O’Keefe, there were ‘two important principles: firstly, the need to retain in public ownership – and for public use – the major part of the land … [and] secondly, the need to ensure openness and adhere to principles of transparency in deciding the future of this land.’20 Feature continued overleaf

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2011: Has cameo role in Dennis Grosvenor’s documentary, State

of Siege, which graphically details claims of ‘growing culture of corruption, fuelled by the lure of big money, which is now endemic in the NSW planning system.’21 2011: Elected President of Australians for Sustainable

Development, a loose Sydney-based civic coalition opposing the controversial Barangaroo scheme. Mundey was a member of the jury established by the Sydney Harbour Foreshore Authority in 2005 to select the winner of an international urban design competition for this project; the competition was won by Hill Thalis Architecture +Urban Projects, Paul Berkemeier Architects and Jane Irwin Landscape Architecture. Three years later the state government selected Lend Lease Corporation to develop first stage; the scheme shattered the integrity of the award-winning concept by fundamentally modifying its height, bulk and floor space provisions. At the 2010 public meeting Mundey spoke against modified scheme and the highly secretive decision-making processes. 2015: Spoke at public meeting opposing state government plans

for high-density development in historic colonial-era precinct in Parramatta, known as the Female Factory, the ‘earliest female convict site still in existence’ given its 1818 origins under Governor Macquarie and architect Francis Greenway. The Parramatta Female Factory Friends, with support from the National Trust, claim the site should be ‘preserved in its entirety’ as a potential World Heritage item, with adaptive reuse as part of a sensitive conservation program. Mundey reportedly announced at the meeting that a union green ban was pending.22

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A number of the campaigns brought mixed results – a failure here, a success there, occasionally a negotiated compromise. In the particular case of the National Trust as an NGO lobby group, the record shows that its capacity to influence government decisions on heritage matters has waxed and waned, dependent as it is on limited financial resources and its heavy reliance on a force of dedicated volunteers to man the barricades when the need arises. One of the many Trust volunteers deserving a mention here is June Poland, whose lifetime ‘was dedicated to preserving Sydney’s historic sites and buildings.’23 Although her career as a heritage activist came after the green ban era, she responded to the spirit of reform that followed by applying her formidable energy and negotiating skills to later heritage campaigns in the Sydney suburbs of Parramatta, Newtown, Marrickville and Woollahra.24 The energies of people like Poland have been absolutely vital to the Trust as in most major campaigns the Trust found itself on the back foot when it came to resources. Today, as in the green ban days, the Trust tries to do its best but, regrettably, that is often not good enough to restrain or compete with the powerful commercial and political forces that underpin major development proposals and are typically accompanied by promises of jobs, investment, and ‘progress’.

ICOMOS – not a Greek island! In 1965, the International Council on Monuments and Sites (ICOMOS) was established in Warsaw. This NGO of heritage professionals drew its inspiration and strength from the 1964 Venice Charter, the first international protocol that (as discussed earlier) aimed specifically at the preservation and restoration of historic buildings and monuments. Today, ICOMOS has national

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committees in more than 60 countries, working in concert with its head office in Paris. In 1977, the Australian committee (known as Australia ICOMOS) was established at an inception meeting in the historic Victorian town of Beechworth. An immediate start was made on a review of the Venice Charter, the purpose being to produce a document better suited to Australian heritage practice. While accepting the underlying philosophy and core concepts of the Venice document, the new committee ‘wrote them in a form which would be practical and useful in Australia … the result of the collective wisdom and experience of people working in the conservation of heritage places in Australia and overseas.’25 The result was the Australia ICOMOS Charter for Places of Cultural Significance – better known since as the Burra Charter after the old South Australian mining town in which the new document was debated and formally adopted in 1979. It says something about the fervour and commitment of the founders of Australia ICOMOS, that they managed to give birth to a document which has not only survived to the present day but has also achieved international recognition as a model of its kind. The charter drew heavily on the knowledge and experience of Professor Miles Lewis, a leading Melbourne University architectural historian and key member of the Burra Charter group, and James (Jim) Semple Kerr. 26 Kerr is remembered especially for his Guidelines to the Burra Charter and for his Conservation Plan, first published in 1982 by the National Trust (NSW) and used in many countries outside Australia. It is now in its seventh edition. Revisions to the Charter came in 1981, 1988, 1990 and 2013, when the organisation was legally incorporated. It is accepted as the first point of reference for heritage professionals, with its authoritative collection of definitions, conservation principles, processes and practice guidelines.27 Kerr was an early member

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of Australia ICOMOS and his death in 2014 led to the establishment of the annual Jim Kerr Memorial Address, the first of which was given at the Sydney Opera House on 18 April 2015 by Joan Domicelj, an internationally recognised heritage advisor and cross-cultural mediator.28 It is a mark of the man that, despite his absolute commitment to the cause of heritage conservation, Jack Mundey stood well clear of any temptation to become involved in conservation practice. Always content to let the professionals get on with the job at hand, he saw his role as that of the advocate, the honest broker, the activist on the frontline. Although he was well known to many members, he himself was never a member of Australia ICOMOS.

Despair – and optimism – in the design professions According to Robin Boyd, widespread loss of heritage buildings had already occurred well before the property boom of the 1960s and 1970s. In his acclaimed 1963 book The Australian Ugliness, Boyd made the trenchant assertion ‘that the decade before the Second World War in Sydney, and the decade after … saw the most violent destruction of historic colonial buildings … in that period Sydney lost many of its best old buildings, including Burdekin House in Macquarie Street.29 Boyd went on with his frank assertion that ‘there is no malevolence here; only a painful void where a national sense of history might [have been] expected … of all the hundreds of examples of early work (discussed by) Morton Herman in his Early Australian Architects, only twelve were in a recognisably intact state when he published the book in 1954.’30 In 1998, art critic Robert Hughes quoted historian Max Kelly’s estimate that, by

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1960, one-third of Sydney’s Georgian, Regency, Victorian and Federation buildings standing in 1900 had been demolished. Despite being an avowed modernist in his own architectural practice, Boyd was not the only architect to start ringing alarm bells at that time. According to the Burgmanns, Mundey was a guest speaker at a 1972 seminar on historic buildings in Sydney that was organised by the (then Royal) Australian Institute of Architects (RAIA) and the Faculty of Architecture at the University of Sydney.31 The Institute was seriously considering disciplinary action against members who accepted commissions involving the loss of heritage buildings. In Sydney, three years after Boyd’s book, the RAIA published Australian Outrage – the Decay of a Visual Environment.32 The committee responsible for this ground-breaking publication and the accompanying exhibition included several institute members whose names, in later years, came to be associated with significant conservation efforts in a number of fields. The chair was Don Gazzard, partner in a leading Sydney practice, a foundation member of Sydney’s Paddington Society and champion in several successful campaigns. Peter Johnson, Dean of Architecture at Sydney University and a director of the nationally recognised firm of McConnel Smith & Johnson, was a staunch supporter of the National Trust. Milo Dunphy was the architect son of his architect father Myles Dunphy, whose exploits as a pioneer Australian conservationist and bushwalker are legendary. Milo went on to give up a promising architectural career when he founded the Total Environment Centre in Sydney in 1972 and subsequently played a leading role in many major campaigns, including those pursued by the Australian Conservation Foundation. Prime Minister Whitlam appointed him to the Committee of Inquiry into the National Estate in 1973. Later he served a 25-year term on the Council of the Australian Conservation Foundation, overlapping with Jack Mundey.

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Most stimulating! I loved them all!

Molnar’s satirical take on the RAIA OUTRAGE Exhibition, Sydney 1966. Permission of National Library of Australia [PIC 7345/2367]

RAIA Gold Medallist Richard Leplastrier worked with Joern Utzon on the Sydney Opera House, and later with Kenzo Tange in Tokyo before establishing his own one-man practice in Sydney. His commitment to sustainable design won him the 2009 international Dreyer Foundation Prize. In the present century, he has played a distinguished and continuing role as a teacher and mentor to young architects, and as an advisor and consultant on conservation and urban design to the Sydney Harbour Federation Trust. This team of concerned design professionals worked to an institute brief whose main point of departure was the widespread visual debasement of Australian urban areas and landscapes by an

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‘uncompromising ugliness’ that was creeping, cancer-like, across the nation. In his Foreword to Australian Outrage, John Douglas Pringle does not mince his words: ‘Australians inherited a continent of matchless beauty … but what man has touched he has spoiled.’ The book was unashamedly polemical, with a message for all Australians: don’t sit back and do nothing; harass your political leaders. Don’t take ugliness for granted; visual chaos and clutter can be avoided. And when it came to the matter of heritage, the message was simple: we are all custodians. If our treasured heritage buildings and places are lost to ‘progress’, history will exist only in books, photographs, ephemeral records, memories, and it will be absent from the built environment. Other equally and even more disturbing prospects during the 1960s and early 1970s were the near total shortage of qualified professionals and the absence of strong protective legislation in the planning and conservation fields. In most state jurisdictions, town planning law was basic, embryonic, overly legalistic and open to abuse. The legislation that did exist tended to be tokenistic, with origins in Britain or the United States; and in the typical case the officials responsible for administering the law would have had no professional qualifications in planning, urban design or heritage.33 Indeed (as if to add insult to injury) there was a fair chance that the odd local government planner who was in fact qualified would have received his ticket overseas. The influence of overseas-trained academics and practitioners reached a peak during the 1970s, when most of the design schools in Australian universities were headed by English professors who trained in the prestigious School of Civic Design at the University of Liverpool.34 Liverpool alumni also found their way into numerous planning bureaucracies, including the National Capital Development Commission (NCDC) where they exercised considerable influence on the planning and design

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of Canberra – especially during the early years of the Commission’s reign.35 Looking back, it would be unfair to attribute responsibility for the malaise in local planning and conservation to these overseastrained overseas. On the contrary, their position was almost certainly one in which they looked despairingly at the voids in the local policy and legislative fields and did their best to fill those voids with sound advice. That advice, though, had one fatal flaw: it was based in the main on their experiences working in the relatively sophisticated professional environments that had evolved in Britain, Western Europe, and the United States. In the United Kingdom and Europe in particular, planning and heritage conservation had already entered the mainstream of practice, whereas in Australia (at the local government level at least) preparation of local urban plans was a soft option, not a legally mandated requirement. For those with overseas qualifications, frustration was a daily experience. Notwithstanding their knowledge, their good ideas, their confidence and enthusiasm, the local professional environment rarely provided them with anything in the way of a serious career challenge. For many the scene was bleak. In the particular case of heritage conservation, and apart from the odd take-it-or-leave-it provision in a local planning scheme, the picture was bleaker still. Controls were either token or nonexistent, at least until the flood of new laws that followed the green ban era in the late 1970s and into the 1980s. Metropolitan Sydney’s first and only statutory plan (the County of Cumberland Planning Scheme, gazetted in 1951) was an example in this regard. Throughout the entirety of the Sydney region the county council could identify only 19 buildings and groups of buildings for inclusion in its Register A.36 Only five such buildings were formally proclaimed in the scheme ordinance; and in the Sydney city centre,

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only nine were officially recorded in an official 1967 booklet.37 Today, these figures appear inexplicable, even ludicrous, but they provide a telling insight into the narrow definition of a ‘historic building’ that prevailed at the time of the County Plan. If the professional environment was bleak in the days of the County Plan, it is clear that by the end of the 1970s and into the 1980s there were major advances throughout Australia in planning law and practice, and in heritage law, practice and training. In Victoria, the election of the Cain Government in 1982 led to amendments to planning laws and heritage controls in designated conservation areas. In New South Wales, the perfunctory if not tokenistic approach to heritage that was evident in the County Plan listing was superseded by the 1975 appointment of Nigel Ashton, who had sat on the National Trust’s Historical and Architectural Survey Committee (1961–65) and had retired from the chair of the recently abolished State Planning Authority at the time of his appointment to lead a new Historic Buildings and Sites Advisory Committee. Although the state was still in the hands of a conservative government, the turbulence of the green ban era and the growing community pressure for official reform were beginning to show results.The new committee had a wide-ranging brief ‘to identify and list buildings, structures and sites worthy of preservation and to advise the Minister on ways and means of preserving, maintaining and managing such buildings.’38 Two years later, with a Labor Government in power and heritage legislation on the statute books, Ashton was appointed to sit on the newlyestablished Heritage Council of New South Wales – the nation’s first such body – and would later sit on the Architectural Advisory Committee (1981–82).39 The pioneering initiatives in Victoria and New South Wales had their counterparts in other states. In some cases, they were

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in fact preceded by such action. A state-by-state chronology of all legislative efforts in the heritage field would reveal that during the couple of decades immediately after the green ban era, reformist legislation entered the statute books at both national and state levels. Today, in every jurisdiction across the nation, it has become a standard requirement that heritage provisions and listings be included in local town plans. To strengthen these listings, professional skills are at work nationwide in official planning offices and advisory bodies such as the heritage councils in Victoria and New South Wales.There is a vigorous heritage consultancy sector, active both locally and internationally. Courses in heritage studies and urban conservation are offered in several Australian universities, and there is a well-established network of Australian heritage architects and consultants whose professional standing today is a direct outcome of the establishment of Australia ICOMOS in 1977 and the drafting and adoption of the Burra Charter in 1979.

M e a n w h i l e, i n t h e c o r p o r a t e b o a r d r o o m s a n d a t Tr a d e s H a l l … There may have been despair among the idealists within the design professions during the green ban era and its immediate aftermath, but for the typical developer the planning system offered a dream run. For the serious player, a heritage property was only a temporary obstruction, not an asset. It was just like any other chunk of real estate to be bought, sold and redeveloped at will. Commercial interests far outweighed any vestigial affection the community might have had for historic buildings. Money ruled, and the bulldozer hire business flourished. In his Sydney Boom, Sydney Bust, Maurice Daly tells in minute detail the story of the seemingly unrestrained

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frenzy in the property industry in Sydney during the very period when Kelly’s Bush in Hunters Hill was starting to attract developer interest. He describes how the ‘boom’ led to the reshaping and physical transformation of the city’s central area in the period 1968–1974. Good buildings came down. Bad buildings went up. Heritage buildings, lacking any legal protection, were summarily razed overnight. Huge public companies emerged, only to crash a few years later – never to recover. For more than a decade, the skyline of downtown Sydney was dominated by tower cranes while the footpaths were cluttered with hoardings, safety barriers, warning signs, dust and debris. Some projects succeeded while others left abandoned excavation pits and the skeletal remains of unfinished structures awaiting new owners and new futures. In one or two cases (World Square, for example, in the southern part of Sydney’s CBD), it was a decade or so before new owners were able to finish the job and, during the interregnum, the entire city block with its stark pile of incomplete concrete structural elements and its tangle of rusting steel reinforcing rods was a daily reminder of the bust. Commenting on the appearance of the city centre at the end of the boom, Daly’s language says it all: ‘a mish-mash of conflicting architectural styles … the visible poverty of the architectural and development imaginations … which were responsible for the mess that became downtown Sydney in a little less than a decade.’ If ever the time was ripe for reform, it was then. If ever there was a need for someone, somebody, some leader, to take a stand against this behemoth that was consuming irreplaceable heritage items in the nation’s biggest city, it was then. If ever there was a need to unleash grass-roots energies and engage the wider community in a debate to find a better way, it was then. During the heyday of the green bans era, Jack Mundey and his BLF colleagues were in the vanguard in responding to these

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challenges. Their initiatives were beacons for others, even though the green ban era lasted only a few years and the demise of the BLF as an influential player in conservation, was fast approaching. Mundey’s mantra – that organised labour had a right and a responsibility to concern itself with social and environmental issues as well as those at the core of traditional union activity – had undoubtedly borne fruit. But what about other players in the wider community? Mundey’s fervent belief that building workers had a right to insist that their efforts on the job were socially beneficial was central to his commitment to union intervention – but what if you did not belong to a union? What was your position on urban conservation if your very livelihood depended on being free to demolish old buildings and replace them with steel and concrete? What were your feelings about green bans if you had invested your life savings in a property development project whose viability was being threatened by a ban? What if your construction company was an accredited member of the peak industry body (the Master Builders’ Association) and you saw projects that had been through the proper development approval process being brought to a standstill by the Communistled BLF? What if you were a law-abiding citizen, with no particular interest in heritage matters, standing on the sidelines and observing the members of the BLF blocking the demolition of an old and abandoned building and preventing its redevelopment? These were serious and legitimate questions for many observers during the height of the green ban era. But no matter what answers might have been forthcoming, the record shows that as far as the MBA was concerned, its corporate position was entirely consistent with the view taken by the full bench of the NSW Industrial Court when the NSW branch of the BLF was deregistered in June 1974: ‘The union had openly flouted the law, awards and agreements

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Front-page spread of The Tribune, issue 1770, August–September 1972. The Tribune was the journal of the Communist Party of Australia. Reproduced with kind permission Dr Adrian Graves and the SEARCH Foundation

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and resorted to intimidation of employers and employees on a wholesale basis.’40 For the MBA, the forced exit of the union was seen as a triumph of the democratic process over anarchy. It was an outcome that the association had been awaiting since the first green bans; and the association was undoubtedly the most ardent opponent of the BLF during the entire green ban era and beyond. Its trenchant no-holds-barred opposition can be seen yet again in the November 1973 editorial of the MBA’s journal The Builder: Many people with a genuine concern for the environment have been led into supporting … some green bans imposed since the BLF discovered its social conscience … By doing so they have given implied endorsement to the rest of the bans and, with textbook communist tactics the BLF has wooed the left wing intellectuals and journalists to extract the maximum of publicity for both environmental issues and its more clearly recognisable communist line for its industrial goals. It is time to stop this lawlessness, and to force the environmental lobbies to use legal, democratic methods to achieve their aims.41

AV Jennings Pty Ltd, of Kelly’s Bush fame, was a leading developer and fervent supporter of the MBA stand. In his 1992 history of this very successful company, Don Garden notes: anyone with awareness of the Australian construction industry will know that the 1970s and the first half of the 1980s was a period of political and industrial radicalism among building unions, particularly the BLF, led at times to virtual guerrilla warfare and anarchy … from the mid-1960s the building unions became more militant and began to make demands outside the system … NSW and Victoria

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were the worst affected, but after Jack Mundey’s BLF was de-registered in NSW it was Norm Gallagher and the BLF in Victoria who made most of the running.42

Pa r t i c i p a t i o n … by w h o m ? Arguments about the democratic process aside, it seems reasonable to make the claim that the BLF’s commitment to industrial democracy within its own ranks probably helped to foster a more widespread debate about the value of public participation in the planning process generally. That debate covered some tricky ground in the political landscape of the day. To what extent should local communities have a say in the determination of controversial development proposals in their patch? Why should councils consult with so-called ‘stakeholders’, given that the councillors themselves are elected to represent the views of all their constituents? Why should the views of special-interest groups and sectoral lobbies be given special weight in the decision-making process? If local democracy is to mean anything, does it not require us to have faith in our elected representatives to make the right decisions, on our behalf? And if we do not like those decisions, do we not then have the ballot box as a remedy when elections come around? Behind these questions lay other concerns. In grass-roots circles there was a palpable growth of mistrust, a lack of confidence, in the official planning process. Planning officials were supposed to be public servants but in the public eye they were often seen to be the servants of their political masters – as well as being vulnerable to the blandishments of the big developers. And as for their expert reports, why was confidentiality so important if public money was

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being spent on their production. Surely the public had a right to view their contents.43 Of course the public had that right, but exercising it was the difficult part when you were a lone voice seeking access to official information from a top bureaucrat. It was the them-and-us syndrome, and to many outside the system it seemed that the game was often played with loaded dice. In such circumstances, it is no wonder that frustrations often boiled over. Imbalances in the information flow, for example, coupled with the general reluctance of officialdom to engage directly with community members, were direct causes of such frustration. And when recourse to normal ‘democratic’ channels failed and your patience was fast running out, recourse to direct action seemed the only option: let’s invite the BLF to impose a green ban! But as we have seen, even then there were hurdles to cross. The BLF’s policy position was clear. The union insisted that a ban could only be considered if it was sought by way of a public meeting of the affected community, and was subsequently endorsed by the union rank and file. The union was in effect demonstrating the value of consultation to a wider public. The union was saying that every affected person had a right to cast a vote, to have their say, to participate, when a decision was to be made about a proposal that directly affected them. Outside the union, this revolutionary yet simple idea was slowly becoming accepted. It mandated that before you make plans and decisions directly affecting others, talk first to those others: the ordinary people in the neighbourhood, local residents, workers, those in the line of fire. In the United Kingdom, for example, the 1969 publication of the Skeffington Report on public participation in planning was a major stimulus to the debate within the planning profession and the general public. That report led to amendments to the UK Town and Country Planning Act, thereby providing

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an official mandate for the participation process as it would apply to the preparation of local development plans. And in 1976 in Vancouver, the preamble to the Vancouver Plan of Action saw participation as an integral part of the decision-making process – a necessary move away from the bland tokenism of public relations.44 ‘Participation is becoming an indispensable element of a truly democratic process.’ But things moved more slowly in the antipodes. The successful translation of the participation concept into the day-to-day planning operations of Australian local councils, in particular, was not going to be easy. In New South Wales alone, public participation was to remain an optional rather than a mandated requirement in local planning and decision making until 1979, when the state’s first-ever comprehensive planning act came into force. As an integral part of the participatory process, consultation per se is a hollow notion unless there is clarity as to who is being consulted, why, and when. The dimensions of the matter at stake must be defined, the rules of engagement determined. In an ideal situation the process will be based on the concept of the ‘level playing field’ in which all parties have equal access to relevant information. Secrecy is out. Information sharing is in. And the opinion of experts must be open to the scrutiny of peers and the community at large. Consultation based on a one-way flow of carefully selected and pasteurised information from the powerful to the powerless is a travesty – demeaning to all. And like heritage conservation, the concept of stakeholder consultation has always been vulnerable to the tokenism syndrome. A powerful official agency or developer would proudly call a public meeting to ‘discuss’ a controversial development proposal. The slide presentation would be faultless, with seductive images and carefully scripted speeches by the

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proponents to make sure that their good news gets through to a bewildered and suspicious audience. The bad news would rarely be presented, despite the certainty that every project, no matter how well conceived and designed, will carry some adverse impacts for its neighbours. After the main presentation there would be the obligatory call for questions from the floor. The chair would thank the participants for their valuable contributions. Coffee and tea would be served, the proponents sipping their refreshment with relief while those members of the audience who had stuck it out till the bitter end would be standing around nonplussed, confused, uncertain of the next move in this uneven game. For the proponents it would be back to business, relieved that the meeting was over and that they had survived the embarrassing interjections from the bunch of crazy greenies in the back row. At such meetings, a proponent would rarely admit to having made errors or mistakes. Conversely, an unprepared audience would rarely have had the knowledge or resources to enter the fray on an even footing. With major projects there was always the risk of a serious knowledge imbalance; and on the question of resources, there was always going to be a huge gulf between the proponents on the one hand (with their full-time salaried professionals and paid consultants) and the community groups on the other, struggling volunteer efforts without bureaucratic support, and with the challenge of managing their campaign on a shoestring.

Unity is strength So for years, this consultation game tended to be a charade. As community angst increased, a widespread acceptance of the old adage that unity is strength emerged. The consequence was the

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extraordinary explosion of local action groups across the country during the late 1960s, 1970s, and into the 1980s. A graph in the 1974 Report of the National Estate reveals that in the decades between 1950 and 1970 there was an ‘exponential growth in the formation of new conservation bodies in Australia’, far outdistancing population growth over the same period.45 The old parishpump progress associations were gradually being replaced by neighbourhood societies, associations, groups and trusts, many of which achieved legal incorporation status that greatly improved their standing in the battlefield. Perhaps more importantly, the membership of these groups invariably included knowledgeable professionals and skilled strategists whose expertise and experience enabled them to enter the debates on a reasonably equal footing with those on the other side. Among the newly formed groups there were different agendas, different targets, different campaign strategies and tactics. At the same time, they tended to have one thing in common: support for the spirit, if not the actual execution, of the green bans. Across the nation, such support was becoming widespread. In December 1973, Jack Mundey commented on the action group phenomenon, saying that ‘New South Wales has in the past two years seen the emergence of resident action groups linking up with builders’ labourers and other unions to become a powerful countervailing force against institutionalised bureaucracy and the power of the developers’ dollar.’46 By 1974 there were more than a hundred such groups in metropolitan Sydney alone.47 Some, like the pioneer Paddington Society in Sydney, were distinctly if not proudly local. Others, like Sydney’s Coalition of Resident Action Groups (CRAG), had a regional membership catchment. Still others, like the Total Environment Centre, the Civic Design Society and the various National Trust

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branches, had a broader constituency. At the top of the hierarchy were the national NGOs – Australia ICOMOS, the Australian Conservation Foundation, the Australian Council of National Trusts and the Australian Institute of Urban Studies – which were all established within this period. Some enjoyed corporate status, with a dedicated office and paid staff; others were entirely voluntary. In the particular case of the social housing sector, the needs and interests of low-income earners, pensioners and those on welfare led to the establishment of SHELTER NSW in 1975. Today, SHELTER is a well-organised, not-for-profit body, funded in the main by the NSW Government through its public housing ministry. Since the days of the BLF campaigns in The Rocks, Woolloomooloo and Glebe in Sydney, Jack Mundey has been a strong advocate for greater governmental involvement in the public housing and welfare sectors.48 In November 2009, along with Tom Uren and others, he spoke at a seminar on these interrelated topics organised by SHELTER at the University of Sydney. The birth of many of the ‘pioneer’ action groups in Sydney can reasonably be attributed to the fact that Sydney bore the brunt of the 1960s property boom. Like bees to a honey pot, developers swarmed into the market while conservative NSW governments turned a blind eye. Corruption was rife, planning laws were weak, money was plentiful and the stuff flooded into the coffers of the big developers. It is fair to say, however, that it was not only the private sector development projects that engendered the wrath of local action groups. Government projects were also targeted, especially if they involved major roadworks through residential areas. This new grass-roots movement was starting to spread from its centre in Sydney to places as distant as Fremantle and Hobart, as well as to other capital and provincial cities. Not all groups developed

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alliances with the trade unions but, by the early 1970s, all groups had heard of Jack Mundey and would have been well aware of the potent forces that he and his BLF colleagues had unleashed through the green ban movement. T H E PA D D I N G T O N S O C I E T Y

Based in the historic inner Sydney suburb of the same name, this society was established in 1964 – pre-green bans, and almost certainly Australia’s first resident action group in the contemporary meaning of the phrase. Don Gazzard, a leading Sydney architect, was one of its founders along with his wife Marea, and John and Pat Thompson. Initially the society was the instigator of a vigorous and well-orchestrated campaign against a state government plan to run an expressway link through parts of its area, with the consequential potential loss of hundreds of houses, including valued heritage terraces and other buildings of historic interest. The campaign was a success. In 1968, in the face of growing threats to the area’s heritage, leading Sydney architect Walter Bunning was appointed by the minister for local government to conduct a public inquiry and advise on the suburb’s future.49 His report recommended ‘that the Paddington area … should be declared a precinct of architectural merit.’ Bunning went further. His report envisioned a future Paddington that ‘would become to Sydney as Chelsea is to London, the Left Bank to Paris, and Greenwich Village to New York.’50 Later the society played a lead role in an explosive, and ultimately successful, citywide campaign opposing the ill-conceived 1972 government proposal to build a state sports centre and entertainment complex in the historic parklands precinct of Moore Park–Centennial Park. A BLF green ban led by Jack Mundey permanently put that bizarre and hugely unpopular proposal to bed. Half a century later, the Paddington Society

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continues as a vigilant watchdog over developments that threaten the city’s first officially designated heritage conservation area. THE GLEBE SOCIETY

To the west of Sydney’s CBD, The Glebe Society sprang into existence in 1969 to fight two major freeway proposals, and push for a new town plan to curb the spread of unsympathetic private redevelopment projects which were threatening local heritage. Along the suburb’s lengthy harbour waterfront, remnant maritime industries were becoming obsolete, their sites enticing developers who saw opportunities for high-rise waterfront apartments. What they found were derelict sheds; abandoned buildings, machinery and wharfage; invasive plantations of blackberry, lantana and other alien species; feral animal communities – all clear evidence in their eyes that redevelopment was the only proper answer. What they did not see was the rich maritime heritage values associated with these sites. For the Glebe Society, these values were self-evident, but heritage remained legally unprotected until the late 1970s. One particular and unusual property holding in Glebe became the focus of special concern, not only locally but also nationally, because of action on the ground by the society, and by the BLF through its opposition to the freeway program. The society had already succeeded in having the hugely threatening freeway proposals withdrawn; now another target appeared. A large low-income rental housing estate comprising some 740 dwellings, all owned by the Church of England, was languishing, due in the main to the inability of the church to undertake proper maintenance.51 With the prospect of sale for high-density private housing looming, the society in concert with other affected players, and with the anti-freeway campaign behind it, pressured the local council to prepare a new heritage-sensitive local environmental plan. Under

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federal Minister Tom Uren, and with strong support from the local council, the Glebe Estate was purchased in 1974 from the church, and renovated as a demonstration of its new social housing and heritage priorities by the Labor Government in Canberra.52 Official recognition of Glebe as an Urban Conservation Area was achieved, and the gradual creation of a continuous harbourside open space corridor was set in train along what had been a decaying industrial waterfront.53 For the social reformers and heritage advocates, these various campaigns were hugely successful. For the developers and economic rationalists of the day they must have seemed absurdly unrealistic, a drain on the public purse, and evidence yet again of what they saw as the distorted left-wing ideologies that were being pushed by Whitlam and Uren across the nation.Today, like the Paddington Society across town, the Glebe Society is still actively dedicated to its various causes.54 The Glebe Estate is listed on the Register of the National Estate because of its heritage significance. And for good measure, a plaque in Annandale’s Federal Park provides testimony to Jack Mundey’s role in the campaign to rehabilitate the Rozelle Bay waterfront for public enjoyment into posterity. T H E B A L M A I N A S S O C I AT I O N I N C .

Established in 1965, the association represents this old maritime and industrial suburb in Sydney’s inner west, which, like the adjoining area of Glebe, was threatened with freeway proposals and high-rise apartments on prominent sites with harbour views. Its maritime industries, shipbuilding and the timber trade were winding down, leaving derelict waterfront sites and decaying infrastructure. Developers were becoming increasingly attracted to what they saw as a potential goldmine awaiting their energies in this sleepy old working-class suburb on the edge of one of the world’s

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great harbours, and heritage buildings were seen as minor obstacles. Residents joined forces as an association and set in motion a series of changes that led to new local plans and a firm political commitment to ‘maintaining all features having natural, architectural and/or historical value of the area’.55 THE CIVIC DESIGN SOCIETY (UNIVERSITY OF NSW) (CDS)

The CDS was established in 1962 on the initiative of Professor FEA (Tony) Towndrow, the inaugural Dean of Architecture at UNSW. In its lifetime, it had four presidents: John (later Professor) Shaw, Elias Duek-Cohen, Tony Strachan and Phillip Briggs. Freestone claims that ‘for two decades, from the early 1960s to the early 1980s, the CDS played a key role in facilitating discussion and debate on the quality of the urban environment in Sydney … [and] was a key player in some of the significant urban development issues in Sydney’ during that era.56 The CDS was also a strong proponent of the reformist planning and heritage legislation in New South Wales that came in the aftermath of the green ban era. The society sought to encourage a holistic approach to the creation of the urban environment – inclusive of architecture, industrial design, civic design, landscape architecture and town planning. Heritage had its place, but was far from being the society’s raison d’être. Having said that, the record shows that the CDS ‘lent its support in opposition to a string of locally unpopular development proposals including a new housing project at Kelly’s Bush in Hunters Hill, redevelopment of Victoria Street [Kings Cross … and] the Olympic-scale sporting complex at Moore park.’57 N O RT H A D E L A I D E S O C I E T Y I N C . ( N A S )

In Adelaide, the NAS was founded in 1970 and to this day remains the city’s longest-standing and continuously active

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community group. The first committee met in July 1970 at the same time that the temperature of events in Sydney’s Hunters Hill was reaching boiling point. Unlike Paddington and Glebe, North Adelaide enjoys a direct and continuing association with one of Australia’s (and the modern world’s) most revered city plans: Colonel William Light’s 1836 vision for the capital city of this newly founded British colony of free settlers. But like Paddington and Glebe, North Adelaide was also threatened by a freeway proposal that would have taken the knife to the city’s unique encircling parklands, and to nearby heritage properties in North Adelaide itself. In this society’s official history, John Bridgeland acknowledges the influence of the Paddington Society during the formative years of its Adelaide counterpart.58 This story is enough in itself to indicate that a network of such civic societies was being established throughout the country – even if the threats and pressures varied from place to place. Of further relevance is the fact that within two years of its incorporation the NAS was able to play a central role in the debate that led to reforms of the South Australian planning laws. Bridgeland notes that those reforms were strongly influenced by Hugh Stretton, historian, academic, and early Society member. In his hugely-influential Ideas for Australian Cities, Stretton acknowledged with obvious warmth the influence of Mundey and Pringle, with his reminder that ‘if you love any of Sydney’s old buildings or poor people, don’t ever forget who first stopped the [Askin] government, and the class and party that put it there, from the injury they tried to do to all of us and all our heirs.’ 59 The Burgmanns put it in slightly different terms; according to them, Stretton took the view that the green bans were ‘intelligently chosen’ in the sense that they brought more benefits to the city than did the work of the city planners themselves.60

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C A R LT O N A N D P A R K V I L L E A S S O C I A T I O N S A N D T H E M E L B O U R N E – S O U T H YA R R A R E S I D E N T S ’ G RO U P I N C .

In Melbourne, 1967 saw the establishment of the Carlton and Parkville associations – two strong and influential resident action groups with interests that spanned such matters as heritage conservation, strategic planning, and the highly controversial urban renewal programs of the Victorian Housing Commission. These two pioneering groups were followed by the Melbourne–South Yarra Residents’ Group Inc. (MSYG), which was established across the river in 1970–71. Residents of South Yarra had decided that they had had enough of the contagion of ugly, box-like and insensitive OYO (own your own) home units that were starting to spring up in this historic inner-city neighbourhood, located within a stone’s throw of the Yarra River. The MSYG was among the first to successfully lobby for a reform of obsolete planning regulations. In 1972 it mounted a strong case for official recognition of the precinct’s heritage, and maintains to this day its diligent watchdog role on the planning system in Melbourne. David Yencken, one of the group’s original champions, later went on to become chair of the Australian Government’s Interim Committee of Inquiry into the National Estate and inaugural chair of the Australian Heritage Commission (1975–81).61 That inquiry, established by a reformist Labor Government in 1973, broke new ground as it set about revealing and recording for the first time the extraordinary richness of the nation’s natural and cultural heritage as well as the multitude of threats this heritage was facing in the name of progress. THE FREEMANTLE SOCIETY (FS)

In the west, the FS was founded in 1972 and has remained a potent advocate for the protection of the city’s rich heritage, to the point of promoting World Heritage listing for part of its territory. In the

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early 1970s, a green ban was placed on the demolition of early port buildings. While the state’s capital Perth lost many heritage buildings during the mining and energy boom in Western Australia, Fremantle has managed to save much of the best, especially in its central area and on Victoria Quay. In the process it has established a proud reputation for its world-renowned and largely intact heritage townscape. T H E B A T T E RY P O I N T S O C I E T Y ( B P S )

In Hobart in the late 1960s, the historic colonial precinct of Battery Point and Salamanca Cove became a battleground between developers and conservationists. In response to a request from the BPS, the Tasmanian branch of the BLF placed a green ban on further large-scale development proposals in the precinct. This provided a breathing space for conservation action and legal reforms, leading to the state government’s purchase of the grand historic stone warehouses in Salamanca Place, a stone’s throw from the parliament where the reforms were debated. Other heritage battles saw determined and frequently successful action by the North Hobart Residents’ Group in the 1970s and by the Sullivans Cove Citizens’ Committee in the 1980s.The Battery Point–Sullivan’s Cove area in Hobart is now represented by a single incorporated body known as The Battery Point and Sullivan’s Cove Community Association. T H E R E D F E R N C A M PA I G N

Mundey’s lifelong sympathy and affection for the cause of Aboriginal land rights and reconciliation was put to the test in the old inner-western Sydney suburb of Redfern. His sentiments were shared by the BLF. In 1972, Aboriginal families, some of whom had been in the area for generations, were being evicted from their rented houses in preparation for demolition and redevelopment

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by a major private developer. Some dwellings, already vacated, were collapsing, and others had been vandalised. But one group of residents refused to move from the area. Redfern is one of the very few localities in Sydney that can trace its connection with the city’s Indigenous community back to colonial days and beyond into the Dreaming. Aboriginal residents were determined to stay put. Initially, the union provided in-kind support by way of donations of labour and materials to cover basic repairs; later, a BLF green ban was placed at the request of the locals, led by Aboriginal lawyer (and later District Court judge) Bob Bellear.62 The ban held while the community sought support from the newly elected Whitlam Labor Government, a request that led to the government’s intervention and purchase of 41 houses. This unprecedented federal action was followed by the 1973 incorporation of the Aboriginal Housing Company as the most appropriate body to manage the estate after its transfer by the commonwealth. The event is cited in the City of Sydney’s Dictionary of Sydney as ‘the first successful land rights claim by the Aboriginal community.’63 O U T S I D E T H E C A P I TA L C I T I E S

In New South Wales, as in other states, there were the beginnings of grass-roots activism outside the capital. Community groups started mobilising against what they saw as improper or insensitive development proposals bringing threats to local heritage – both green and brown. In 1970 in Newcastle, New South Wales, for example, the Blackbutt Action Committee took a lead role in a successful campaign to thwart a highly controversial freeway proposal that would have devastated a valued remnant forest in the inner-city area. In the event, the campaign led to a complete reconsideration of the entire freeway alignment, and then to its eventual relocation to its present position well clear of the forest and of adjoining

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residential development. The Newcastle freeway proposals generated Mundey-led BLF green bans in 1973 and 1974, while another ban was placed on proposals to introduce high-rise office buildings and motels into Newcastle’s historic East End. And as a direct result of grass-roots agitation, other bans in New South Wales were placed on proposed developments in the Tomaree Peninsula at the mouth of Port Stephens, in the northern country town of Inverell, and in Port Kembla and East Woonona in the Illawarra region south of Sydney. Other states saw green ban action, especially in Victoria.64 The Burgmanns list at least 28 bans that were placed on properties and projects throughout the state; and they refer to a ‘Green Ban Gallery’ being opened in 1974 by none other than BLF federal leader Norm Gallagher.65 In Adelaide and Canberra there were three bans, in Perth there were two, Hobart had one, and in Brisbane the union courageously targeted three threatened National Trust listed properties in the heart of the CBD. Some bans were outright successes, others were lifted as a result of negotiations, some failed and some remained in place awaiting fulfillment of their purpose. No matter what their size, resources or membership base, the community-based groups that typically lay behind the bans had several things in common: • they were all non-government organisations (NGOs) • their membership lists were open to all comers, although some (like ICOMOS) had a quasi-professional bias • their programs relied heavily on volunteer effort • they all grew out of a common concern for an issue or issues that could be addressed only through concerted communal action

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• they all required (and mostly enjoyed) strong leaders, champions • constitutionally they were determinedly apolitical, but unafraid to play serious politics when the need arose • they all had democratically elected boards or management committees. There is one item missing from the above list. It is something the typical residents’ action group would have been reluctant to discuss. In their attempts to ‘raise the drawbridge’ against the assaults of uninvited or unwanted developers there was always going to be the glue of self-interest holding the group together. The arrival of the term NIMBY – not in my back yard – into the suburban vernacular of the day is sufficient in itself to support the view that not all grass-roots action was driven purely by public interest values. In many cases, protection of the private interests of the comfortable few would have been a higher priority than protection of some vaguely defined heritage values shared by the wider community. Happily, many campaigns saw a convergence of these two positions. Writing on this topic in the immediate post-green ban era, Leonie Sandercock questioned whether the ‘popular front between radical labourers and middle-class greenies would be an enduring feature of urban politics. Middle-class environmentalists rarely urge the protection of the inner suburbs for the poor; they unashamedly want protection for themselves [emphasis added].’66 She argued that in the longer term, the urban poor were unlikely to benefit from the kinds of legal reforms that were being pushed by resident action groups: Laws will be passed which give residents a greater say in decisions affecting their environment, and more trees, historic buildings, and parks will be saved … but it is

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unlikely that laws will be passed to alter the existing free market mechanisms which determine the distribution of environmental wealth … In this situation, the congenial areas of our cities will increasingly become the preserves of the rich.67

Perhaps the rich had the money and the motive to support conservation. But for groups in general, money was always scarce. Membership fees were rarely sufficient to cover campaign costs, and government grants and private philanthropy were frequently needed but not always available. Larger bodies like the ACF, the National Trust, Environment Victoria, and the Total Environment Centre in Sydney had some success in attaining the status of registered charities, which entitled donors to claim deductions from their taxable income. Depending on the persuasion of the state or federal government of the day, those bodies might also have qualified for grants from the public purse. Overall it was a rocky path for many of these groups. Some, such as the Australian Institute of Urban Studies, no longer exist as national entities, while others, like Environment Victoria, the Total Environment Centre and ACF, have survived despite the waxing and waning of government financial support. Environment Victoria, established as the Conservation Council of Victoria in 1969 to save the threatened Little Desert National park from subdivision, is one of several state-based not-for-profit conservation bodies that provide an ‘umbrella’ under which smaller heritage and conservation groups across each state can operate.68 The Sydney-based Total Environment Centre is an exception in that it operates independently of the NSW umbrella group (Nature Conservation Council of NSW). The TEC was founded in 1972 by the pioneer environmentalist Milo Dunphy at the height of

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the movement to save Australia’s threatened rainforests. It was one of the first of the small number of full-time and professionally managed environment NGOs to be established in Australia. In his thought-provoking and comprehensive coverage of ‘the battle for a green Australia’, Jeff Angel provides what he describes as ‘an insider’s story’ of this battle – told from his position as Executive Director of this influential environmental lobby group since he took over from Dunphy in 1996. His narrative describes the emergence of environmental politics across Australia within fields as diverse as waste management, energy production and consumption, and urban and rural sustainability. As its title suggests, Angel’s timely book dealt mainly with the green movement … a chronicle of ‘the turbulent history of our growing environmental awareness’.69 But he readily acknowledges that while the campaigns for saving endangered forests and wilderness were being prosecuted by environmental activists, there was a parallel ‘explosion of action … in the burgeoning cities’. His take on the Mundey-led green bans of the 1970s is a reminder of that explosion: Sydney bred the Green Bans … where the coming together of a building workers’ union with local urban environmentalists gave rise to a unique coalition of forces. For some time, until trade unions swung back to conservatism, Sydney’s voracious appetite for building, demolishing and rebuilding was slowed where heritage or local community concerns were heard.70

From its office in Sydney, the TEC today provides support for community-based green groups throughout New South Wales while engaging in major environmental campaigns, undertaking research, and producing a regular newsletter. Its successes include the identification and creation of national parks, the preservation

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of water catchments and tracking the impacts of industrial waste. The founding director Milo Dunphy lived for a time in a part of Sydney that includes Botany Bay and its catchment, and which for over half a century has been the scene of many environmental battles.71 Today, his legacy is in part being carried by the somewhat younger Sutherland Shire Environment Centre (SSEC) under its veteran campaigner, historian, ardent democrat and patron Bob Walshe. Since 1991 the SSEC has carried the environmental flag for the community of this large local government area in Sydney’s south. It has been a leading player in bringing to the attention of government (both local and state) the concerns of local people relating to the health of Botany Bay, the Georges River and its tributaries, the risks associated with coal-seam gas extraction, and other threats. Walshe’s dedication to the cause of local democracy as the vehicle for resolving environmental disputes is one of several values that he has shared over the years with his friend and co-campaigner Jack Mundey. A necessarily selective search of the available information sources suggests that among the action groups that were established during the period under review there were two distinct sets of driving forces. Urban (brown) groups tended to have a focus on site-specific threats to a particular building, place or locality. Groups concerned primarily with the natural environment (green) were more likely to focus on diffused threats to ecological systems, water catchments, plant communities and habitats.There was always scope for overlap, with a blurring of brown and green. With the brown groups the issue or issues that led to their formation were typically associated with a threat to their cultural or heritage resources, or perhaps to what planners call ‘local amenity’. Concerns for adverse social impacts, like loss of low-income housing, were also emerging in some areas. As was the case at Kelly’s Bush in Hunters Hill, these

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threats were often unexpected. Residents were caught unprepared. Ignored or by-passed by officialdom, they had to scramble into action at short notice, typically relying on one or more courageous individuals who were prepared to give time to the cause.

Green goes global – we a l l l i ve o n P l a n e t E a r t h The passions and concerns of the campaigners for Kelly’s Bush and other green ban sites were part of the global green movement that Barbara Ward and René Dubos discussed and which gave rise to a multitude of local campaigns worldwide.72 Most of the players were small, and most passed into the local history books when their particular battles had been fought, no matter whether the result was win, lose or draw. But during the green ban era, there was another group of campaigners targeting environmental issues, and their dimensions were far from local. A small number of these bodies have survived to the present day. They have been successful in establishing themselves as powerful, influential and wellorganised forces in environmental campaigns that frequently involve debate about fundamental survival issues at the global scale. No matter whether the threat is to a living species, a cultural treasure, a splendidly beautiful landscape, or a dwindling lifesupporting resource, one or more of these globally active organisations will be there in the wings, ready to engage when the need or opportunity presents itself. During his active trade union days – and well into the decades that followed – Jack Mundey took an increasing interest in this worldwide green movement. It is a movement with a focus that is less on brown, more on green. Notwithstanding this caveat, it is clear

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from Mundey’s memoirs and from many of his public statements that he saw a direct link between his commitment to environmental causes on the one hand, and his earlier strong left-wing leanings towards socialism and social justice generally. Thirty years after Kelly’s Bush, Jack Mundey joined the New South Wales Greens Party.73 His decision was in part born out of his disillusionment and frustration with the Australian Labor Party: ‘the Greens are now the party that best represents the workers, the disadvantaged, and the public interest … [I support] the Party’s strong stance on protecting workers’ rights and fighting inappropriate development.’74 As a card-carrying Green, Mundey was going to be well placed to bring his frontline experience and knowledge of conservation matters into the arena of NSW state political debate.

Links in the Mundey chain: books, c o n n e c t i o n s , n e t wo r k s , t r ave l That knowledge was in part the result of earlier reading and the influence of thinkers like Ward, Dubos, Commoner and Ehrlich. But it also came from Jack’s firsthand meetings with green leaders in Australia and during his overseas travels in the mid 1970s after the frenzied momentum of the green ban era had subsided. Those experiences and connections provided him with strong evidence that the efforts of the BLF, other supporting unions, and community-based conservation groups throughout Australia were in fact part of a much bigger mosaic of activist efforts worldwide. The Burgmanns refer to Bob Brown’s and Peter Singer’s claim that the German Green Party – Die Grünen – as the world’s first ‘green’ political party, took its name and inspiration from its contact with the BLF during the visit by its feisty leader Petra Kelly in the mid

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Sydney City Council Alderman Mundey with Petra Kelly, leader of the German Green Party, Sydney, 1984. Mundey personal collection

1970s.75 Kelly was clearly inspired by the Mundey ethic involving grassroots democracy, social justice, non-violence and responsible environmental management. According to the Burgmanns, Kelly ‘did not merely import vocabulary into Germany … she would often speak about the impact that the green bans had upon her and her philosophy, and that she was especially impressed with the linkage achieved between environmentalists and a progressive trade union movement’. Kelly also receives a brief mention in Veronica Brady’s biography of Judith Wright, where Kelly – ‘heroine of the German Greens’ – joined David Bellamy and other world figures as speakers at the 1983 National Conference of the ACF.76 Brady goes on to suggest

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that, at that time, Australian environmentalists were coming to feel ‘more and more a part of a world movement’; Mundey’s meetings with Paul Ehrlich and Kelly during that time help make the point. But it needs to be remembered that whatever might have been the topics discussed by these ‘heroes’ and ‘heroines’, Mundey’s primary focus was urban, while he remained well aware of the strong links between green and brown, and the futility of trying to draw a hard line between the two.

The Sier ra Club The Sierra Club is among the oldest of the small group of conservation organisations that operate internationally. Established in 1892, it is based in San Francisco and works in the United States and other countries to implement its mission ‘to restore the quality of the natural environment and to maintain the integrity of ecosystems. Educating the public to understand and support these objectives is a basic part of the Club’s program.’77 Mundey talks about a ‘historic meeting’ with the Club during his 1976 visit to San Francisco when he brought trade unionists and environmentalists together for a sharing of interests and values. His view at the time was that the Sierra Club was ‘pretty bourgeois in many of its attitudes, but active in a lot of good causes’.78 The club was more complimentary in its earlier Bulletin of April 1975, when Gordon Robinson reported on an interview with Jack, arranged during a visit to Sydney in the same year. Robinson was ‘impressed by the man and his convictions, by his indomitable determination to help save the city and the land he calls home.’79 In an interesting aside, in the same opinion piece the author refers to official advice he received at the time from the Australian Consulate in

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San Francisco, to the effect that ‘the Australian government would prefer to think of Jack Mundey and his Green Ban movement as a minor social twitch, not to be taken seriously.’ Robinson recorded his rejection of that view, and went on to praise Mundey in the terms quoted above. He was right. Mundey’s link with the Sierra Club was not the only one of interest during his 1976 visit to North America. Through Barbara Ward he had been invited to San Francisco to attend a conference of the World Wildlife Fund (WWF). The WWF was established in 1961 as an international fundraising body that would work in collaboration with existing conservation groups for the primary purpose of raising financial support for the worldwide conservation movement. Based in Switzerland, WWF today works in 100 countries, pursuing its ambitious mission of conserving nature and reducing the most pressing threats to the diversity of life on Earth. Australia’s link with WWF goes back to the early 1960s when the Duke of Edinburgh was elected president of the British National Appeal, the first national organisation within the WWF ‘family’. Prince Philip actively promoted WWF in Australia, and from that initiative was born the Australian Conservation Foundation (ACF) on whose governing council Jack Mundey would later sit for a record term from 1974 to 1993. Prince Philip became president of ACF from 1971 through to 1976, a term which overlapped Mundey’s early period on the Council.80

Fr iends of the Earth Mundey developed connections with Friends of the Earth (FoE) in Britain and North America. Another international body that has become increasingly influential in the field of environmental

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conservation, FoE is unashamedly radical in its campaign philosophy. The first FoE group in Australia was formed in 1972 in Adelaide: FoE was established in the early stages of the social transformation happening across Australia that had been influenced by similar movements elsewhere … there was a growing public awareness of ecology; the land rights movement was becoming increasingly militant; and the NSW Builders Labourers’ Federation under the leadership of Jack Mundey was profoundly changing the roles of trade unions as it took a leading position on a range of social and environmental concerns … Against this social backdrop, FoE, based on the concept of radical grassroots environmental action, took off … for many, the new network structure of F oE was important because it offered an alternative to the often hierarchical structures of many other groups.81

Mundey’s first link with FoE was in 1975 in Manchester, in the United Kingdom. He had been invited to Britain by David Donnison, Director of the London Centre for Environmental Studies. Donnison was keen to spread the message of the green ban movement to professional bodies, grass-roots organisations and trade unions in England, and Mundey made the most of the opportunity. He records on their website his view that despite the strength of the trade union movement in Britain, the movement had been less enthusiastic about pursuing social action than the BLF had been, back in Australia. During the same trip, Jack attended a rally that brought together environmentalists and unionists working in the nuclear power sector. Not surprisingly, he described it as a ‘tough confrontation’. In his later travels in the United States, he met and was impressed by David Brower, the founder of the FoE and a determined evangelist for the FoE cause internationally. In

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Australia, FoE functions from its head office in Melbourne as a federation of autonomous local groups that share a concern for ‘an environmentally and socially equitable future’. During his 1975–76 UK visit, Jack played a part in the successful campaign to save the Birmingham General Post Office, a grand example of French Renaissance architecture whose future

Mundey and English building workers’ leader Pete Carter in front of the Old Post Office, Birmingham, UK, 1976. This grand French Renaissance building was saved from demolition by a community-led green ban. It has since been fully restored. Mundey personal collection

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was threatened by a high-rise redevelopment proposal. Mundey’s message was embraced by the Royal Victorian Society and the building unions, a ban was placed, and a vigorous struggle culminated in success. The building (since converted to other uses) has been faithfully restored and stands today as a landmark in the city’s Victoria Square. Jack’s place in the popular history of the city was aptly captured by a local songwriter in the following ditty, sung by an enthusiastic audience at a rally in the famed Banner Theatre on 20 March 1976 to the tune of ‘The Wild Colonial Boy’: It’s of a wild colonial boy, Jack Mundey is his name. A building workers’ leader from Australia he came. He said you lads in Birmingham can beat the bosses plan; Do like we did in Sydney – just put on the old green ban. That means you fight for wages, but you fight for something more – Not only for the right to work – but what you’re working for! A place that’s fit to live in, where your kids can thrive and grow, And not a concrete jungle where you scurry to and fro. The greedy men of property have knocked old ‘Brum’ around; Broad Street, Bull Ring, Aston Cross – they’ve razed it to the ground; Put up skyscraper tombstones where a working city stood – But there’s still time to call a halt, hold on to what is good. So listen to Jack Mundey when he says ‘Green bans are beaut’! A Green ban on Victoria Square will surely bear some fruit. If you can win the Post Office, you lads of high renown, You’ll win the right to take the fight to every part of town.82

G re e n p e a c e Greenpeace is another of the global environmental organisations whose birth coincided with the beginnings of Mundey’s green

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activism in Sydney in the early 1970s. Founded in 1971 in Vancouver but now based in Amsterdam, the website claims 24 million members and 28 national and regional offices worldwide. Greenpeace Australia began with its successful 1977 action campaign to force the closure of the country’s last whaling station in Albany, Western Australia. Other early actions internationally sought to curtail or terminate the slaughter of baby seals in Newfoundland, the French nuclear testing program in the Pacific, and uranium mining in Australia. In 1998, Greenpeace Australia merged with Greenpeace Pacific to form today’s Greenpeace Australia Pacific, which has enhanced the body’s potential for engaging in current campaigns for sustainable fishing, opposing illegal and destructive logging, preventing toxic pollution in water resources, and the ongoing fight to ban commercial whaling.

Action and reaction in Australia Jeff Angel, long-standing Director of Sydney’s Total Environment Centre, confirms that the early 1970s were significant years in the growth of the conservation movement in Australia. In his Green is Good he refers to the Wilderness Society as yet another influential green organisation that emerged during the period and which went on to take its place among the peak conservation bodies in Australia. This organisation was homegrown – from its inception in 1976 as the Tasmanian Wilderness Society during the unsuccessful campaign to save Lake Pedder, it grew into today’s national body. Angel describes the era in his chapter on ‘Changing Culture’: From the 1970s onwards the battles between those wishing to preserve the forests, coasts, wetlands and woodlands and the advocates for the mining, logging and the development

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industry took on epic proportions. The failure to protect Lake Pedder … and the successful Franklin Dam battle (both in Tasmania) radicalised conservationists and the general public alike. Major environment groups such as the Wilderness Society and the Total Environment Centre were established, or in the case of the Australian Conservation Foundation, reformed to become more activist.83

While Jack Mundey was never directly associated with the Wilderness Society, his memoirs carry a brief reference to his regret that the green muscle of the trade union movement had not been made available early enough to the campaigners for Lake Pedder in Tasmania.84 That failure may well have stimulated his later attraction for entering the wider environmental debates that coincided with his term on the Executive Committee of the ‘reformed’ Australian Conservation Foundation.

Inter national influences While Australian politicians were getting their respective acts together in this turbulent period there was an exponential growth of international and domestic interest in and concern for the global environment, as reflected in the extensive literature of the day and in the activities of international agencies and NGOs. Rachel Carson’s Silent Spring (1962) was almost certainly the first international bestseller to open people’s minds to the environmental damage done by the widespread and indiscriminate use of pesticides.85 A decade later, in Only One Earth, Barbara Ward and René Dubos argued passionately for a holistic approach to ‘the care and maintenance of a small planet.’86 These books and others like them were being read and quoted by ordinary people in Australia; they

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nourished political debate at a time when the environment barely rated a mention on official agendas in the lucky country. Barry Commoner’s The Closing Circle (1971) was a hugely influential work by this Harvard luminary who was one of the founders of modern ecological science. In 1972 the Club of Rome87 published its first report, The Limits to Growth, described by Charles Birch as a ‘tour de force in bringing home to many people the indisputable yet unappreciated fact that the earth is finite … we are moving from an age of resource abundance to one of resource shortage … [and] we cannot expect technology to save us.’88 The second report of the Club of Rome, Mankind at the Turning Point, was released in 1974, its central argument being that the growing gap between the rich and poor countries was leading to a crisis that would not be solved by existing political and economic structures. Cognate works by Paul and Ann Ehrlichs appeared on the related themes of ecosystems, population, and the consumer society.89 In 1976 Australia’s Charles Birch published Confronting the Future, a timely attempt to answer the question: Can man control himself and the technology he has created? Birch brought the international debate home with his prescient suggestion that Australia as a ‘frontier country’ could even play a crucial role in determining ‘mankind’s future’. As he saw it, the potential for society to generate an ecologically sound strategy for survival into the twenty-first century may perhaps be greater in Australia than elsewhere. It is noteworthy that both Ward and Birch express admiration for the green ban movement in Australia and, in 1976, Ward uses the Kelly’s Bush saga in The Home of Man as a hook on which to hang her strong support for the environmental benefits of citizen action at the local level. She also acknowledges Jack Mundey’s assistance in the preparation of that seminal work.

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In the field of urban heritage conservation and as mentioned before, the 1964 Venice Charter on the preservation and restoration of historic monuments and sites led to the birth of the International Council on Monuments and Sites (ICOMOS) in 1966. Australia ICOMOS followed in 1976 under the inaugural chairmanship of David Yencken who later served as President of the Australian Conservation Foundation during Jack Mundey’s term on the council. These events helped to stimulate a nationwide groundswell of concern for heritage in Australia and elsewhere. Debate continued into the early 1970s when Labor’s convincing electoral victory in 1972 delivered the political energy for an unprecedented burst of reformist legislation at the national level. One of Gough Whitlam’s first decisions as prime minister was to appoint Labor stalwart Tom Uren as his Minister for Urban and Regional Development, a new and demanding portfolio that took the national government into the hitherto unexplored depths of inner-city politics in all state capitals. Uren immediately became the government’s advocate and energetic champion for a raft of measures that included improvements to city infrastructure and protection of ‘the National Estate’. That year was a tumultuous one for the environment in Australia, stimulated by the UN Conference on the Human Environment that took place in Stockholm in June of 1972. In May I971, one month before the Kelly’s Bush campaign, the United Nations had commissioned Dr René Dubos to chair an international group of experts to prepare an authoritative background paper for the upcoming conference. The report became the precursor to an advisory document that was released to the Conference, and became a book, Only One Earth by Barbara Ward and Dubos, in May 1972. Among the 152 expert participants were three Australians: the renowned immunologist and Nobel Laureate

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Sir Macfarlane Burnet from Melbourne, Professor Frank Fenner, Director of the John Curtin School of Medical Research at the Australian National University, and Sir Otto Frankel, a CSIRO geneticist. The loss and destruction of urban heritage assets was one of the many topics covered in this very influential – if not seminal – report: In [beautiful] cities the chief problem is to care sufficiently and efficiently for the urban heritage … [there can be] a fateful connection … between the private land market and the destruction of urban values … a treadmill is created … the need to secure very large returns on the limited amounts of land available in central areas and hence the development of the huge skyscraper with all its destructive influences on the urban landscape [emphasis added].90

While Australia was represented at the Stockholm Conference in June 1972, it was at a time when a tired conservative government was struggling to establish its environmental credentials in the face of an increasingly determined, energetic and soon-to-be victorious opposition. The UN Environment Program was born in Stockholm, to be followed shortly after by the adoption by UNESCO of the Convention Concerning the Protection of the World’s Cultural and Natural Heritage. These momentous international initiatives were watched closely by environmentalists in Australia. All three had significant repercussions at the grass-roots level in this country. It may be no coincidence that according to pioneer Green politician and leading conservationist Bob Brown, the United Tasmania Group (UTG) was established at around the same time. Brown claims that it was the world’s first ‘greens’ political party.91 Brown was one the many admirers of Mundey and the saviours of Kelly’s Bush in Sydney.

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The UNESCO Convention was significant in that it provided a bridge between two separate conservation movements. In a single document, it linked the concepts of nature conservation with those associated with the preservation of cultural property. The idea of combining the conservation of cultural sites with those of nature was born seven years earlier when the notion of a world heritage trust was discussed at a White House conference in Washington, DC. In 1968, the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) developed a similar proposal. Both of these initiatives were presented to the 1972 Stockholm Conference. In November 1972, the convention that gave birth to the international protocol on world heritage listing was ratified by the UNESCO General Conference – another major landmark in the evolution of a global commitment to saving the world’s outstanding natural and cultural sites. Australia ratified that convention in 1974 under the Whitlam administration and, in the same year, the Australian Heritage Commission was created by act of parliament. Australia is now the custodian of 18 world heritage sites. All are on the world register as a result of campaigns that, like those that saved Kelly’s Bush and The Rocks in Sydney, started at grass-roots level. While 1972 was a landmark year for the environment, 1976 was one for human settlements. In that year, Australia participated in the first UN HABITAT Conference in Vancouver. Jack Mundey was an invited delegate to the forum of international NGOs that preceded the official UN Conference. Mundey recalls in his memoir that he had hoped to meet American unionists and environmentalists en route, but this hope was dashed when US officialdom in Australia refused his visa application because he was a communist. He eventually made it into Canada – but only after being detained for four hours by immigration officers in Los Angeles, and refused permission to leave the airport:

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I was the only working-class person among the invited delegates to the special pre-UN conference … open to all types of organisations and individuals … free and impressive … my speech covered the social responsibility of trade unions … I also had something to say about green bans and other political and social actions by trade unions … the Vancouver Sun gave my speech strong coverage.92

On 31 May 1976, Mundey was the only Australian among the 24 signatories to the NGO declaration at Vancouver. His cosignatories included many illustrious names from that era: Maurice Strong, Barbara Ward, Charles Correa, Buckminster Fuller, Jean Gottmann, Otto Koenigsberger, Margaret Mead, and others. The boy from Malanda was in good company. Mundey details in his book his experiences in Canada and in the United States where, at Barbara Ward’s invitation, he attended the World Wild Life Fund Conference in San Francisco. He also made contact with the Sierra Club and was interviewed by the San Francisco Chronicle. On this occasion he was reluctantly granted a ten-day visa by the US Consul in Sydney: ‘the first visa given to an Australian communist since the war years.’ His attempt to re-enter the United States for a lengthier stay in 1977, though, had to be abandoned. On that occasion his application was refused because of protests from ‘a number of organisations’. If he was going to talk to unions about environmental issues, ‘he was too dangerous’. While Mundey was attending the unofficial HABITAT NGO forum, members of the 130-odd national government delegations, including from Australia, were engaged in producing the official Vancouver Declaration on Human Settlements. The declaration opened with a message to governments worldwide to ‘create more liveable, attractive and efficient settlements which recognise human

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scale, the heritage and culture of people’. This was supported by a General Principle that stated that ‘every country should have the right to be a sovereign inheritor of its own cultural values created throughout its history, and has the duty to preserve them as an integral part of the cultural heritage of mankind.’93 In the aftermath to Vancouver, domestic conservation debates in Australia became more animated and potentially better informed. It will always be a matter of opinion as to whether Stockholm or Vancouver was the most influential in this country. But the overlapping chronologies of events at home and abroad during the period between the Venice Charter and Vancouver HABITAT support the view that both were crucial to the cause. Without Stockholm there would have been no Vancouver. Reforms in one country influenced reforms in another, and Australian conservation policies at state and national levels were maturing. The legislative framework was being strengthened, and the ratification of the international protocols that emerged from these major global events provided further stimulus to action in Australia at both governmental as well as NGO levels. No discussion of these international events and contributions to the debate about ‘the human condition’ would be complete without reference to the 1987 Report of the World Commission on Environment and Development: Our Common Future, a document that has come to be known as the Bruntdland Report after the commission’s chair, Gro Harlem Brundtland. This special United Nations commission was established in 1983 and headed by Brundtland, then the prime minister of Norway. Out of that report came the concept of ecologically sustainable development (ESD). Within two or three decades, every self-respecting government worldwide would ensure that ESD was embedded in legislation, in policy statements, in majestic ministerial manifestos, in soothing press releases and a flood of official studies and reports. The

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very use of the word ‘sustainable’ has become ubiquitous, being randomly applied to every kind of human activity from cooking a bowl of rice or a meat pie to placing an astronaut in orbit. Politicians dare not make a public statement without using the word at least once – even if their real message is one of ‘business as usual’. Sarcasm aside, the message that Bruntdland presented was blunt and well written, backed up by authoritative research and opinion. Throughout her report was a consistent call for the involvement of communities in decisions about their future; an emphasis on helping disadvantaged groups and indigenous peoples to hold their own against powerful predators, both public and private; and encouragement to governments to adopt holistic approaches to urban problems associated with low-income housing, historic districts and infrastructure. These messages resonate with the earlier ones from Vancouver and Stockholm, and they are consistent with the ideals that lay behind the BLF’s pioneering position on green bans in the 1970s.

And in Canber ra … If there was underground turbulence in the late 1960s and early 1970s, there was also the first sign of rough seas ahead for the conservative government that had held office in Canberra from 1949 to 1966 under Prime Minister Robert Menzies, and for another five years under his Liberal Party successors. During this record period of conservative rule, the condition of Australian cities and of the natural environment had been seen largely as matters for state and local governments. The Australian Constitution makes no reference to cities or the ‘environment’, thereby providing the perfect excuse for federal indifference. But as the boom days of the 1960s were coming to an end, it was recognised by leaders on both sides

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that environmental phenomena have no respect for constitutional or administrative boundaries, and that if the urban environments in our major cities suffer, so too does the nation as a whole. Thus, at the end of the 1960s at the national level, political leaders of both major persuasions were starting to take notice of novel and unexpected dispatches coming though from the local frontline and from off-shore. Something called the environment was getting regular headline coverage. Like the word ‘sustainable’, ecology – hitherto a vaguely understood scientific concept – was fast becoming ubiquitous, to be included at least once in any statement by a dutiful politician. In its dying days, and in the face of a certain victory for Labor at the 1972 polls, the conservative William McMahon-led Government sought to demonstrate a belated commitment to the cities by releasing hastily prepared policy statements. Patrick Troy covers this last-ditch effort to fill their gaping policy void in his Federal Power in Australia’s Cities.94 Those efforts included the lightweight and poorly conceived act to establish a national urban and regional development authority – a statute that was rushed through the parliament, only to be consigned to the sidelines after the Labor victory. In the opposition camp, however, some diligent policy work of another kind had been in train since 1968–69, led by Labor leader Gough Whitlam and Tom Uren. This work was being undertaken by a network of knowledgeable advisors from around the country. It covered conservation, both green and brown, within a comprehensive national urban and regional policy framework. The results were immediately apparent when Labor took office in late 1972. It is doubtful if any political party, before or since, has managed to produce such a battery of visionary, incisive and robust policy statements on issues of great contemporary importance to the entire nation. The record is clear and undeniable.

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Another significant primary source in this context is the Labor Party policy speech delivered by Whitlam in the western Sydney suburb of Blacktown prior to the 1972 elections. In an inspirational and extraordinarily comprehensive launch of the It’s Time campaign were the seeds of reform programs for the cities, the environment, social welfare, higher education … many of which were implemented within months of Labor’s taking power in Canberra. Examples include protection of the Barrier Reef and ratification of the World Heritage Convention.95 This latter initiative proved to be of crucial importance for the later Hawke Labor Government, because it provided the commonwealth with the legal power to override state government decisions that might threaten designated World Heritage sites.The saving of Tasmania’s Franklin River stands as a landmark outcome of that particular event.

The National Estate The creation of the Australian Heritage Commission and the Register of the National Estate in 1975 was another seminal event in the history of conservation management in Australia. The enabling legislation was introduced into the parliament by Minister Tom Uren in May 1975 during Labor’s second term. He described its broad aims in his autobiography: to set up an Australian Heritage Commission on a broad and representative basis to advise the government and the Parliament on the condition of the National Estate and how it should be protected, to establish and maintain a register of things that make up the National Estate, to require that the Australian government, its departments and agencies, and those acting on its behalf, respect the National Estate and do all that they can to preserve it.96

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Uren sought David Yencken’s advice in drafting the legislation. As chair of the Interim Committee of the National Estate at the time, Yencken was impressed by Uren, seeing him as a visionary minister. Uren had presided over a Whitlam Government initiative that would go down in history as an event that would change the paradigm. Later,Yencken recorded his impressions of Uren and his words are warmly quoted at length (by Uren) in Straight Left: The very best things often come from instincts, intuitions and feelings. The formal elaboration of the ideas, the logic, and rationality come later. Tom Uren’s feelings for his surroundings, his passionate espousal of native trees – both their preservation and planting … became widely known to readers of Sydney papers long before the Whitlam government came to power in 1972. It was thus entirely appropriate that Tom Uren should have been given a portfolio in that government that gave him opportunities to express these strongly held instincts and feelings in innovative policies and programs. He was, however, more than an originator. He was also the most solid and consistent supporter of all initiatives that finally brought a fully-fledged Australian Heritage Commission into being, often acting against the advice of his department, trusting his instincts and the advice of the people he had asked to develop the programs. The result has been acclaimed in Australia and overseas. The Commission and its work have survived changes of government … that too was part of his statesmanlike vision.97

So what was and is this entity called The National Estate? Why was it so important? Is the concept still relevant, forty years on? During the lengthy preparations for his successful ascent to the prime ministership, Whitlam used the phrase ‘national estate’

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in policy speeches and statements. According to Lloyd, its use by Whitlam was not original, as President JF Kennedy had used it in a presidential address in 1963.98 Whatever its origin, the term rapidly entered the political vernacular as a result of the 1973 decision by Whitlam and Uren to appoint a committee of inquiry under the chairmanship of Justice Hope of the NSW Supreme Court. Other members were NSW National Trust stalwart Reg Walker, poet and environmentalist Judith Wright McKinney, Len Webb, David Yencken, Keith Vallance, and academic Judith Brine. Jack Mundey was originally on the list but, as he recalled in his 1981 memoir, his nomination was quashed by NSW State Premier Robert Askin.99 According to Mundey, Uren asked him to sit on the committee and Mundey gladly accepted the invitation.Then things got sticky: Before the composition [of the committee] could be announced, Bob Askin got in touch with Uren and told him he would ‘scuttle’ the project if Mundey was appointed. Uren realised that the cooperation of the states was needed for environmental protection. He got in touch with me and explained the position. I agreed to step down and Milo Dunphy was appointed in my place.100

The committee presented its report in 1974. In May 1975, Uren introduced the Australian Heritage Bill to the parliament. The bill passed through both houses with largely bipartisan support, and became law later that year. In March 1977, under Malcolm Fraser’s Liberal-Country Party Coalition Government, the newly created Australian Heritage Commission under its first director, Max Bourke, published its preliminary listing of items for inclusion in the National Estate Register.101 Around the nation, moves to introduce similar initiatives were leading to action at state level. Victoria legislated the Historic Buildings Act 1981, followed by a

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state register of historic buildings and the subsequent creation of an advisory Heritage Council. In New South Wales, The Heritage Act of 1977 led to the creation of the NSW Heritage Council with Justice Hope as its first chair.102 The new council’s functions were novel, untested, ambitious: • To consider and evaluate the significance of buildings and sites to the State’s environmental heritage; • To prepare a register of protected items of the environmental heritage; • To recommend to the Minister the application of interim and permanent conservation orders; and • To recommend the allocation of funds for the repair and conservation of worthy buildings and sites.103 The council’s 1978 Annual Report makes it clear that the 1977 Act and the subsequent establishment of the NSW Heritage Council were direct outcomes of the 1974 National Estate Inquiry. For the first time in New South Wales, a legal definition of heritage entered the statute books. Henceforward, the relevant minister would have access to expert advice on the conservation of the state’s ‘environmental heritage’ and on the exercise of ministerial powers conferred under the act. There would be no confusion as to the meaning of that phrase, given the explicit terms of the new definition: • Buildings or structures and their fixtures and fittings; • Relics such as archaeological remains relating to European settlement generally prior to 1900;104 • Works such as bridges, roads, dams, mine pitheads; • Places, such as sites or areas of historic, scientific, natural or aesthetic significance including geological features, landscapes and gardens; and • Precincts such as streets or urban areas where the grouping of structures and spaces adds significance to the individual items.

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Over the next twenty years, all states and the Northern Territory enacted heritage legislation, to be followed, at last, by the Australian Capital Territory’s Assembly with its Heritage Act 2004.105 The ascent of Labor to power in December 1972 can now be seen as a historic threshold in the politics of heritage and the environment in Australia. Through the next half century there would be some wavering of commonwealth interest, depending on which party and which leader held office at any particular time, but it is indisputable that after Whitlam and Uren, the game had changed forever. Concern for both the natural and cultural heritage would henceforward remain on the commonwealth’s agenda. Even when conservative governments returned to Canberra, these matters remained on the business paper. And even today – under a right-wing administration in Canberra – it could reasonably (optimistically?) be anticipated that no future political party or leader will be so foolish or irresponsible as to revert to the pre-1972 era of laissez-faire and indifference to the national estate and all that the phrase implies. Mundey and Tom Uren at a Glebe Society picnic, June 2009. Mundey personal collection

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Chapter 5

Big issues, big battles People power – a new social chemistry

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T

he years between Rachel Carson’s Silent Spring (1962) and the UN Habitat Conference in Vancouver (1976) saw an unprecedented upsurge of global and local concern for the natural and cultural environments, as we have just discussed. Throughout the western world, citizens in this pre-computer, pre-mobile phone era were coming out into the streets in increasing numbers to man the barricades, lobby their politicians, write pamphlets, hold demonstrations, and make a nuisance. The two major UN conferences during this period were accompanied by less formal international gatherings of NGOs representing thousands of community-based organisations that were finding common ground on environmental and human settlement issues.The UN events alone were sufficient evidence to show that, henceforward, strategies for our survival must respond to global as well as local conditions – what happens here will affect what happens there. In environmental management in particular, we had at last been forced into accepting what science had long been telling us: that we are dealing with phenomena that have no respect for the often arbitrary lines on the political atlas. After ten millennia, humankind had at last come to recognise that we are all in this ship together. Buckminster Fullers’s concept of Spaceship Earth says it all. As for action at community level, the literature of the period shows that even if its efforts often came to naught, people power had arrived and was here to stay – though derided by conservative forces and treated as suspect by those dedicated to material progress at all costs. In Australia it was the same story, but with one significant difference: the sudden emergence of the green ban movement in Sydney in the winter of 1971, when a tiny plot of riverside bushland was saved from the bulldozers, was a turning point – a battery-charger for local action groups nationwide. Certainly

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there had been courageous grass-roots initiatives in other places in Australia before Kelly’s Bush, but the campaign to save the Bush became front-page news.This campaign managed to take the battle out of the trenches, across no-man’s land and into the enemy lines where negotiations took place, and a new spirit of respect for what the French call le patrimoine was born. If the elegance of this term is missing from the English word ‘heritage’, there was nothing elegant about those early grass-roots campaigns. There was serious business afoot. There was voluminous media coverage of these unprecedented, rough-and-tumble happenings in Arcadian bushland and in the battered back streets and alleys of Sydney’s The Rocks and Woolloomooloo areas. In the normal course of events, grown men and women do not happily lie down in front of bulldozers or calmly submit themselves to police arrest, yet that is what Jack Mundey and many others did. As was to be expected, they got short shrift from many on the right. Political demonstrators, no matter what their cause, were bad news.1 Even Neville Wran, a future Labor premier, was far from complimentary when in 1972 he made ‘scathing remarks’ about the green bans and the fact that they were being imposed at a time of full employment in the building industry: ‘Wait till the industry goes into recession and we’ll see whether you [the BLF’s Mundey and Pringle] survive.’2 A couple of years later, Wran was to change his tune as public sentiment increasingly warmed to the prospect of heritage and planning reform in New South Wales. In office, he moved rapidly in this direction and oversaw major reforms in planning and heritage. Most of those in the property development industry at the time ardently hoped that the BLF would not survive. Public enemy number one was that paid-up communist leading a staunchly left-wing union.The fact that the union leaders were simultaneously

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fighting for improvements to the appalling working conditions faced by their rank-and-file members on construction sites was inexplicably and silently ignored. A group of poorly paid labourers abandoning a concrete pour on a big job during a green ban was headline stuff, but moves to introduce compulsory on-thejob showers, or safer scaffolding, or civilised rest rooms, or less risky conditions for riggers, would have been lucky to get even a one-liner in the business pages. Throughout all this fractious activity, the name Mundey was heard whenever discussion turned to protecting heritage assets, or stimulating a co-operative response from recalcitrant bureaucrats, or saving conservation treasures great and small. An unexpected change had arrived in civil society. A new social chemistry was at work, binding unionists and non-unionists alike as they found common cause. Protection of the commons was the enabling, unifying principle, energising the Australian conservation movement in an entirely novel way. This chemistry came to be the uniquely identifying characteristic of the green ban movement, even though that movement slowly expired and the BLF eventually ceased to exist as a serious player in the conservation game. Its successor, the CFMEU, inherited some of the BLF’s spirit but its horizons were different and it did not have a Mundey at the helm. In the event, the movement’s most notorious practitioner found himself presented with other unexpected and interesting opportunities after the BLF’s deregistration and his entry into the ranks of the unemployed. Jack would probably admit that at no stage of his life did he have a serious game plan for his future, but career uncertainties at least gave him a certain freedom of movement that would not have been available if he had been holding down a secure full-time job with a clear career path ahead. Whatever the facts of the matter, it is undeniable that the fresh somewhat

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serendipitous opportunities that came his way after union deregistration saw him continuing to influence Australian conservation policy and practice well into the next century. The demise of the BLF in 1975 was the end of a chapter. During the period leading to its deregistration, other stories remained unfinished; some had still to be written. Some were concerned with new governmental initiatives, new legislative arrangements, new possibilities for productive effort in conservation. Others, like the ongoing saga over the future of The Rocks, dealt with a single set of related events, or perhaps a major conference that was later seen as a landmark event, such as the First National Conservation Study Conference in Canberra in 1973.These seminal events have been recounted in detail by Jeff Angel (2008), Meredith and Verity Burgmann (1998), Marion Hardman and Peter Manning (n.d. c.1975), Peter Webber (1988), Drew Hutton (1987), Richard Roddewig (1988) and Jack Mundey (1981). Out of the turbulence came new laws, new policies, new design paradigms and new thinking about the cultural values embedded in the natural and built environments. Things were never going to be same again.

The Rocks, Sydney Over several generations this small part of urban Australia has attracted writers, artists and photographers eager to find needed inspiration and stimulation. Ruth Park’s 1980 novel Playing Beatie Bow and Unk White’s sketches in The Rocks are typical. Most Sydneysiders and millions of tourists would know The Rocks as a historic precinct in which it is possible to have a good night out while enjoying the ambience of a genuine nineteenth-century townscape replete with historic pubs, tiny workers’ cottages,

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handsome terraces, inviting eateries, pocket parks and cobbled laneways – all within a stone’s throw of the harbour and the CBD. Some would have been vaguely aware of the fact that the area had been the site of European activity since that day in January 1788 when white men from a distant land came ashore from their strange sailing ships, and – in their strange uniforms – claimed possession of the land in the name of a faraway king. An educated few would know that for thousands of years before these invaders raised their flag the area had been home to the Cadigal people, members of the Eora clan. Even fewer would remember from their history lessons that while these newcomers were busy establishing the infant colony, a new constitution was being forged in the United States, France was facing a revolution, and their own King George, back in the mother country, would go insane. Such was in part the antipodean political context at the time of ‘first’ settlement in Australia. In Sydney Town the immediate job for government was to establish a peaceful colonial township while keeping the convicts under control. The Rocks area on the western side of Sydney Cove was an obvious place to gain a foothold for the invasion that commenced in January 1788, and to lay the first bricks in what was a nation-building enterprise. A little under two hundred years later, in 1973, The Rocks was far from peaceful. The events that took place there, early on a cold morning late in October, would become famous in the annals of the Australian urban conservation movement. An old building in Playfair Street was the focus of the action. Its demolition by non-union (scab) labour had commenced, despite a BLF green ban on the wider Rocks area. Passive occupation of the site was seen as a way of furthering the conservation cause and ensuring that the green ban held. But under instructions from the state

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government and Premier Askin, a large force of police arrived shortly after dawn to ensure that the non-union workforce could continue the demolition. They found the site occupied and barricaded by a very resolute group of locals and the two BLF leaders, Jack Mundey and Joe Owens. According to the Burgmanns, the police arrested 58 of the activists, Mundey and Owens included.3 Jack Mundey recalls: That morning’s occupation was just one of the large number of separate actions that, together, saved The Rocks. The combined power of citizens and unionists stopped insensitive development and, more importantly, gave citizens a say in the making of decisions.4

Why was Mundey arrested? A strictly legal answer might be because he defied a police order to move on, to cease his trespass. A more realistic response might be that the premier wanted his head. Why did residents defy the police? Because they were facing summary eviction from their homes, the destruction of a tight-knit community, the wrecking of a familiar and much-loved landscape, and bureaucracy’s failure to properly consult and negotiate. Why did the whole Rocks saga become front-page news – eventually entering the history books as a brown sequel to the earlier and greener Battle for Kelly’s Bush? Because it involved the mass refusal by an army of determined unionists to apply their labour to an unpopular development proposal, and because it was a catalyst, a unifying event, an extraordinary and unprecedented moment for public sentiment to emerge as a driving force for reform of outdated planning laws and the introduction of heritage conservation as a proper responsibility of government. The story begins with an outbreak of bubonic plague in 1900. This threat gave the state government a convenient excuse to

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Jack Mundey arrested in The Rocks, October 1973. Courtesy Sydney Morning Herald, Fairfax Media

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compulsorily resume most of the area in order to achieve two pressing objectives – in addition to dealing with the very unwelcome health scare. The first was to bring this sector of the harbour waterfront into public ownership so that progressive modernisation of wharfage could take place. The second was to secure control of a site that would in the years to come be a strategic element in the construction of a future bridge across the harbour to the north shore. From the date of resumption forward, residents became tenants of the state. Little private ownership remained, and private investment virtually ceased. By the 1930s the extensive area that had been resumed earlier to create a modern, commercially competitive waterfront was the subject of a government committee report, which recommended that this slum be cleared to make way for flats, offices and commerce. In the event, nothing of the kind happened, but the massive construction program for the Sydney Harbour Bridge (1928 to 1932) took a partial toll. The building of the Cahill Expressway across Circular Quay in the 1950s also had its impact on the community, both socially and environmentally. But, by and large, this traditional inner-city working-class community – many of whose members traced their lineage back to colonial days – was able to stand its ground against these threats. Then, in 1960, the state government under Labor Premier Heffron invited selected developer teams to submit fresh proposals for reshaping the area east of the expressway, right down to the harbour’s edge. Once again, big changes were looming. In January 1964, the construction firm of James Wallace Pty Ltd was named the successful tenderer on the basis of a scheme prepared by leading Sydney architects Edwards Madigan & Torzillo. From the harbourside at Dawes Point as far south as the Cahill Expressway, the old Rocks would be replaced by high-rise office towers, retail and commercial space, and some 13 residential

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apartment blocks linked by a continuous traffic-free podium element at ground level. The Wallace scheme placed little value on heritage, as the following extract from the company’s report reveals: Although a careful examination has been made of the area, it has been finally concluded that there are few existing features of historical and architectural interest that warrant special efforts at retention … [However] it has been thought appropriate that the preservation of Cadman’s Cottage … would be of value … it is proposed to dismantle the cottage and re-erect it … to form a subtle link with history without aggravating problems of physical planning.5

The Wallace–EMT scheme did not proceed under the new conservative state government that was elected in May 1965. But the building boom in Sydney was moving into top gear and a year later the prospect of wholesale redevelopment again appeared when Liberal Premier Bob Askin sought the advice of John Overall, Commissioner of Canberra’s National Capital Development Commission (NCDC). On the ground, little had changed. The Askin Government saw a large, rundown yet extremely valuable area of public land occupying a prime harbourside position on the edge of the CBD. Yes, it was occupied, but only by a handful of low-income state tenants, slum dwellers, hippies, down-and-outers and families on the welfare housing list paying ridiculously low rents. The government’s position was clear: in the name of progress they would have to go. Under Overall, the project’s ambit was augmented by extending the redevelopment area south to Grosvenor Street. As with the abandoned Wallace scheme, the government’s ultimate objective was to enable the huge real-estate potential of the area to be unlocked and exploited to the full.

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Above: The Rocks, aerial view of 1967 scheme. Below: The Rocks, George Street North as it might have been under the 1970 scheme. Both images courtesy Sydney Harbour Foreshore Authority

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Above: The Rocks, the model of 1963–64 proposal. Below: The Rocks, 1970 scheme as adopted by NSW Government. Both images courtesy Sydney Harbour Foreshore Authority

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In June 1967, Overall presented his Observations on Redevelopment of the Western Side of Sydney Cove Rocks Area to Grosvenor Street to the NSW Parliament. At his recommendation, the study area had been extended to include ‘the contiguous Crown-occupied land in West Rocks and Dawes Point. Observatory Hill, Argyle Place … other holdings extending from Dawes Point to the Quay’. Overall stated in his 1993 memoir that his assignment was a ‘concentrated exercise … proposing the development of the whole area around a design theme. Its aim was to retain the historic parts … opening up of Sydney’s majestic waterfront by developing a great harbour-front square that would provide the city with a memorial for its birthplace.’6 His report was supported by the National Trust – on 31 July 1967 the Trust’s council resolved to support the scheme and its proposal to preserve ‘about seven buildings … it did not preserve very much but it was a great deal better than the previous [Wallace] situation’ – and adopted by a grateful government.7 The government also embraced with enthusiasm Overall’s recommendation that a special redevelopment authority be established to implement the project. As later events proved, that single recommendation triggered the chain of events that led to blood in the streets, lockouts of building sites, police arrests, massive street demonstrations and, eventually, the famous BLF green ban of 1971–73. John Overall was an architect, ex-military commander, and a very capable public servant. He brought these attributes to his Rocks assignment in full measure. In particular, his architectural training and his ready access to the considerable design resources of the NCDC coloured his approach to urban design. This background was a major influence on the beaux arts formality – some might call it sterility – of his recommended scheme, with its grand plaza overlooking Circular Quay, its axial building

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relationships, and its serried rank of towers stepping down to the harbour’s edge. Predictably it bore some similarities to the abandoned Wallace concept, with its towers, grand plazas and podiums. In hindsight it could reasonably be seen as the offspring of the dry, sterile urban design achievements of his commission in central Canberra. Its general spirit was vaguely reminiscent of the post-war plans for the blitzed St Paul’s precinct in London prepared by Sir William (later Lord) Holford, one of those eminent UK-trained designers whose advice was regularly sought by the federal government in Canberra during the three decades following the end of the Second World War.8 Overall’s military background also gave him the no-nonsense management skills to get things done. He was comfortable in the company of government ministers and the captains of industry. Socially he was suave and likeable, with a twinkle in the eye, always impeccably dressed. These attributes endeared him to his political masters, and he remained comfortably in Canberra’s top job for 14 years. Overall’s recommendation that the state government create a dedicated agency to undertake the redevelopment of The Rocks was hardly a surprise, given that his own NCDC had proven to be the perfect model for a major city building project.The commission had achieved an impressive track record since its creation by Prime Minister Menzies in 1958. Largely autonomous in its relationships with other federal agencies, and enjoying a mandate to get the job done as expeditiously as possible, the NCDC had a dream run as both a design agency and a construction authority. Almost overnight, the empty paddocks of the capital territory were filled with houses, roads, parklands, schools, neighbourhood centres and civic facilities of all kinds.The commission attracted skilled professionals in architecture, landscape design and civil engineering, and it enjoyed the certainty of continuous federal funding. In the case

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of The Rocks, Overall saw an opportunity to apply the Canberra model, suitably modified, to this hugely valuable state government asset, and his recommendation was enthusiastically embraced by the government. The state government’s decision to create a special authority was shortly followed by the impetuous passing in January of the Sydney Cove Redevelopment Act 1968.9 Public debate on the bill was not on the agenda and press coverage was minimal. Two years later, in January 1970 the Sydney Cove Redevelopment Authority (SCRA) was established.The authority’s first executive director and deputy chair was DO (Owen) Magee BE FIE, another ex-military man whose field rank as a recently retired Brigadier was prominently and proudly noted on the back cover of his 2005 memoir.10 Obviously a no-nonsense operator, there could be no better man for the job. Under Magee, the SCRA quickly appointed a consortium of consultants led by Melbourne architects Bates Smart & McCutcheon, with a brief to review the Overall scheme and present a detailed set of proposals to the government within a year. In December 1970 they delivered, and their scheme was promptly adopted. The SCRA was in business. In retrospect, it must be seen as an extraordinary miscarriage of the democratic process that, in the preparation of all three schemes for this unique area, not even lip service was paid to the concept of citizen participation. In the case of the Overall scheme, coming at a time when participation was entering the lexicon of contemporary planning, neither Overall nor his client saw any need to consult with the large resident community in the area or with the people of Sydney generally. It might be argued that Overall’s NCDC was excused from consulting the community back in Canberra because at the time that community barely existed. The commission’s brief was to accelerate the design and

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construction of the new capital, a project that had been languishing since the 1930s. Engaging with newly arrived residents in the territory would have been pointless, but The Rocks was a different story. Here was a mature community with a long memory and long-standing associations with an area it had come to love. In the case of the SCRA scheme and its Melbourne-based architects, the tight schedule set by the government virtually ruled out any serious consultation. For this high-powered consortium, the prospect of community participation would have been dismissed as an expensive and time-consuming diversion. Weren’t the majority of residents low-income public housing tenants, slumdwellers?11 What right did they have to influence or interfere with a multimillion-dollar urban renewal project designed to clean up, once and for all, this crumbling and ramshackle quarter that was disfiguring the site of the nation’s birthplace? A highly personal account of this prestigious state project has been provided by Owen Magee in his 2005 memoir. His choice of title, How the Rocks Was Won, says something about his (and the Authority’s) philosophical position on the controversy that unfolded as he took the reins back in 1970. For this ex-military field officer and his newly created SCRA, the aim was to ‘win’ the battle and eventually end the union’s ‘rule by violence’, as described in his second chapter. He makes it clear in his preface that his purpose in writing the book was to ensure that ‘the true story of how The Rocks was revitalised’ was ‘set straight’ in order to counter ‘the myths, first fabricated by the BLF and their supporters and repeated so often since that their truth is now seldom challenged’.12 Clearly, future historians will have a field day comparing Magee’s version of events with those from Mundey, the Burgmanns, Roddewig and others. Magee’s take on the matter of consultation was clear. For him, consultation meant talking, negotiating, bargaining with the

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relevant bureaucracies, and the thought of entering into civilised discussions with the residents or interested NGOs would have been remote from his military mind. His was a priority of a different kind. Consultation meant consulting with officialdom, not with the affected citizenry. Quite reasonably, he saw ‘the establishment of close contact at working level with the organisations controlling Sydney’s essential services and development’ as being vital to the Authority’s planning program. Some 24 ‘public and private’ organisations were brought into the process, including agencies responsible for roads, planning, water, public works and public housing.13 His list diplomatically included the Sydney City Council and the National Trust, although the former had no real power in the area, and the latter was a NGO considered, as noted earlier, to have ‘no teeth’. But talking to the people at grass-roots level was not his style. His book is vague as to his views on citizen participation as a concept, and the topic does not appear in his index. There can be no doubt that for Magee, and presumably for the Authority, there was no love lost when it came to its later dealings with the Rocks Resident Action Group, professional institutes, including the Royal Australian Planning Institute (RAPI), the Royal Australian Institute of Architects (RAIA), and the BLF. Magee’s colourful language in his chapter on the ‘Riots in the Rocks’ makes it abundantly clear that for him at least, the unionists were ‘thugs’, ‘a mob’ of ‘screaming rioters’ and ‘conspirators’, ‘drunkards’, members of a ‘power-mad’ union intent on ‘rule by violence’. Bob Pringle and Jack Mundey were ‘henchmen’, promoting the ‘power of the proletariat’ and their ‘ruthless’ desire for ‘worker control’.14 For Magee and his management team, dealing with such a rabble was going to be a priority as they pressed ahead to discharge the Authority’s statutory redevelopment responsibilities as expeditiously as possible. The NSW parliament had given the Authority

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unprecedented powers at a time when town planning legislation was primitive, when there was no statutory protection for heritage, and when a right-wing conservative government was in no mood to have its plans derailed by resident activists, left-wing unionists, or their misguided allies in the design professions. There may also have been a disinclination – or even a directive – to avoid dealing with those local design professionals. For reasons unknown, Magee’s book ignores the institutes of planning and architecture, despite the evidence that the RAPI and RAIA had significant concerns about the 1970 scheme and both institutes made formal submissions to the Authority setting out those concerns.15 Both bodies also achieved something that eluded the Authority at the time: the development of a mutually respectful working relationship with Jack Mundey and other BLF leaders as well as with the residents’ action group. In the case of the RAPI, a policy statement released in June 1972 called for the state government to amend the SCRA act ‘to provide for better consultation, public participation, and occasions for the exhibition and seeking of public comment on the policies and proposals of the Authority’.16 If participation and consultation with the non-government sector was a low priority for the SCRA, its highly selective approach to heritage was at least explicit. Magee quotes from the minutes of the Authority’s inaugural meeting on 20 January 1970, when Chairman Pettingell announced that the task facing the new organisation was one ‘which would not only preserve the historical significance of the area [but] would also see that it ran a useful business enterprise for the government and the people of the state.’ Magee later states that one of the key requirements that were briefed to the incoming consultant team was that historic buildings worthy of preservation should be incorporated in the new development.17 ‘Worthiness’ was not defined and, not surprisingly, very

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few buildings were found to be worthy. In hindsight it can reasonably be claimed that much of the ensuing furore over the heritage issue was the result of dispute in interpreting that mandate. On the one hand there was the RAPI’s view that the project site should be designated as a single coherent and unified conservation zone, with only selective redevelopment of certain properties within a heritage context. On the other was the view – first advocated by John Overall and later adopted by the Authority – that apart from a small number of distinctive ‘historic buildings’ the bulk of the site was ripe for demolition and redevelopment to satisfy the pressing commercial imperatives laid down by the government. On the heritage issue, the National Trust’s position was evolving, if not ambivalent. At the invitation of the Authority in 1970, the Trust submitted a survey and report, adopted by the National Trust Council in September that year, listing 23 buildings or groups of buildings ‘with first, second and third priorities for preservation, and a statement of townscape principles’. According to a file note from the Trust’s Acting Director John Morris, many of the buildings that the Trust had recommended for preservation were included in the Authority’s scheme, published in February 1971. The trust duly expressed its support for the Authority’s position, although only five buildings in the entire Rocks area had been formally entered onto the Trust’s register. Subsequently the Trust moved to correct this anomaly by directing the Historic Buildings Committee to review the listings, ‘taking into account what the committee believed to be essential to the character of The Rocks. That is, groups of buildings and the spaces they contain, together with the very important framed vistas which these spaces permit’. Significantly, the committee decided to recommend the inclusion of a number of 20th century buildings that had been overlooked until then. In April 1974 the Trust considered a schedule of new

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and revised listings, thereby preparing for its later classification of the entire Rocks precinct as an urban conservation area.18 Meanwhile, it was undeniable that the state government was the landlord. Public ownership gave the infant SCRA the legal muscle it needed to implement its mandate, to ensure that old buildings and residences were vacated, to enter into agreements with developers and investors, to undertake improvements to long-neglected infrastructure. Importantly, the decision as to whether or not a historic property was ‘worthy of preservation’ was one for the Authority and the Authority alone – to be made in the context of the demanding commercial objectives that the government had imposed. If expert advice was needed before such decisions were made, Magee makes it clear that consultation with the National Trust was sufficient. It was the preferred path; indeed, as noted above, the Trust was initially supportive of the consultants’ 1970 scheme, much to the consternation of the BLF and other opposing parties.19 The SCRA scheme was founded on the expectation that it would be a model – a demonstration – of what could be achieved when the crème de la crème of the country’s design consultants, project managers, land economists, traffic engineers and real estate brains were brought together to determine a profitable future for this very valuable piece of publicly owned property. Overseas precedents such as La Défense in Paris and The Barbican scheme in London were examined in the field during a whirlwind study tour that Magee and architect Walter Bunning made shortly after the former’s appointment as executive director. The resulting design was a cluster of brutalist tower blocks stepping down the ridge to the harbour’s edge and ranging in height from 30 to 50 storeys, accommodating offices, retail uses, luxury hotels and apartments.20 A labyrinthine system of underground car parks made sure that motorists would not be inconvenienced. The heritage lobby was

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placated by including the retention (or relocation) of a handful of historic buildings, mainly in the northern sector. The government summarily adopted the scheme after a token public exhibition, and its implementation was promptly authorised in December 1970. This was probably seen by the Authority as an auspicious time to release such a potentially controversial scheme, given the holiday period. In February the plans were officially launched, and briefly put on public display. Over the next few months the SCRA gave consideration to the vexing matter of ensuring that rental tenancies were terminated so that demolition for the first stage of the redevelopment could begin. The authority was also able to commence its program of renovation and conservation of a handful of historic buildings that were now part of its portfolio. Rumours of impending evictions and loss of tenant rights, such as they were, led swiftly to the formation of The Rocks Resident Action Group. Their leader was Nita McRae, third generation Rocks resident and mother. In November 1971 the group approached BLF secretary Jack Mundey and president Bob Pringle seeking union help. A green ban was placed, and the battle for The Rocks was about to get underway. According to Mundey, at the time ‘everyone should be interested when Sydney’s history and beauty is going to be torn down, and when people in the way of this so-called progress are regarded as minor inconveniences.’21 The ‘people’ in this case were the residents facing eviction. Other people (not mentioned by Mundey) were the officials in charge of the redevelopment, and the financiers, developers and builders whose interests were of a more material nature. These ‘others’ included anyone on the right who saw the BLF’s decisive intervention as a threat to the state’s economy, led by a group of communist extremists intent on defying the rule of law and on undermining the integrity of the

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Master Builders’ Association as the influential peak body within the NSW building industry. From the outset, the campaign to save The Rocks had to be a fundamentally different battle from that which was still raging at Kelly’s Bush. In the latter case, it was the future of rare harbourside bushland that was at stake. In The Rocks, the welfare and housing needs of hundreds of low-income public housing tenants were among the primary drivers. Loss of heritage and history was another. As for the wider public – and a growing cohort of concerned professionals, civic leaders, ‘ordinary folk’ – there was a palpable feeling of outrage at the cavalier way a state government could comfortably accept these architecturally audacious schemes without any attempt to assess public opinion.22 Almost half a century on, the contemporary observer familiar with the human scale and undeniable charm of this mid-Victorian townscape could be excused for failing to understand what was being proposed at the time. The archives say it all. Many historic properties from Grosvenor Street north towards the harbour were to be razed and replaced by massive tower blocks, concrete plazas, podiums. Modern architecture was to be given free rein in this special place – all in the name of slum clearance and ‘urban renewal’. This was not Kelly’s Bush, where the locals were dealing with a private developer. In The Rocks, the opponents of the scheme were facing a powerful statutory authority with a mandate to clear, demolish and rebuild.23 Unlike Kelly’s Bush, the land was largely in public ownership, and there was no local council directly involved, because the role of a local authority (the Council of the City of Sydney) had been usurped by the state government through the Sydney Cove Redevelopment Act.24 In The Rocks, there were no green issues as such; but there was what many came to see as the most important question of all for the birthplace of European

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Australia: was it not vital that this historic precinct be protected and conserved for posterity as an indispensable part of what later came to be known as the National Estate? In simple terms, the BLF’s green ban led by Mundey and Pringle proved to be the kiss of death for the official SCRA scheme that had been so enthusiastically adopted by the Askin Government.25 The ban provided a breathing space for residents and supporters from outside to consider their options. It encouraged The Rocks community to work with a group of interested professionals in the preparation of a people’s plan for their historic turf, a project that came to naught in bricks-and-mortar terms but would indirectly influence the review of the SCRA scheme, which eventually, and perhaps reluctantly, was commissioned in 1974.The revised scheme signalled a significant volte-face for the Authority. From that time on there would be no going back to wall-to-wall high-rise office towers, luxury housing for the fortunate few, a few tokenistic nods in the direction of the heritage lobby. Indeed, Magee’s book includes a detailed schedule of domestic, commercial and civic heritage restoration projects that were successfully undertaken between 1970 and 1985 – an impressive list by any standards.26 From 1974 onward – at least until well into the 1980s – the work of the Authority took it into new fields in which consultation with residents would take place as a matter of course on controversial matters. Conservation became a priority rather than a soft option. The resident population would be increased with a reduction in office and commercial accommodation, and there would be an explicit commitment to low-to-medium building heights in the historic core area. North of the Cahill Expressway, high-rise was out. In more recent years, the Authority’s conservation effort included some meticulous archaeological work that has added greatly to the fund of knowledge about the routines

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and lifestyles of the intrepid lads and lassies who found safe haven on this rocky hillside during the boisterous colonial era and the decades after. And the area’s role as a setting for public art has seen the installation of a larger-than-life, three-dimensional portrait of Jack Mundey in Globe Street, one of the oldest laneways in the old Rocks. In 1995 the SCRA quietly dropped the word ‘redevelopment’ from its official title – tacit recognition that heritage conservation was not only culturally important, but also officially legitimate, as well as commercially attractive.As locals and tourists flocked to visit and spend, the cash began to flow. A further change came in 1999 when the newly constituted Sydney Harbour Foreshore Authority (SHFA) took over the role of custodian of The Rocks from the SCA. A couple of years later, this custodial role for state-owned harbour properties was augmented by an unexpected initiative of the commonwealth, when it established the Sydney Harbour Federation Trust, a new federal agency whose task was the preservation and rehabilitation of eight commonwealth-owned properties around the harbour.7 The advent of the federal government into the Sydney Harbour management scene was the culmination of a vigorous five-year-long, grass-roots campaign involving activists from harbourside communities, strongly supported by the National Trust.28 In December 1997, the then Trust President Barry O’Keefe wrote to members urging their involvement and inviting them in turn to write to their local federal member of parliament, including Tony Abbott, the Member for Warringah who would later become prime minister. The following year, a press release from the Trust’s executive director welcomed Prime Minister John Howard’s ‘entry into the debate’ about the future of the commonwealth lands.29 The trust’s priorities were clear: recognition of the ‘immense conservation values’ of the remaining

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harbourside bushland, identification and recognition of the many items of built heritage, retention of public ownership of the lands in perpetuity, and the allocation of adequate funds to ensure effective conservation and management. While Jack Mundey played no active frontline role in the campaign to save the commonwealth harbourside lands, his shadow could be seen hovering over what SHFA Chair Mike Collins referred to as the ‘lineage’ of government decisions relating to the management of the harbour foreshores. The SCRA scheme triggered the green bans of the 1971–73 period, when Mundey’s reputation as a leader was in the ascendancy.The Sydney Cove Authority’s revised brief and much stronger commitment to heritage was an outcome reflecting the efforts of Mundey and others on the heritage frontline. The SCA was eventually absorbed into the SHFA and Executive Director of the SHFT Geoff Bailey is part of the lineage, since before 2002 he had worked for the old ‘Rocks’ authority before moving to a senior position with the SHFA and then to the SHFT. It says something about the shifting sands of officialdom that as SCA manager (of architecture, conservation and planning) back in 1996, Bailey had recommended to the March meeting of the Authority’s board that it ‘instruct the Authority to prepare a report outlining the options available’ to commemorate the 25th anniversary of The Rocks green bans. His recommendation stands as a pointed reminder of the almost seismic change in official attitudes toward conservation in this historic precinct that took place over the quarter century in question. He noted (for example) that the bans in The Rocks ‘captured the imagination of many … the debates, arguments and events of the time all contributed to a widespread public view that The Rocks belonged to all Sydney-siders.’ He went further, suggesting that the year 1996:

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is seen as an opportunity to not only mark the 25th anniversary of the Green Bans … but also to recognise the achievements of those who campaigned and often sacrificed their time, money and reputation. It is also a suitable time to note the positive change in role which the Authority adopted as a result of the Green Bans.30

One could reasonably conclude from these events that there would have been no Sydney Harbour Federation Trust if there had been no Mundey. It is surely incontestable that without the bans, the massive redevelopment program that was the state government’s aim in the early 1970s – with Magee leading the SCRA in the original ‘battle for The Rocks’ – would have proceeded in one form or another. Nearly half a century later, The Rocks is the destination of millions of locals and visitors who come to the area to enjoy its ambience, thriving night life, handsome Georgian townscapes, cobbled alleyways, churches, open spaces, and many reminders of an earlier Sydney. But this is not to say that the entire Rocks–Millers Point precinct is in good condition. Poor maintenance and neglect by successive state governments raise questions on the future of certain parts of this heritage area, while the process of selling heritage houses to the private sector has already commenced. It is probably this wilful ‘death by a thousand cuts’ policy of neglect that triggered Miranda Devine’s trenchantly scornful description of Millers Point on 26 March 2014. She claimed in her Daily Telegraph column that ‘Millers Point, from the northern end of Lower Fort Street through Argyle Place to Merriman Street in the west and down to the southern end of High Street, is a decaying monument … a run down hovel [sic].’ To the uninitiated, this might seem to be reasonable enough. But when she goes on to describe this

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neglected place as ‘a decaying monument to the stand over tactics of the wharfies and the defunct, deregistered and disgraced BLF … a reminder of this city’s bad old days of greed, thuggery – and graft for those in the know’ she might be accused of overstepping the mark. If decay and neglect are evident today, it is not because of the BLF; it is the result of three decades of poor maintenance by a negligent state government. Curiously, Devine’s unproven accusations of ‘greed’, ‘thuggery’ and ‘graft’ during the period of the BLF’s intervention can be compared to her silence on the rampant corruption with which the Askin Government was associated at the time of the green bans. To close the circle, the chair of the SHFA officially opened Jack Mundey Place in The Rocks on 1 May 2009. Within a stone’s throw of the setting for the bulldozer charges, bashings, sit-ins, lockouts and arrests of the early 1970s, Mike Collins named a small piece of the city after the man who began the conservation process during that turbulent period: All movements need leadership, and this one found a dynamic and charismatic leader in Jack Mundey. He was the right leader at the right time … the movement that he led here at The Rocks was the genesis of Green Bans, and part of rethinking of planning and heritage in New South Wales … there is therefore a direct lineage between the protests that Jack led here and the birth of regulated heritage preservation around Australia … Jack Mundey Place celebrates this important moment in our history [emphasis added].31

Coincidentally, the naming of Jack Mundey Place occurred at the same time as the release of a Revised Heritage Policy by the SHFA. This document is evidence enough of the steady reversal of government policy for this area during the period separating

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the SCRA-Magee era and the SHFA under Chair Mike Collins. Initially, Magee saw his primary responsibility as being the implementation of the Askin Government’s mandate to redevelop a rundown slum, while undertaking a very limited heritage conservation program. The SHFA Vision Statement for the same area, as stated in the Revised Heritage Policy of 2009, is based on an entirely different precept: The Rocks will continue to be recognised as an authentic heritage precinct which is symbolic of our history and the values we place on heritage conservation … The total heritage resource … will be cherished and managed for the benefit of current and future generations.

The revised policy is realistic in its acknowledgment that change must be accommodated if The Rocks is to continue ‘as a real place rather than as an artificial tourist destination … it is insufficient to expect that recognition of heritage values alone will conserve the place.’ It follows that management of the area must involve adaptation – ‘provided that the uses and physical changes which result are compatible with the heritage significance of individual places and their settings.’ Given the irrefutable evidence of such a profound shift between the philosophical positions in 1971 and today, it could reasonably be concluded that the efforts of Mundey, the BLF and the heritage lobby of the 1970s have been well and truly vindicated.

Following pages: The Rocks, looking north from above the Cahill Expressway, 2014. Courtesy Simon Colman with the kind assistance of The Shangri-La Hotel, Sydney

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Wo o l l o o m o o l o o On the other side of town, in the old working-class area of the ’Loo, the residents had been waging an almost simultaneous battle against the advocates of progress and their leader, Premier Askin. But in the ’Loo the stakes were markedly different. Under the Cumberland County Planning Scheme, Woolloomooloo had been zoned as part of the county centre and was scheduled for comprehensive redevelopment and slum clearance.32 At the behest of the state government, the then State Planning Authority had prepared an outrageously ambitious redevelopment plan, which would have brought to this old and well-established residential area an intensity of development comparable to that being pursued in the central business district just over the ridge to the west. As might have been expected, the scheme was warmly welcomed by local property development interests. In 1971 a revised version of the earlier plan, equally if not more grandiose, attracted government support. But it also triggered the formation of the Woolloomooloo Resident Action Group (WRAG) in 1972. Colin James, Sydney architect and community advocate, briefly but accurately summed up the saga: Thus began one of the longest and most bitter resident action campaigns against redevelopment seen in Sydney. Together with the fight for The Rocks, inner city residents, conservationists and supporting unions became locked into two memorable green ban battles against the developers and the then State Government.33

At the time of its formation the WRAG faced a trio of powerful opponents. A conservative federal government in Canberra had plans for a commonwealth office precinct in the ’Loo. A private developer, Regional Landholdings, had achieved state govern-

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Location of major conservation battles and green bans in The Rocks, Millers Point and Woolloomooloo.

Harbour Bridge

Millers Point

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Opera House The Rocks

o

Baran garo

Courtesy Cox Richardson Architects Sydney

Port Jackson

Royal Botanic Gardens

SYDNEY CITY CENTRE

The Domain

Darling Harbour

Hyde

Woolloomooloo

Park 0

500 m

ment support for a four-and-a-half-hectare, multimillion-dollar commercial redevelopment. The state roads authority was keen to proceed with a freeway link. The WRAG’s objective was to stall these massive proposals to ensure that the area remained largely residential in character. Fortuitously, the WRAG’s chances of success were greatly enhanced when Labor won the 1972 federal elections on a reformist platform that included measures designed to thwart or stall major inner-city redevelopment proposals nationwide.The new federal government’s intentions were explicit in the Commonwealth Budget Paper No. 8; they included commitments: • to preserve accommodation in the inner suburbs for lowincome households; • to preserve the historic landscape qualities of the older inner suburbs; and • to foster community participation in the planning, development and management of neighbourhoods.34

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The paper referred specifically to the new Woolloomooloo project as being ‘in the negotiating stage … it is hoped that … the project will focus on the renovation of, and addition to, the low income housing stock and will provide for adequate community amenities and public open space’. Active resident participation was to be encouraged. Colin James was appointed by Minister Uren to work directly with the community, and to act as an interface between that community and the other stakeholders. With the commonwealth on its side, the WRAG next turned to the BLF for help. In February 1973 the union imposed a green ban, with Jack Mundey and his colleagues announcing that at the request of the local people, the BLF would withhold labour from any demolition or construction sites within the core ’Loo area. ‘These people have called for the preservation of the area as residential,’ said Mundey.35 On a later occasion he explained that ‘we are not setting ourselves up as the town planning authority. We are merely supporting progressive architects and planners.’ The residents of the ’Loo, like their counterparts across town in The Rocks, had enlisted the help of design professionals who were sympathetic to their cause in the preparation of a ‘people’s plan’. But unlike the situation in The Rocks, the Woolloomooloo community had the support of the powerful, sympathetic and cashed-up federal Department of Urban and Regional Development to help them achieve their aim. The 1973 green ban in the ’Loo held until early 1975. Its imposition was a major factor in the withdrawal of Regional Landholdings from the scene.36 During the period of the ban, a series of diplomatic moves involving the BLF, the WRAG and officialdom led to the historic, first-ever tripartite agreement between the state government, which owned the houses; the Council of the City of Sydney, which owned the roads and services; and the federal

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government, which was prepared to provide the funding. This led Mundey and his executive, with the approval of the WRAG, to lift the ban, thereby paving the way for the signing of the 1975 Woolloomooloo agreement by Prime Minister Whitlam, Premier Tom Lewis, and Lord Mayor Nicholas Shehadie. The Financial Agreement between the Commonwealth of Australia and the State of NSW and Arrangements, June 1975, included a requirement that stands as a landmark in the evolution of the participatory process in urban affairs in post-Second World War Australia. It called upon all parties ‘to take account of the bona fide interests of long-standing residents in all stages of the project’.37 The project in question was a fresh plan for the ’Loo – a fresh approach to land-use planning – involving a serious commitment to maintaining a substantial public housing presence, a determination on the part of the NSW Housing Commission to work with the locals, and the creation of a joint planning committee linking the key players. Mundey’s name remains alive in the ’Loo, 40 years after the signing of the inter-governmental agreement. Until recent years, a Mundey portrait by Sydney artist Andrew Sibley was hanging on the wall of the men’s toilet at the friendly old East Sydney Hotel in Cathedral Street, a curiously-placed counterpart to the heroic, larger-than-life and historically significant murals of Mundey and other green ban leaders that can be seen beneath the railway viaduct in the heart of the old ’Loo today. The Burgmanns aptly summarised the dénouement of the Woolloomooloo story: Instead of becoming a district of empty canyons of redundant office space, the green ban led ultimately to a development with a genuine socio-economic mix of residents living in medium-density buildings with many trees and landscaped surroundings … the Woolloomooloo project was

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awarded six separate architectural awards in 1980. [According to Ed Campion] the green ban had been the single most important feature of resident action history.38

The Pitt Street Cong regational Church Within months of the turmoil and action in The Rocks, and in the absence of any form of official concern or legislative restraints on demolition, the BLF had effectively become the sole source of protection for historic buildings listed by the National Trust. Local government councils had no power to prevent the wilful demolition or destruction of historic buildings, and there was no heritage legislation at state or federal levels. It was under these circumstances that the Trust was driven to quietly endorse BLF action, despite its in-principle reluctance to be seen as supporting the use of communist-led green bans for trust purposes. John Morris, then acting director of the Trust, was honest enough to admit in a letter to the Sydney Morning Herald in July 1973 that ‘the absence of existing legislation has created a vacuum into which Mr Mundey has stepped.’39 The union’s blanket ban on Trust-listed buildings included a specific ban on the late-Georgian Congregational Church at 263 Pitt Street, located in the city centre, not far from the Town Hall and the city’s primary retail precinct. It was constructed between 1841 and 1857 to the design of architect John Bibb, a protégé of the better-known John Verge, whose reputation had already been firmly established by his many fine achievements during the 1830s.40 Morton Herman describes the church’s interior as being ‘unusual for Australia, with two galleries that run around three sides of the “nave” making the building virtually three storeys

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Pitt Street Congregational Church later renamed the Pitt St Uniting Church. Courtesy Simon Colman

high … it is one of the first examples of the new architectural movement which was expressing Australia’s changed status’ in the immediate post-colonial years.41 The Pitt Street Congregational Church, as it was known in 1972 but now called the Pitt Street Uniting Church, was regarded by the Trust as a significant heritage item, and the Trust was therefore strongly supportive of its preservation. This was in the face of

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an ambitious 1972 plan by none other than the church authorities themselves to demolish the church building as part of a comprehensive redevelopment proposal involving a 20-storey office tower, a new church, and other facilities. In the event, the BLF’s green ban effectively killed the project. Sitting quietly on its uptown site and surrounded by a mixed bag of generally undistinguished buildings – some new and some not so new – the church remains today a relatively small but surprisingly interesting period piece in busy Pitt Street. The church authority’s original indifference to its heritage value, led by the pro-development Reverend John Bryant, stands in sharp contrast to its later listing on the Register of the National Estate as a result of the efforts of the BLF and the Trust – divine intervention, perhaps.

The siege of Victor ia Street Some would say that Kings Cross is to Sydney what Soho is to London’s West End or Greenwich Village is to Manhattan or Montmartre or Place Pigalle is to Paris. Close examination would suggest that these propositions involve drawing a very long bow, but in the 1970s there were many romantics who saw the Cross in Parisian terms. One street in particular was dubbed the Montmartre of Sydney by the then National Trust Director Reg Walker. That was Victoria Street, classified by the Trust in May 1973. It was an unusual, unprecedented, untested and adventurous classification. For the first time the Trust had applied its classified grade – meaning it was ‘essential to heritage/must be preserved’ – to an entire street.42 The trust described it as possessing ‘a combination of environmental qualities which make it a boulevard unique to Sydney’.The new classification required that any changes to the

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built fabric and its associated streetscape must be sympathetic to the other core heritage attributes that, in this case, included a splendid elevated location looking west across the Woolloomooloo basin to the city. The street accommodated an interesting and eclectic mix of architectural styles and periods, and a fine avenue of mature trees. Colonial-era stone stairways, their treads showing the wear and tear of decades, dropped steeply down to the cobbled streets of the older ’Loo below. There was additional heritage interest in the street’s bohemian reputation through its considerable associations with notable Australian writers, artists and sundry intellectual hangers-on. Tranquility was the rule rather than the exception in Victoria Street until 1971, when the drums of war started beating in this normally peaceful Potts Point location on the north-western edge of the Kings Cross entertainment precinct. Frank Theeman was one of many colourful and adventurous property developers active in Sydney at the time. He had good connections with leading politicians and was looking for development opportunities in the Cross. He and his company, Victoria Point, had acquired a portfolio of some 30 houses in Victoria Street. At the time there were no heritage listings of any kind – heritage protection under the law was yet to come. It was a smart business deal, and one that was entirely within the law as it then stood. Theeman’s first scheme was an architecturally audacious ambit claim: demolition of the entire residential strip, to be followed by the erection of three 45-storey apartment towers, an office block, lower terrace units and car parking. Rejection by the State Planning Authority led to a modified tower-and-podium scheme that was submitted early in 1973. On 3 April 1971, eviction notices were served on the 300-odd tenants to make way for immediate demolition in anticipation of

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the approval for high-rise redevelopment from the Sydney City Council, which was duly granted on 16 April. But in response to a request from residents, and before the National Trust had formally declared its position, the BLF placed a green ban on demolition. The National Trust classification followed in May. Theeman was not impressed. In a bid to comply with the new heritage constraints and get the project moving, he and his company reluctantly set about producing alternative schemes. During a two-year interregnum, squatters moved in and occupied some of the recently vacated houses. In his rollicking 2013 ‘biography’ of Kings Cross, Louis Nowra refers to the new arrivals as comprising a ‘motley bunch of students, intellectuals, feminists, communists, anarchists and working class people, a unique and combustible mix’.43 The unplanned yet unsurprising conjunction of a BLF green ban and the arrival of the squatters was sufficient to spark the fuse for the running conflict that followed over the next few months and led to the short but bloody two-day ‘siege’ of Victoria Street in January 1974. The period saw occasional bursts of open street warfare between residents, activists, union members on the one hand, and Theeman’s squad of burly security guards on the other. While it lasted, the siege was nasty business, and for the NSW BLF it got even nastier. The NSW branch of the BLF was deregistered in October 1974, following which Norm Gallagher, the Federal Secretary, lifted the green ban in a haze of suspicion. Theeman moved on to other pastures and eventual commercial oblivion. Oblivion of another kind was to be the mysterious fate of Juanita Nielsen – Kings Cross beauty, local journalist and activist whose family link with the Mark Foy retailing dynasty gave her a certain aristocratic cachet in cosmopolitan Kings Cross. Jack Mundey described her as of ‘striking appearance … [wearing] broad-rimmed

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nineteen-twentyish hats, dark expensive dresses, high-gloss highheeled shoes … a distinctively upper class background.’44 In July 1975 she disappeared in mysterious circumstances. No charges have ever been laid, no body has ever been found, and Sydney journalist Peter Rees claims that her disappearance remains ‘one of Australia’s great unsolved murder mysteries’. Her link with the Mundey story lies squarely in the fact that her local newspaper NOW ran stories opposing Theeman’s redevelopment plans for Victoria Street, supporting Mundey and the green ban campaigns in Woolloomooloo and elsewhere in the city, and ‘her strident and effective opposition to the redevelopment of Victoria Street’. Rees maintains that it was this last interest that led to her sudden disappearance, and presumed murder.45 For the BLF and the Trust the end result of that ‘siege of Victoria Street’ was a pyrrhic victory. The scheme that was eventually built was significantly modified to comply with lower height limits and other planning controls, bringing some heritage benefits. But it was also a scheme that triggered the progressive gentrification of Victoria Street over the next three decades. Never again would it be home to low-income students and artists looking for cheap accommodation at the Cross. For Mundey and the union it was a case of winning the battle but losing the war – a war that would continue for many years to come. But with Mundey bowing out of his union leadership role, new pastures were beckoning.

T h e A u s t r a l i a n C o n s e r va t i o n F o u n d a t i o n and the 1973 Study Conference In his 1981 memoir Jack Mundey refers to his 1973 invitation to join what he described as ‘the rejuvenated Australian Conservation

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Foundation’ (ACF). At that time he was still actively involved in BLF affairs.The bans in The Rocks,Woolloomooloo and elsewhere were holding, and across the nation the union and its leadership had come to be seen as serious players in heritage conservation – not to be taken lightly. Contemporary media coverage of the union’s position on urban conservation and the protection of low-income housing suggested that public opinion had moved on from cynicism, scepticism and occasional outrage to general in-principle support. Many saw the union doing a job in the field of heritage protection that, in an ideal world, would have been one for government. But nationwide, at all levels of government, there were few if any heritage statutes, resources, policies. The responsibility for saving a valued heritage item lay largely with its owner, until the BLF intervened and the bulldozers were held at bay by green bans. These provided breathing space, time for negotiation, for rethinking, for the temporary laying down of arms if not for a complete cessation of hostilities. It was clear at the time that the tactics of the BLF under Mundey, Pringle and Owens had fallen under a national, even an international, spotlight. Mundey’s reputation as a determined leader, an eloquent and occasionally fiery speaker and a committed conservationist in the urban field, was firming. Meanwhile, and despite its green beginnings, the ACF was moving tentatively towards an involvement in urban conservation issues. Its Canberra-based founders came from science, the public service, academia, business and the world of politics. Legally incorporated in 1966, it initially drew a three-year financial grant from the federal government that enabled it to move directly into pioneering campaigns to protect the Great Barrier Reef, the Mallee woodlands, threatened old-growth rainforests, and the environmental assets of central Australia. Later in the 1970s, and especially

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during the Whitlam era, the Foundation became increasingly involved in urban conservation issues, and it was inevitable that some kind of alliance between green and brown activists would be forged. When he joined the ACF, Jack Mundey was the right man for the job. During 1973 the ACF collaborated with voluntary conservation groups from around the nation in organising the First National Conservation Study Conference. It took place in Canberra in November 1973 and was billed as the first event of its kind ever to be held in this country. It attracted 106 delegates, representing NGOs active in nature conservation, heritage, ecology, national parks and related fields. The report of the proceedings noted that ‘this was the first occasion on which a representative group of Australian conservationists was addressed in Canberra by a Federal Minister’.46 That minister was Dr Moss Cass, Minister for the Environment and Conservation in the Whitlam Cabinet. His presence was further evidence of the quiet revolution taking place in Canberra. It affirmed, perhaps for the first time since Federation, that there was a role for the national government in designing and implementing policies for protecting ‘the commons’, the national stock of environmental resources. Minister Cass was doing for the natural environment what his colleague Tom Uren was doing in his challenging role as Minister for Urban and Regional Development – a portfolio that included urban heritage and the cultural environment generally. Jack Mundey was never afraid to point to the many links between these two areas and to the need for a holistic approach to policy and problem solving. As a member of the Council of the ACF he was well placed to pursue this line of thinking to the utmost in his contributions to the many debates of the day.

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C e n t e n n i a l Pa r k – M o o r e Pa r k In March 1972, Sydneysiders were presented with a NSW Cabinet-endorsed proposal for what its proponents saw as a golden opportunity to tell the sporting world that the city had the ideal site for a new national sports centre capable of accommodating the 1988 Olympic Games. While the bidding process for the Games had not yet commenced, ambitious politicians were already dreaming and scheming. A winning bid would obviously require a world-class venue and, according to the dreamers, including sportsman Nick Shehadie, ex-Wallaby great and the then Lord Mayor of Sydney, a site for such a venue already existed, right on the city’s doorstep.47 The site that they had in mind lay conveniently on the southeastern outskirts of the city centre, close to the airport and in an area dominated by historic parklands and an array of existing sporting facilities. Within this leafy area they saw space for a new stadium, sports centre and swimming pool complex – all of which would be designed to satisfy the most demanding Olympic standards, and bring some spectacular architectural statements to a pleasant but unexciting landscape. As with all such visionary projects, however, there would be a few obstacles to be overcome. Part of Sydney’s largest public open space, the much-loved Centennial Park, would have to be annexed to accommodate the new Olympic Pool. It must be understood that Centennial Park is not your ordinary municipal park – far from it. Patrick White compared it to London’s Hyde Park and New York’s Central Park. From the 1830s to the 1880s its natural ponds and swamps were an important source of the city’s water supply. In 1888, some 220 hectares of this land were dedicated for posterity to the people of New South Wales to mark the first 100 years of colonial government. So for Sydneysiders, the park was

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(and remains) an important place. The adjoining Moore Park, part of the Centennial Parklands open space cluster, was also threatened, given its apparent suitability for the new 80,000-seat stadium. The dreamers behind this audacious scheme were not going to be deterred by these realities: their vision had substance, and progress comes at a cost. The proponents made their case. One cannot expect to build a world-class Olympic sports venue without incurring some minor sacrifices along the way. The community was reminded that on the plus side there will be jobs, money and massive commercial benefits flowing to the city and state. This once-in-a-lifetime opportunity must be grabbed and implemented, and Sydney will never look back. Never mind the odd screams from a few disgruntled locals. The opinions of the well-heeled gentry in the nearby suburbs of Paddington and Centennial Park should not be allowed to frustrate the achievement of this alluring dream for Sydney, the Olympic City! Such might have been the arguments being pushed by the dreamers in the big end of town. But things did not turn out as they expected. Across the city, a powerful wave of opposition arose, its momentum growing by the day. Riding the wave was a group of local residents, leading sports figures, blue-blood representatives of the nearby Sydney Cricket Ground and Royal Agricultural Society Showground, and members of the general public. A rapidly growing consensus of opinion across the board was that this hastily conceived proposal was a classic example of bad planning in every sense of the phrase. Opponents attacked the government on two grounds.48 First, the chosen location on the eastern edge of a rapidly growing metropolitan region was crazy, indefensible, unsuitable. A prestigious metropolitan facility of such scale and importance should be located close to the demographic and geographic heart of the region – not on the eastern edge. Second, by what miraculous process did

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this scheme come to achieve Cabinet support without even a token effort at consulting those who stood to be most affected? As for the local residents, they saw their amenity being destroyed as armies of spectators swarmed into the area on big game days and nights, adding to the already intractable traffic problems in this part of the city. For one particular group of residents, their splendid heritage homes were in the direct line of fire with compulsory acquisition and demolition of their properties on the agenda. Resident opposition was led by Dr Neil Runcie, a professor at the nearby University of New South Wales. His illustrious neighbour Patrick White gave strong and passionate support. Public meetings were organised, addressed by leading figures from across the city. Among them was Jack Mundey. In June 1972, in response to resident demands, the BLF placed a green ban on key components of the project. Later that month, in the face of trenchant and well-articulated opposition, the responsible minister backed down, announcing a public inquiry. The inquiry was duly held and, among other things, it recommended that the Centennial Park–Moore Park site be abandoned for the purposes of an Olympic Games complex. QED.49

The Queen Victor ia Building In 1891 the Sydney City Council acquired a prime piece of real estate in the heart of town. An entire city block immediately north of the Town Hall had become available and its purchase enabled the council to commission George McRae, the City Architect, to design a new building and organise its construction. Over the next five years, this hugely elaborate and architecturally eclectic building was completed. Its main tenants were the city markets, whose stalls

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were located on twin level shopping galleries under a huge glazed vaulted roof.When the markets were relocated in 1910, decline set in. Insensitive alterations and sporadic changes of use did nothing to prevent the dereliction that later triggered the push for redevelopment. Today it stands as a much-loved and enormously popular landmark, meeting and eating place, retail el Dorado, and architectural extravaganza in one of the busiest parts of the city. Few would deny that the grand old QVB has joined the Opera House and the Harbour Bridge as one of three internationally recognisable symbols of modern Sydney. But it was not always so. This extraordinary structure was facing the prospect of demolition in 1959, when Lord Mayor Harry Jensen bravely suggested that it had outlived its usefulness and that it might best be replaced by a civic square and underground car park. That threat set off a chain of events that ultimately saw the QVB achieve fame as an exemplary urban conservation project. Today, it brings joy and wonderment to millions of admirers and its restoration has been a financial success. So what happened to the Lord Mayor’s courageous (or outrageous?) suggestion that it be should be demolished, and the site redeveloped for the purpose of a civic plaza and the underground storage of motor vehicles? Lord Mayor Jensen was not alone in his view that redevelopment was the only responsible option for this ageing building. Decades of neglect and several changes of use had left the council with a white elephant. Over time, this once dignified building had acquired ‘a rather louche reputation … associated with cut-price outlets, dubious clothing shops, and the still pervasive smell of wine emanating from the basement’.50 A boom in property development was about to hit the city. Here was a prime asset on a prime site, awaiting a golden future. In the absence of heritage controls it could be pulled down tomorrow to create opportunities for yet

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more skyscrapers, more investment, more money, more ‘progress’. It was a mayoral dream awaiting fulfilment. All that was needed was political support, and an ambitious well-funded developer to make the dream come true. Mayors, like dreams, tend to come and go. Such was the fate of Alderman Jensen and his dream for the QVB. Over the following decade and into the 1970s, public affection for the old building became widespread. The building boom became a bust and the arrival of Jack Mundey and the green ban era led to a fundamental shift in public attitudes towards heritage. According to John Shaw, ‘concern for Sydney’s architectural heritage and its physical future took on a new and vigorous life’. It began among vocal minorities but soon became part of mainstream politics.51 In Mundey’s words, ‘conservation was becoming respectable’ and politicians of all shades were getting the message. In 1971, a new council announced that the QVB would be restored to its original state. The 1971 City of Sydney Strategic Plan included the QVB in its list of structures ‘of architectural and historic significance’.52 Key players in this change of heart were the National Trust and the NSW Chapter of the Royal Australian Institute of Architects. Leading academics such as Professor Peter Webber, Norman Edwards, and Elias Duek-Cohen joined the vigorous public debate with creative suggestions and comment. In 1980, the campaign was joined by a new group that styled itself as the Friends of the QVB.The crucial missing link was a commercially viable restoration package and a developer who would see it through to completion. That link was provided by the 1980 proposal from Ipoh Gardens Berhad, a Malaysian development company. Their team included Australian architects, engineers and bankers, and in 1984 the City Council accepted their proposal. A 99-year lease was signed and

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restoration works commenced shortly after. With NSW Heritage Council approval, the last hurdle had been crossed and, in 1986, the brilliantly restored grande dame of George Street opened for business. It stands today as a permanent reminder that without strong public support and an officialdom ready to listen, the future of great buildings will always be at risk.53

Q u e e n s S q u a r e, S y d n e y, a v i c t o r y of a different kind Queen Victoria is commemorated in another civic space, three blocks to the east of the QVB. King Street – an east-west crossing of Sydney’s central retail district – comes to an abrupt end for vehicles at its eastern end where it joins Phillip Street. For pedestrians, there is an enjoyable, visually pleasing passage through to Macquarie Street. From the square that was created at the time of the street’s closure following official studies in 1962, one can contemplate from a single viewpoint a unique cluster of fine buildings dating back to the early days of the colony, and especially to the Governor Macquarie era. St James Church sits on the same east-west axis as the Hyde Park Barracks, and next to the Barracks sits the Mint. All these colonial architectural gems constitute the southern terminal to Macquarie Street. With the possible exception of Hobart, no other Australian capital can offer such a treat. The story behind the creation of the new Queen’s Square is a small but important chapter in the history of urban conservation in Sydney. It preceded the green ban period and therefore did not involve Jack Mundey or his union, and it seems to have raised barely a ripple among the wider Sydney population of the day. But it did involve John Overall,54 who was by then comfortably

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settled into his powerful position as Chief Commissioner of the NCDC in Canberra, enjoying the status and frequent opportunities for involvement in planning and advisory work outside the national capital that came with the job.55 Among the small heritage community in Sydney the project had stimulated some serious debate about the merits or otherwise of saving the old, dilapidated and functionally obsolete sandstone structure that housed the Supreme Court of New South Wales and sat beside Francis Greenway’s elegant St James Church (1817). Overall had been appointed Chair of the Commonwealth State Law Courts Building Joint Planning Committee, his role being to advise on the establishment of new courts in this area. In this capacity he retained the services of Gordon Stephenson, eminent Liverpool-trained architect and planner and then professor of architecture at the University of Western Australia. Stephenson was one of a coterie of influential Liverpool University alumni who found themselves in demand in Australia during the 1960s and into the 1970s as consultants to (mainly) conservative governments of the day.56 Overall’s name was associated with many of these appointments.57 In the case of Queens Square, Stephenson’s brief required him to provide the joint committee with advice ‘on certain principles of planning and design, together with an outline of the government’s special accommodation requirements’ for new courts of law to be built in this precinct.58 His study area included not only the actual site chosen for the proposed new courts building, but also covered the nearby cluster of Greenway-designed buildings: St James Church, the Hyde Park Barracks, and the southern-most wing of the old Rum Hospital in Macquarie Street (commonly known today as The Mint). In the whole of Australia there was no other urban space enjoying such a rich array of associations

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with early colonial days, revealed so unambiguously in bricks and mortar.59 As evidenced in his memoir of 1992, Stephenson readily accepted that the site plan on which he was working ‘was at a focal point in the city, where the beginning of (modern) Australian history is admirably marked by three outstanding buildings, namely St James Church, the Hyde Park Barracks, and The Mint.’ At stake was the old Supreme Court building ‘which blocks the view of the church from Elizabeth Street’. Stephenson recommended the removal of the old court, and his recommendation was initially supported by Sydney architect and historian Morton Herman, and UNSW Professor Max Freeland, both of who had been appointed as expert advisors to the project. The support from these experts proved to be short-lived. Notwithstanding their undoubted public and professional reputations, Stephenson was about to experience at first-hand the fact that in the early 1960s in Sydney, the heritage pendulum was already starting to swing towards greater protection and care of great buildings from the past. Simultaneously, at the beginning of the property boom, Sydneysiders were beginning to see more and more old buildings bulldozed into piles of dusty rubble and debris. Stephenson and his experts got the message and soon found cause to change their minds about demolishing the old courthouse with its John Verge colonnade. They recommended accordingly to their client, and the recommendation was accepted. Today the old sandstone building, polished and meticulously restored, stands comfortably alongside the church as a vital element in this extraordinarily rich historic precinct. If Stephenson’s original proposal for demolition had happened ten years later it would almost certainly have triggered a green ban, but at the time there was no community outrage to speak of, no BLF heritage activists and no Mundey to ride to the rescue.The old court building was saved as the direct

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result of a remarkable and carefully considered change of heart by a pair of experts who were prepared to go back on earlier advice; surely a rare event. The Queen’s Square story may not have had this happy ending if the commonwealth had not been involved, and if John Overall had not been its impresario. If it had been exclusively a state government project, with the then NSW Government’s clear lack of enthusiasm for heritage, it would have been highly unlikely that a person of Stephenson’s reputation would have been appointed. The most likely outcome in such a circumstance would have been a short, sharp bulldozer job – at midnight, with no questions asked. Fortunately for posterity, things were otherwise.

T h e w i n d s o f r e f o r m s t a r t t o b l ow The saving of the old Supreme Court building in 1962 had nothing to do with contemporary official thinking at the state level about urban planning deficiencies, or the possible need for heritage protection. The state had to wait another 17 years for real reform in these areas. In this respect, and in hindsight, it can be seen that the sloppy and irresponsible planning process that was in place at the time of the Queens Square project and the Centennial Park Olympic stadium fiasco provided many lessons for future administrations – especially when it came to the promotion of big prestige projects in pursuit of progress, economic development and political glory. The lessons from the BLF bans at Kelly’s Bush, The Rocks, Woolloomooloo, Centennial Park, the Theatre Royal and other places are now part of the nation’s folklore. By 1975 at the federal level, the Department of Urban Development was dead; but the consequences of those bans and the concurrent campaigns

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stand as highlights of an historic period in trade union history. But perhaps more importantly, they triggered the acceleration throughout Australia of moves that were already underway, if tentatively, to introduce heritage legislation and reformist planning statutes.60 State by state, old laws were replaced. New bureaucracies were created to implement new political agendas.61 Local governments were mandated to adopt more rigorous town planning and development assessment practices. The dry, legal language of the now-obligatory statutory plans was complemented by the visions and imaginative content of strategic plans and development control plans. Planning education became more professionally driven as new university-level courses in heritage conservation and urban design were introduced. Environmental law became yet another field for specialist legal practice as environmental law societies came into being in each state. The concepts of ‘environmental impact assessment’ and ‘heritage impact assessment’ slowly became accepted as necessary elements in project design and in the development approval process. A new specialist consultancy sector was born, its role being to assist developers and client agencies to cope with the often vaguely defined standards of the various approval bodies of the day. How this nationwide spate of legislative reforms emerged and was prosecuted is a story in itself but interest here lies less in the comings and goings of our legislators and more in the intriguing connections which developed between Jack Mundey, Patrick White and others before, during and after the Olympic site debacle.

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Chapter 6

Strange bedfellows The commo unionist and his illustrious mates

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T

he cardinal events of the green ban era were unexpected, and their astonishing consequences were unplanned, unpremeditated. The story is one of accidental meetings, of decisions made on the run, of spontaneously organised arrangements that were cobbled together in the heat of battle, so to speak.There was no grand game plan, no clearly defined objectives. And Jack Mundey’s leadership was not of the military kind; far from it! As the various campaigns rolled out, their successful execution demanded snap decisions and the deployment of resources whose very existence and efficacy were uncertain at the time. It would be fair to say that throughout this entire period, Mundey was flying blind – never knowing from one month to the next what lay over the horizon, or who he might be dealing with over the negotiating table. In this unpredictable climate it is not surprising that he frequently found himself in the company of other strong individuals whose place at the table occasionally offered the prospect of their developing something more than a cold, business-only relationship. This chapter looks at the fascinating pattern of events that brought Mundey, the communist trade union leader, into fruitful and friendly contact with three other towering and hugely influential personalities of the day – contacts whose outcomes can now be seen as crucially important elements in the overall green ban mosaic.

A l i t e r a r y l i o n a n d t h e Tr a d e s H a l l m a n Author Patrick White was born in 1912 in London into a wealthy Australian pastoralist dynasty, whose estate included the grand country seat of Belltrees in the rich Upper Hunter River pastoral region of New South Wales. He had one sibling, his younger sister

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Suzanne. His parents ensured that, to their standards, he would have a good start to life by enrolling him at a select English boarding school for his secondary education.This was followed by a stint at Cambridge University and the stellar lifelong career as a novelist and playwright that earned him international fame, fortune and the 1973 Nobel Prize for Literature. Although his writing efforts were prodigious and financially fruitful, the family fortune ensured that he never had to rely entirely on his earnings as a writer. It would be fair to say that Patrick White was never short of a dollar. Jack Mundey’s early life, as previously discussed, started in 1929 in the small rural township of Malanda, in the Atherton Tableland of North Queensland. This was no squatter country – far from it. His father was from Irish stock and ran the family dairy farm. His mother, an accomplished pianist and music teacher, died during his childhood, leaving his eldest sister to become the mother figure to Jack, his two other sisters and his young brother. Jack’s style as he grew up was that of a knockabout country lad, helping around the farm, riding horses, swimming in the creek, playing bush cricket, skylarking with his mates. The Mundey family faced the rigours and hardships of farm life during the Great Depression of the early 1930s, and unlike the Whites they would certainly have known what it was like to be short of a quid. Jack’s education was always a priority for his Labor-voting father and, like Patrick White, he spent time at a boarding school after stints at various primary schools on the Atherton Tableland. If White’s family was in the millionaire class, Jack’s was respectable working class, careful with money, far from ostentatious in its tastes. At the end of his secondary school days, he served three years of a plumbing apprenticeship. Without the benefits of family wealth or a tertiary education, Jack then headed to Sydney to play Rugby League. He later joined a left-wing trade union and became a member of the Communist

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Party of Australia in 1955, while White was working on his fourth novel, The Tree of Man. It would be hard to imagine two characters so diametrically opposed in background, wealth, education and social standing. White, often aloof, cynical, private, acerbic, passionate anti-nuclear rebel and committed republican, was born with a silver spoon into the Australian squattocracy, was often quietly generous, unimpressed by fame or celebrity status, enigmatic, an avid art collector and a sometimes reluctant public speaker. Mundey was working class to the core, a committed socialist, formidable orator and crowd-pleaser, a successful yet diplomatic strategist when it came to leading his trade union troops into battle, highly sociable in both male and female company, and a person who did not flinch from joining the debate with the high and mighty across the negotiating table. These two individuals inhabited different worlds and circled in different orbits until one day in 1972 when the NSW minister for lands presented the sports centre proposal for Sydney’s Centennial Park to the state Cabinet. White was interested – very interested. He lived in a grand street in a grand house that overlooked Centennial Park, and which would face compulsory acquisition and demolition if the Olympic scheme for the parklands went ahead as planned. The campaign to oppose the scheme was already underway, largely orchestrated by Neil Runcie, a neighbour of White’s. Runcie organised two protest meetings, and his list of celebrity speakers included White and Mundey.The latter attended as the representative of the BLF, and the outcome of the protests was the BLF green ban that effectively killed the project. White was not backward in coming forward with his support for Mundey when later he wrote an open letter to the 1981 Congress of the Australian Council of Trade Unions in Sydney. He

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looked back seven years to the period when the NSW branch of the BLF was facing the axe, with threats of deregistration from its own national executive and from the Master Builders’ Association: I consider that the parks were saved principally by the efforts of Mundey and … Runcie … Mundey struck me at once as a remarkably charismatic character when we spoke at a rally in the [Sydney] Town Hall

And again: Why is Mundey anathema to the establishment at either end of the political and social structure? I think it is because he is one of those Australian mavericks with true creative gifts. And real creative gifts are feared, whether by the capitalist establishment … or by the cut-and-dried union establishment … he is an exceptional Australian … he has so much to offer his country if only the plodding majority would see it

And finally: Mundey is a man of vision … Just as [he] realises that if we rape the Australian soil for the minerals in it … we are only helping to destroy by more violent means the planet on which we live … I see Mundey as a positive, not a divisive force, as he proved when he united individuals of all classes in this divided democracy.1

Patrick White’s admiration for Mundey found surprising expression in his play Big Toys, which was first performed in Sydney by the Old Tote Theatre Company. Directed by Jim Sharman, it opened in the Parade Theatre at Kensington on 27 July 1977. It was a night of particular significance for Australian theatre since the piece was the first and only White play ever to open in Sydney.

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As part of a small cast of three, Max Cullen played the central figure of Terry Legge, a Mundey-esque character whose left-wing views and determination to save a polluted world from disaster are uncannily like those of Mundey himself. In his rollicking 2010 memoir, Cullen – ever the thespian – recalls discussing the play with White in the bar of the Green Room of the Sydney Opera House on the final night of another of White’s plays, The Season at Sarsaparilla: White: I’m writing a play for you and Kate [Fitzpatrick] … ‘Big Toys’ Cullen: Oh, yeah. White: You don’t seem very excited about it. Cullen: What’s it about? White: Your character is a trade union leader. I’ve based him loosely on Jack Mundey. Cullen: You like Jack? White: Have you met him? Cullen: Nah. White: He rescued Centennial Park from the ghastly developers. Cullen: You like him then? White: Oh, yes. Cullen: He rescued your views, so you like him. Well, that’ll be a change. White: What do you mean? Cullen: You actually writing about someone you like. From what I’ve read, what little I’ve read of your work, your books, you obviously hate people. White: I write about myself.2

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Cullen recalls looking forward to meeting Mundey at a Centennial Park gathering, but there is some uncertainty as to whether the meeting actually took place. Meeting or not, White seems to have had Mundey clearly in mind in his stage directions for Act 1 of Big Toys. He describes Terry Legge (Mundey’s onstage persona) standing on the terrace of the harbourside penthouse: ‘He is approaching forty, a dark stocky man of the working class, but new style. His clothes are as trendy as – though cheaper – than those Mag Bosanquet – [played by Kate Fitzpatrick] is wearing. His pants fit snug; thigh-length leather coat and turtleneck sweater’.3 Further evidence of White’s high regard for Mundey can be found in David Marr’s authorised biography of the great writer. Shortly after the announcement of his having been awarded the Nobel Prize, White had been chosen Australian of the Year. He reluctantly accepted an invitation to attend and speak at a smart civic luncheon in Melbourne. During his speech he nominated three ‘mavericks’ who – in his opinion – had more right than he to be so honoured: Manning Clark, Barry Humphreys and Jack Mundey. Said White: ‘I want to take this opportunity to salute Jack, the farm boy from Northern Queensland, who became an exceptional Australian … and a man whose sincerity has survived his rise to a position of influence.’ Following a rousing public meeting called by opponents of the Centennial Park Olympics proposal, White described Mundey as ‘the first citizen of our increasingly benighted, shark-infested city of Sydney who succeeded effectively in calling the bluff of those who had begun tearing us to bits.’4 The admiration was mutual. In his own account of the Centennial Park meetings Jack recalled that Patrick: likened Centennial Park to Hyde Park in London and the other major parks in the world’s big cities. From that

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time on he became a wonderful friend of the New South Wales BLF … With Charles Birch and Geoff Mosley of the Australian Conservation Foundation he became a foundation member of the Friends of the Green Ban Movement which was formed to keep alive the green bans thinking [after the demise of the NSW Branch of the BLF].5

Mutual admiration of another kind In his 1981 autobiography, Mundey makes a number of references to live theatre, evidence that he was a regular patron of productions on the Sydney stage.6 His connection with Patrick White during the Centennial Park saga in 1972, therefore, must have been doubly enjoyable. Here was a chance to work with White the writer and dramatist in the frontline of the campaign. During the same year, a similar relationship was developing between Mundey and another leading Sydney identity with a solid reputation as a strong and inspirational leader in construction and property development. Coincidently, the connecting link between the two had a distinctly theatrical flavour. This other person was Dick Dusseldorp, founder and later chair of Lend Lease, an Australian property development company that went on to become a hugely successful international corporation.7 The matter in hand was nothing less than the imminent demolition of Sydney’s only downtown live theatre – the Theatre Royal in Castlereagh Street – by Dusseldorp’s company. Along with the theatre would go the adjoining hotel, a small shopping street, a popular restaurant, and the old Commercial Travellers’ Club. The Theatre Royal at the time was the grand old lady of Sydney’s theatre world. Built in the 1850s at the beginning of the

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gold rush era, its design called up the great playhouses of London’s West End, with steeply tiered balcony seating, velvet-clad boxes, the grand proscenium with its elaborate plasterwork arch, candelabra, cheap seats and standing-room-only places up high in ‘the gods’. Its flamboyant decor and rich theatrical ambience had endeared it to generations of Sydney theatregoers. It sat alongside the ageing but still salubrious Hotel Australia, on the corner of Martin Place and Castlereagh Street, with a rear frontage to Rowe Street. At the time, the Hotel Australia was the city’s premier stopover for visiting blue bloods, second- and third-tier royals, showbiz celebrities, the barons of the business world, well-heeled tourists, and young men and women about town. Along with the Metropole down near the Quay, the squattocracy favoured the Australia for the annual high jinks of the Royal Agricultural Show, when for a couple of weeks at Easter time, moleskins, Akubra hats and elastic-sided boots would replace pin-striped suits, Homburgs and brogues as the dominant male fashion statements in this part of town. For serious drinkers, the preferred watering hole was the legendary Long Bar at the Australia. For the high-society matrons of the eastern suburbs racing set, and for charity balls and debutante extravaganzas, this grand address was the place – the only place – to see and be seen. Immediately adjoining the Royal on the west was the charming little laneway of Rowe Street, a favoured haunt of the eager young and not-so-young bohemians and intellectuals of the day, including the Sydney Push, ‘a bohemian group whose intellectual core was provided by the Sydney libertarians’.8 If your fancy turned to tiny shops managed by eccentric émigrés and selling erudite books on art, philosophy, bisexual bonding, Hindu erotica and modern poetry, this was an essential stopover. Other boutiques handled homemade fashions, smart and oh-so-fashionable

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Scandinavian furniture, and the latest in soft furnishings. Rowe Street was definitely the place to go. An essential part of its appeal was its popular coffee houses: the Lincoln and the Revics. Both were equipped with the very latest espresso machines – then something of a novelty. Havens of peace and seclusion, both offered an irresistible mix of soft lights, charming young waitresses with fascinating European accents, and the latest newspapers and literary journals. The Lincoln had a dimly lit basement – a rare resource among the cafes of the day – that offered an ideal setting for recovering from hangovers or enjoying romantic assignations. Within a block or so were Lorenzini’s friendly little wine bar in Elizabeth Street and the el-cheapo Florentino spaghetti basement in Castlereagh – both of which were patronised by aspiring down-town bohemians, off-duty journos, art students and sundry impoverished members of the left. One did not have to go to Greenwich Village or Soho or the left bank in Paris – it was all here, in the very heart of downtown Sydney. This was what was to go under the wrecker’s hammer. Dusseldorp’s Lend Lease planned to demolish all these urban treasures as part of a long-awaited redevelopment of this large, consolidated site. It was a developer’s dream, with no counterpart anywhere in the city centre. On the north, it had a generous frontage to Martin Place – the city’s major civic space. Flanked by the big banks and insurance houses, and the grand General Post Office, Martin Place also accommodated the Cenotaph in the section between George and Pitt streets, the setting for military parades and special ceremonial observances such as Anzac Day and Remembrance Day. On the east, the site had a frontage to Castlereagh Street with its smart shops, fashion houses, legal chambers. On the south it fronted King Street, effectively the northern boundary of the city’s principal retail precinct. For Lend Lease the site was as good as it comes.

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In April 1972, with the gradual acquisition and amalgamation of the 22 constituent sites now complete, the company announced that the contents of the old theatre were to be auctioned.9 Demolition would commence in May, after which would come the massive construction of the MLC Centre to the design of leading Sydney architect Harry Seidler.The auction announcement ignited a storm of protest. In his book, Mundey refers to the after-show backstage party at the Royal when the curtain came down for the last time and when patrons, players, Actors’ Equity unionists and friends spontaneously organised the Save Sydney’s Theatre Royal Committee (SSTRC). The committee decided the matter was important enough for an urgent public meeting to which the BLF was invited. The meeting was convened on 1 May under the chairmanship of Justice Martin Hardie, a conservation supporter soon to retire from the bench of the NSW Land and Valuation Court. It took place in the AMP building at Circular Quay. Speakers included theatre director John Tasker, actor Darlene Johnson, and BLF leader Mundey. At the request of the meeting, Mundey agreed to recommend the imposition of a green ban to his BLF executive. Then, at the end of this boisterous and determined gathering of theatre buffs, the chair was faced with a last-minute request from the floor, a late arrival who wanted permission to address the meeting. This request was from Dick Dusseldorp. He had just disembarked from an overseas flight but, despite travel fatigue, had decided to attend, having heard that things were reaching boiling point down at Circular Quay. His announcement to the sceptical and antagonistic audience was a diplomatic ace: the old theatre had to go on grounds of hygiene and functionality but, in its place, he was willing to consider a ‘fresh, modern, beautiful theatre in the new complex’.10 To that end he would instruct his architect Harry Seidler to work with two other designers, nominated by the SSTRC, ‘to assess the

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possibilities [for inserting a theatre into the plans] and come to a conclusion’.11 He warned that lengthy delay was unacceptable, but in his closing he played another ace card: ‘Let’s say that we give the architects two weeks, and ask them to present whatever they have come up with after that to a public meeting.’ Not surprisingly, this final offer was warmly received and the crowd dispersed.12 Seidler’s studio was immediately briefed. Mundey recalls the meeting between the SSTRC, the BLF and a truculent Seidler, whose initial response was that redesign of the complex to accommodate a modern theatre was an outrageous suggestion, impossible, out of the question.13 However, Dusseldorp’s instructions carried the day and on Monday, 15 May, the second meeting took place in Sydney’s Lower Town Hall. Press reports describe a noisy, fiery, often turbulent gathering with a full house. Mundey confirmed to a supportive crowd that the green ban would hold pending another public meeting. Facing a largely hostile audience, Dusseldorp then reported that his architect had managed to devise a fresh scheme incorporating a new Theatre Royal within the MLC complex, and that they were confident that both sides would be satisfied with the amended plans. Architect Ross Thorne, a senior Sydney University lecturer and theatre historian, advised the committee that in his expert opinion the Seidler-designed compromise was acceptable. Dusseldorp then played his last ace, tabling a written commitment that Lend Lease would stand by the amended plan and ensure that a new theatre was created in accordance with the committee’s wishes. Then came the biggest surprise of all: Mundey and Dusseldorp took centre stage and amicably moved a motion to have the green ban lifted. The motion was duly passed and the meeting came to a largely peaceful close. Demolition began three weeks later. On 23 January 1976 the curtain rose for the first production in the new Theatre Royal, signalling the end of another successful

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development by Lend Lease as well as a landmark for the green ban movement and for the city’s theatre world.14 Jack Mundey recalled the salient aspects of the event: It was an important victory because the committee was able to get its objective – a continuing theatre. It also showed that the BLF was not against new construction in principle, as long as the development followed social objectives. We demonstrated that there were two kinds of bans – negotiable and non-negotiable. Kelly’s Bush, for example, was non-negotiable. It was green space that had to be preserved. The Theatre Royal was to be preserved as a theatre – not as an existing structure – in accordance with the wishes of its supporters. We were not just … against developers. The upshot was that Dusseldorp kept his promises and a new Theatre Royal functions to this very day.15

The story was that of ‘a principled compromise’ in which all parties – developer, MLC, Dusseldorp, the committee, the general public, the BLF and even Harry Seidler – were happy with the outcome. The Theatre Royal negotiations brought Mundey and Dusseldorp together for the first time. The evidence suggests that a spirit of mutual respect, if not of admiration, prevailed from the outset of their relationship, and this spirit survived over the following decades. For Mundey, his short statement on the cover of Lindie Clark’s biography of ‘Duss’, Finding a Common Interest, is sufficient evidence of his respect and esteem for the visionary Dutchman: Dick Dusseldorp was an exceptional property developer and builder. He was not only concerned with the shareholders, but was equally concerned with his workers’ rights and their entitlements. Dick Dusseldorp gave dignity to his

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Jack Mundey and Dick Dusseldorp, 1972. Courtesy Dusseldorp Forum, Sydney

workers; he gave them continuous work in what is often an uncertain and turbulent industry. This is a tribute to a very talented man.

Dusseldorp’s take on values and attitudes that were cognate with those of Mundey can be found hidden, thinly disguised, in a number of places in Clark’s book: … socially responsible businesses recognise that they have obligations to the local community, wider society, and natural environment in which they operate. Dusseldorp translated his ‘community of interest ‘ philosophy into every aspect of his business practice. Dusseldorp was himself willing to defend the union’s use of green bans: ‘People are not being given adequate chance to discuss developments with local government and property developers … Jack Mundey, by his actions [he said approvingly] has given people time to mount their protests and opposition to projects.’ Dusseldorp … looked for a way of resolving [conflict] that was sustainable in the long term … a way of dealing with it

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that provided for managing an ongoing relationship with the BLF and the broader Sydney community. [Dusseldorp] would seek solutions … that enabled people with different, sometimes conflicting needs, to strive together towards a common goal for their mutual benefit. Pursuit of profits for its own sake is a sterile activity … the company’s activities have to be socially relevant … whilst we are busy making profits for our benefit, this should always benefit others as well … never [be] at their expense. In short, the pursuit of a community of interest.16

As Clark’s title suggests, these two building industry leaders shared a community of interest. Today, the second Theatre Royal stands as a permanent reminder of a rare moment during the green ban era when two minds coming from different ends of the spectrum found common ground. In the turbulent industrial environment of the time, harmony replaced discord and enmity. Both leaders accepted the futility of confrontation, and both were humble enough to put aside personal ambition for the common good. In Dusseldorp’s case it was noteworthy that his diplomatic approach to working with the BLF and the Building Workers Industrial Union sat in stark contrast to the confrontationist position of the Master Builders’ Association when it came to dealing with unions and working conditions on the job. Here was someone you could talk to. Here was a man who genuinely believed in industrial democracy and who was prepared to give it a go on the ground, at the coalface. The record is clear: Dusseldorp’s construction company was a leader in taking initiatives designed to balance the needs of corporate productivity with the pressing needs to improve the occasionally barbaric working conditions on big construction jobs. For the unions and for Mundey, this was good news indeed.

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T h e Ja c k a n d H a r r y s h ow The Theatre Royal incident also brought some good news of another kind, in that it established a level of rapport and mutual respect between Mundey and architect Harry Seidler. As with Mundey’s relationships with Patrick White and Dick Dusseldorp, there were stark differences between Jack and Harry, between the rough and the smooth. Their necktie preferences illustrate the point. Harry’s penchant for fine silk bow ties was always evident while, for Jack, the only occasions that demanded a tie were funerals, weddings and vice-regal gatherings. Later in life it is doubtful if he owned more than a single tie of the ordinary kind. Notwithstanding sartorial differences, the two would find common ground. The successful last-minute insertion of a theatre into the plans for the MLC Centre generated Mundey’s admiration for Seidler. As for Seidler, the record shows that despite his initial reluctance to undertake the redesign, he was proud of the achievement – one that would not have come his way if it had not been for the intervention of the BLF, and Patrick White and the theatre lovers of Sydney one among many other Sydney theatre lovers. Seidler and Mundey shared other mutual interests, not least a concern over what they both saw as primitive town planning laws and the absence of appropriate dispute–resolution measures. Here their perspectives diverged. As a young and ambitious Harvard-educated architect working in a strange new country, Seidler found himself constantly at odds with what he saw as mediaeval local government building standards and planning controls. His brilliance as a designer and his reluctance to compromise cut no ice with the local council operatives with whom he had to deal as he and his supportive clients sought the necessary planning approvals. As he saw it, council personnel, whether

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elected politicians or members of staff, were typically poorly trained, naive when it came to matters of design and aesthetics – basically rank amateurs, unable to accept advanced ideas and innovations. Elected councillors were either prone to corruption, or they were real estate stooges, or they lacked interest in architecture and urban design. They were clearly incapable of making measured decisions on progressive development proposals that involved the unfamiliar architectural language of a young Harvard-trained modernist like Seidler. Seidler had a robust ego, and absolute confidence in his ability to argue the case for good design as he would have defined it.These two traits came to the fore on several occasions when it was left to the judicial tribunals in New South Wales to sort out rancorous design disputes – and Seidler inevitably came out on top. If he had a dream, it was for a planning system that somehow, miraculously, would allow good design (as he saw it) to flourish with minimal interference. And while the claim may lack hard supporting evidence, it can be assumed that the stand Seidler and other leading designers of the day took against outdated municipal design codes was to be vindicated in due course. New laws and regulations were coming, and before long it would be a brave council that would take on a leading architect in a dispute involving opinions on aesthetics or ‘good design’ as against issues of a purely technical nature. As for consultation with neighbours or a community group on the architectural merits of a particular building design, that was another story. Such action would have been absolute anathema for Seidler. Mundey, on the other hand, was constantly advocating better consultation and community involvement, and arguing that if the state had had better planning and heritage laws, there would have been no need for the green bans. Mundey’s utopia was of a different order to that of Seidler’s in his advocacy of a system

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combining local democracy, an open and orderly local planning process, concern for social needs and priorities, protection of heritage, and corruption-free decision making. When it came to heritage, Seidler was generally dismissive, occasionally scathing in his opinion of the movement generally. Protection of heritage items was, for him, a practice that could stifle the creative spirit, although he and his architect wife Penelope later became supporters of the Historic Houses Trust. According to its records, Seidler was never a member of the National Trust. For him, modern design – based on functionalism and the opportunities offered by contemporary building technology – was always going to be preferable to a sentimentally romantic attachment to the past.17 Here was the dedicated modernist, loyally echoing the spirit of the CIAM Athens Charter of 1973. For Mundey, it was a different story. Heritage was a valued cultural asset, to be cherished and protected as a means of revealing to future generations the values of the present and the past. Mundey’s core concern involved a different set of paradigms. As he saw it, contemporary NSW planning laws at that time were embarrassingly and irresponsibly silent on environmental and heritage issues. There was little or no opportunity for local councils to mandate protection for heritage places, relics and buildings. There was no control whatsoever over demolition – heritage buildings could be razed overnight by determined developers, with no opportunity for redress by the affected community and no penalty. Public participation was a game to be played on a very uneven field, with the dice stacked against grass-roots organisations with frugal resources and limited access to the information that might help their cause. And because the planning system was embryonic, it allowed dubious dealings and opportunities for corruption within the building industry. For Mundey, all these factors helped to strengthen the

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case for systemic reform. Inevitably, reform actually arrived with the battery of new statutes that were coming into play in New South Wales and across the nation during the latter 1970s and into the 1980s and 1990s. Mundey wanted a planning system in which the rules were supported at grass-roots level, in which there were clearly established standards and guidelines, and in which there were strong heritage protection provisions. Up to a point, those needs were satisfied when the long-awaited reforms arrived. As far as is known, the MLC-Theatre Royal project was the only scheme from Seidler’s studio to face a green ban. Other Seidler projects – notably Grosvenor Place in downtown Sydney and the Horizon Tower in Darlinghurst – ran foul of heritage advocates but did not have to face the threat of union green bans. In the case of Grosvenor Place in George Street, an expert city council planning report had strongly recommended the retention of heritage buildings on the Grosvenor Street corner. The buildings in question were included in a City Council heritage inventory. Alice Spigelman quotes Seidler in his trenchant criticism of the list: ‘just about every building along George Street is included. They think that everything old is valuable, an absurd and provincial attitude, which has forced a heritage-listed hotel façade to be stuck like a postage stamp to a new tower.’18 In the event, the council’s position prevailed. Seidler was forced to amend the plans, and a compromise scheme incorporating the heritage elements was eventually prepared and approved. Today, the new and the old sit side by side, somewhat uncomfortably yet respectfully – each offering its own strongly defiant architectural statement while contributing great interest, variety and richness to the public domain on this prominent corner site in Grosvenor and George streets. Mundey was not involved in this case, and no green ban was ever placed on that project.

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A c r o s s t h e b r i d g e, i n N o r t h S y d n e y The evidence suggests that this inner-city harbourside local government area never hosted a green ban. However, the democratic ethos that underpinned the green ban movement, and which reflected Mundey’s own position on community consultation, became a key plank in the campaign that saw architect and local councillor Ted Mack embark on what turned out to be a uniquely successful political career. Talking to the people, consulting with community groups, working at grass-roots level were all hallmarks of the Mack era and, as noted below, he would be the first to acknowledge his debt to Mundey. Politically, Ted Mack was not a party man. Fiercely independent and knowing full well that independent politicians tend to live lonely lives on the sidelines of the power game, he nevertheless managed to move from a local council to a seat in the NSW parliament and eventually to the federal parliament in Canberra. He was Mayor of North Sydney from 1980 to 1988; successfully stood for election to the state Legislative Assembly in 1981, holding the seat of North Shore until September 1988; and won the federal seat of North Sydney in 1990, holding it as an independent until retiring before the general election in 1996. This political record stands as a rare hat-trick, almost certainly unequalled in Australian political history. One of Ted Mack’s achievements as mayor was to orchestrate a very popular and sensitive refurbishment of the original council chambers as an integral part of a new civic centre, park and library precinct. This plum site in North Sydney’s CBD had attracted the interest of Sabemo, a leading developer whose vision of a high-rise office complex was dashed by this unco-operative and absolutely incorruptible mayor. Mack had other priorities for the site. Working with his architect Feiko Bouman, he oversaw

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construction of a new library and civic precinct, commencing in 1986 with completion in 1988.The Sabemo project collapsed.This very congenial, low-key precinct was described by Peter Webber to the author as ‘the jewel in North Sydney’s crown’. In 1975, Harry Seidler, whose practice at this stage was well established and was operating out of his nearby studio in North Sydney, designed an extension to the North Sydney Council offices on the southern edge of what would become the new civic precinct. However, Seidler was not involved in the controversy over the future of the council site. As the initiator of a grandiose and highly speculative scheme for another part of the municipality, he had bigger fish to fry. Working with a small but enthusiastic group of young architects, Seidler set out to produce an ‘ideas plan and model’ to illustrate ‘the principle of tiered development, on the water’s edge, medium height on the slopes in staggered groupings, and high rise towers on the crest’.19 This hypothetical, neoCorbusian proposal was for the redevelopment of the harbourside peninsular of McMahons’s Point, which at the time was facing an uncertain, and possibly industrial future. Multi-storeyed buildings would step down to the water’s edge, replacing the jumbled street system and intricate mix of land uses that had grown up in this old suburb.The concept did not proceed but, in the absence of ‘progressive height zoning’, the 24-storey Blues Point Tower Apartments was eventually designed by Seidler on the promontory and constructed between 1959 and 1961. It is ‘highly visible on the Sydney skyline … and has been much maligned as well as praised by the public.’ 20 Today this solitary residential apartment tower on Blue’s Point stands as a reminder of a Seidlerian dream that came to nothing. Jack Mundey was never directly involved in the North Sydney civic centre project and, as far as is known, no green bans were placed on any sites in that area. But there was a link between Ted

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Mack and Mundey that is worthy of comment. In a 1994 interview Mack could not recall any particular ‘political influences’ in his career, but he certainly remembered ‘being very impressed by Jack Mundey’s activities. “I remember a Sydney Morning Herald editorial in about 1970 thundering at the BLF at this notion that the builders’ labourers had a right to take some social interest in what they were doing”.’21 Along with Mundey and the author, Mack was also a speaker at one of the crowded and tumultuous meetings in the old Abraham Mott Hall in Argyle Place during the early days of the campaign for The Rocks. In 1997, Mack was elected an ‘Australian Living Treasure’ by the National Trust, and in 2013 he delivered the 11th Sir Henry Parkes Oration in Tenterfield, when he reminded his audience of the ‘few simple principles’ that had guided his political life, and which clearly resonate with those that Mundey continues to promote to this day. They included the requirements that ‘the workings of government should be open to public scrutiny’ and that ‘elected representatives should enable people to participate in all decisions that affect them’. Mundey found other interests after the demise of the BLF. For a couple of decades following the peak of the green ban era, the conservation community in Australia went through a period of optimism and conviction that things were at last moving in the right direction. The pendulum of community opinion had swung firmly in favour of widespread reform in the fields of urban planning and conservation. No longer would developers have a dream run to the finishing line. No longer would communities be sidelined and excluded from the planning process. No longer would the preservation of heritage be seen as anti-development. No longer would grass-roots opinion be summarily rejected as the work of

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deviant green activists on the lunatic fringes. Without knowing it at the time, Jack Mundey and his union colleagues had contributed in a major way to what was becoming a nationwide revolution against archaic planning legislation, and the administrative and legal processes with which it was associated. Reform was in the air – not only in New South Wales under Labor Premier Neville Wran, but also in Victoria under enlightened politicians such as Dick Hamer and Alan Hunt, and in South Australia under Don Dunstan. The new rules brought new responsibilities for all players in the development game, yet that game is never-ending. Today there is disturbing evidence that the pendulum is swinging back towards a more laissez-faire approach to planning. Heritage legislation (at least in New South Wales) has already been loosened. Assessment processes are being ‘simplified’ and ‘streamlined’ to facilitate the determination of development applications large and small. Mundey looks despairingly at these trends. His concerns go back at least as far as June 2008 when Labor Minister for Planning and former Lord Mayor of Sydney, Frank Sartor, was announcing the government’s intentions for planning reform. At the time, Jack was chairman of the NSW Historic Houses Trust. In an interview with Sydney journalist Jennifer Bennett, he did not mince his words: ‘This government is the worst on heritage and the environment since the Askin government’ of the 1960s to 1970s.22 In 2011, during the Catherine Hill Bay campaign, he offered a similar message in an interview with National Trust executive Angela le Sueur for the Trust’s magazine: no longer do we have the certainty that heritage and environment will be given any kind of priority – or even the evaluation they deserve … if there is a lesson to be learned [from the Askin years] it is that grass roots and

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community-based organisations working together can bring about change. Although change can occur at the ballot box, our democratic right to protect what we care about must be guarded on a daily basis … a lot of damage can be done [between elections] … we must be vigilant and prepared to speak out at all times.23

Mundey’s recollections of the lessons of the Askin era are clearly evident in these references – just two among many. Between his numerous skirmishes with the conservative forces of the 1970s and his trust interview with le Sueur in 2011, he played an influential role in other chronicles of the heritage movement, and in public life.

BLF Green Ban demonstration, Sydney 1973. Courtesy Meredith Burgmann, personal collection

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Chapter 7

After the bans Mundey moves on

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I

n October 1973 the NSW Branch of the Builder Labourers’ Federation (BLF) held elections for a new executive. Jack Mundey was stepping down after his two three-year terms, to be replaced by Joe Owens as secretary. The election was held at a time when open warfare was brewing between the branch and the federal executive of the same union, which was based in Melbourne. The latter, under General Secretary Norm Gallagher, was trenchantly opposed to the green ban program in Sydney, and this position, not surprisingly, was ardently supported by the employers in the Master Builders’ Association (MBA) in New South Wales.1 The story of this rancorous and dirt-ridden conflict has been well told by Meredith and Verity Burgmann and others.2 It involved lengthy legal battles inside and outside the courts, injunctions, deregistration of the NSW branch, acrimonious exchanges in the media, MBAinspired lockouts from big building jobs, mass union meetings, street demonstrations and arrests. It ended with the expulsion of the NSW leaders from union membership, effectively depriving them of access to work since they could no longer hold a union ticket. By the time it was over in 1974, Jack Mundey was out of a job. Having cleared his desk at the Trades Hall, Mundey was ready to return to the industry, but the industry’s bosses were not ready for Mundey. Without a ticket, he was legally unemployable, although he did manage to find some temporary work without a ticket on the new St Vincent’s Hospital project in Darlinghurst, East Sydney. While there may have been some sympathy for the largely unemployed Mundey within some sectors of the union movement and the wider community, there would have been no tears shed by leaders in government, the board rooms of the big builders and property development companies, or within the media commentariat of the day. A few grabs from the Sydney press through the 1972–74 period reveals the sentiment:

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Mr Mundey, a leading member of the Communist Party, seems to be out to make a name for himself and his party in an extreme and adventurous manner. His union followers should consider where he is leading them before it is too late. (Sydney Morning Herald, 29 May 1970) Mundey’s latest example of irresponsibility … responsible NSW people have had a gut-full of this self-avowed Communist. (NSW Premier Robert Askin, 1972)3 There is something highly comical in the spectacle of builders’ labourers, whose ideas on industrial relations do not rise above strikes, violence, intimidation and the destruction of property, setting themselves up as arbiters of taste and protectors of our national heritage.4 (Sydney Morning Herald, editorial, mid 1972) With textbook Communist tactics, the BLF has wooed the left-wing intellectuals and journalists to extract the maximum of publicity for both environmental issues and its more clearly recognisable Communist line for its industrial goals. It is time to stop this lawlessness. (The Builder, editorial, November 1973) The Federation’s NSW Branch has sought to disguise its communist aims and strategy under a cloak of environmental concern. Its green bans have been supported by conservationists whose blind refusal to accept the reality of communist domination of the branch has lent a wholly undeserved air of respectability to a politically motivated attempt to sabotage Sydney’s construction industry and produce a ‘confrontation’ with employers. (Sydney Morning Herald, 9 November 1973)

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It must now be clear to all thinking people that ‘green bans’ are a communist tool to bring into difficulties developers who have to pay hundreds of millions of dollars yearly in interest on frozen properties.5 (Frank Theeman, developer, Victoria Street, Kings Cross, 1973) I accuse Messrs Mundey, Pringle, Owens of dragging BLF members and other unionists into ruthless acts of lawlessness … Citizens beware!! – you may be next to lose your civil rights!! (Frank Theeman, ‘Anarchy Reigns’, full-page advertisement in Sydney Morning Herald, November 1973)6 This dispute [between the BLF and the MBA] is about anarchy and the destruction of democratic processes. We believe an element of the BLF is engaged in anarchy. This is the Communist way – issues come and go but the eventual goal of Communism is to destroy the existing political system. Green Bans are just a political tool to create anarchy. (Master Builders’ Federation, 1973)7 All these action groups and harum-scarum … I have nothing to do with them. I regard them with a great deal of dismay because I don’t like anarchism [sic]. (Alderman Nicholas Shehadie, Lord Mayor of Sydney, 1974)8 The seductively and inadequately named ‘Green Bans’ were imposed haphazardly for ‘socio-political’ objectives and had the secondary purpose of establishing the reputation of the union as a power to be feared in the building industry and beyond … the union had indulged in actions which offend basic notions of fairness as between one citizen and another and the respect which anybody ought to have for observance of the elementary principles of civilised life that

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citizens should not be subjected to violence and the threat of violence to their property. (The Builder, editorial, July 1974)

It was not until 1975 that shifts began appearing in media opinion. Mundey the anarchist, the dangerous banner-waving commo rat, one of the ‘power-mad conspirators’ and ‘thugs’ who had made life difficult for Owen Magee and the Sydney Cove Redevelopment Authority in the early 1970s, was now being hosted by the likes of UN HABITAT in Vancouver and the environmental research community in Britain. Mundey did not relinquish his links with the union during this troubled period. His memoirs make it clear that he was directly and personally involved in the internecine skirmishes and clashes with the federal leadership, and externally with the Master Builders’ Federation. He took a lead in the negotiations with lawyers, and in securing support from other unions and unionists in the battle over deregistration. Green bans remained on the agenda. But, after his sacking, his interest in matters outside union politics became more focused. As an accomplished public speaker he was increasingly called upon by NGOs looking for a proven visionary who could enliven their meetings and add some lustre to their public image. He also had time to speculate on his own future and his own beliefs, nourished as they were by his appetite for reading the works of other thinkers, philosophers, writers and battlers for the green and brown environments. His thinking about the very meaning and purpose of work started to sharpen: I began to ask myself about the need for a social re-organisation of work and to question the work ethic … The purpose of work and, arising out of our practical green ban experiences, the right of workers to consider much more deeply the end result – in the case of building workers,

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of the use of the buildings they constructed; in the case of others, the products they make – are crucial issues to which the trade union movement must address itself in future. Not only trade unionists but also others should open a debate on the subject. Together with occupational health, these are the big and sadly neglected questions in the working class movement throughout the world.9

G o o d bye B L F, h e l l o AC F As it happened, Mundey was fortuitously presented with an opportunity to pursue these very themes at a national level when he was invited to join the Melbourne-based Australian Conservation Foundation (ACF) as a councillor for New South Wales. He duly took up that position, and from 1974 to 1993 he represented New South Wales, serving a term as vice-president in 1978–79. The ACF was born during the politically conservative era of Prime Minister Robert Menzies when, in 1964, HRH Prince Philip, then patron of the World Wildlife Fund, wrote from Buckingham Palace with a request that the Australian Government contribute to the fund’s coffers. Menzies, ardent monarchist that he was, acceded with a small grant, and simultaneously invited a group of scientists and business leaders to form an Australian chapter of the WWF. Francis Ratcliffe, then chief of the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation’s (CSIRO’s) wildlife survey section, made good use of the grant by setting up the ACF instead. Malcolm Fraser, a future liberal prime minister, was one of the founders. In due course, the new Foundation was affiliated with the WWF. Ratcliffe became Honorary Secretary, Dr Don McMichael10 was the first director, and Sir Garfield Barwick was its

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first president. As mentioned previously, Prince Philip would move into the president’s shoes for the period 1971–76. The ACF initially saw its role as a catalyst for environmental debate at a time when Australian environmentalists nationwide were beginning to see the need for a peak body to represent their interests in Canberra and to undertake research, education and advocacy work on behalf of the conservation movement. The Foundation was legally incorporated in 1966 under a conservative national government. The founding council members were drawn largely from the senior ranks of the scientific and academic communities, the business world, the public service and politics. Initially the organisation focused on major national natural resources that were facing environmental degradation – the Great Barrier Reef and the threatened Mallee forests of Western Australia and Victoria were typical. From the beginning, ACF resources were slender. Campaign tactics had yet to be designed and sharpened and links with kindred bodies had yet to be forged. Despite these resource limitations the ACF moved rapidly into action, with one of its first successes being the 1969 declaration of the tiny Chappell Island off the wild north coast of Tasmania as a sanctuary for the endangered Cape Barren Goose. Other projects in the late 1960s included promoting a national system of parks and reserves – Norfolk Island, Little Desert, Kakadu, Australian Alps, and the south-west Tasmanian wilderness – followed by pioneering work in countering environmental pollution, and entering into the always vexatious debate on national population policy. The Cape Barren Goose campaign’s success was due to its reliance on science, not emotion. This was a lesson that would be put to the test in later contests around the intangible values to be placed on scenic beauty, for example. Saving a threatened bird habitat on purely scientific grounds was always

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going to be easier than saving a beautiful threatened landscape. It was the old heart-versus-mind debate – C.P. Snow and his two cultures revisited.11

T h e AC F a n d r e f o r m a g e n d a s dur ing the 1970s As the Foundation moved into the 1970s it rapidly became apparent that protection of threatened goose habitats, important though that activity may have been at the time, was a lower priority than other emerging environmental threats, whether local or global. For the ACF, the philosophical underpinnings of its birth during a conservative administration in Canberra in the 1960s would be seriously challenged by the waves of reform that burst on the nation with the advent of the Whitlam Labor Government at the end of 1972. In hindsight, there is a delicious irony in the fact that Gough Whitlam, a committed republican and zealous Labor true believer, took office during the period when the management of the Foundation enjoyed the high esteem associated with its blue-blood president, the Duke of Edinburgh. Notable achievements during this period of Royal patronage included the efforts that led to the 1981 moratorium on commercial whaling. It was no coincidence that Whitlam came to power at the time of the green bans. Labor’s political antennae had picked up the vibrations from the BLF’s activities, especially in Sydney. Conversely, the supporters of the bans were among the growing sector of the Australian electorate that had grown tired of the fumbling ineptitude of Prime Minister William (Billy) McMahon’s lacklustre rightwing government living out its last days in Canberra. Whitlam’s electoral platform was informed with reformist ideals that had

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their source in grass-roots action as well as in influential precedents offshore. His advisers were tuned in to international movements in the environmental fields, both green and brown. It was becoming apparent that a concern for environmental values did not lie exclusively within the domain of the left; ardent environmentalists could be found across the entire political spectrum. Labor stood to draw support from those on the right whose political loyalties did not prevent them from crossing the floor when it came to protecting the commons.This reflected Mundey’s unwavering view that, with heritage protection, there was common ground between party loyalists on both sides of the political divide. He recognised that there was a potential paradox when a heritage debate might see strong support from small-l liberals and opposition from those on the left for whom the creation of jobs and improved working conditions were higher priorities. As it turned out, in due course his bridge-building efforts bore rich rewards for the federal Labor Party. Whitlam seized his 1972 electoral mandate with extraordinary vigour. The rapid creation of the entirely new federal Department of Urban and Regional Development (DURD) at Cabinet level to oversee an ambitious program of reform for the cities and the bush was unprecedented. Improvements in the way Australian governments at federal, state and local levels had been managing their responsibilities for both the urban and the natural environments were among the new government’s objectives. Within this range of reforms was a determination to encourage environmentalism at the grass-roots level, to seek the involvement of NGOs in consultative and decision-making processes, and to generally encourage a heightened community awareness of these interrelated matters. It was a hugely impressive, if not audacious agenda, and the infant ACF would have to adjust to the new messages coming out of the nation’s capital, as highlighted in Whitlam’s ‘It’s Time’ election policy speech.

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One encouraging indication of the new government’s support for the conservation cause was the June 1973 launch of Habitat, the ACF’s flagship journal, by Prime Minister Whitlam.At that time, the Foundation had already made gains through its successful campaigns for banning oil drilling on the Barrier Reef, and of logging of the Queensland wet tropics rainforests. Whitlam recorded: It was the Foundation … that took the first steps to establish a Royal Commission into the conservation of the Barrier Reef … its National Symposium in Sydney on 3 May 1969 recommended a joint advisory committee on the reef [and] on 5 May 1970 Mr Gorton [then Prime Minister] announced the setting up of the Commonwealth and Queensland Royal Commission into drilling on the Reef.

Whitlam went on to say: No issue in the past ten years has more quickly captured the interest of the public or the attention of politicians than conservation … The word ‘conservation’ used to denote nothing more than re-afforestation schemes and the control of soil erosion. It was essentially a state concern. Today it is a national concern, a universal concern … When ACF was formed its aims and philosophy seemed novel; today it enjoys broad public support and approval.12

Behind the praise was Whitlam’s honest concession that, at the time, the ACF was seen by many ‘as a somewhat conservative – even establishment – body.’ One early councillor described the Foundation of the day as a ‘1950s style conservation NGO [which was evolving into] a socially engaged and politically progressive group.’ Another former councillor, Geoff Evans, remembered the 1970s as a time:

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when activists were engaged in a struggle to drag ACF from a conservative, nature-conservation-focussed organisation to one that focussed on a broader set of issues, and linked ecology with union’s, women’s, indigenous and gay struggles … the mix of 1960s idealism and quieter scientific-based conservation philosophies was forced to give way to the urban edge of emotion-charged political activism. We had to [because] we lost Lake Pedder … we were aware but not as aware as we should have been’.13

It can be assumed that the shift from the ‘quieter scientific-based conservation philosophies’ to the ‘urban edge of emotion-charged activism’ lay behind Mundey’s use of the word rejuvenated in his reference to his joining the ACF in 1973–74.14 The Foundation was ready for Mundey and Mundey was ready for the Foundation. Importantly, there was a new president ready to take the baton from Professor Mark Oliphant in the 1978 changeover. The new boy was Dr Herbert ‘Nugget’ Coombs, whose reputation as a well-respected advisor to governments of all political persuasions dated back to his 1945 appointment by Prime Minister Curtin as head of the new Department of Post-War Reconstruction.

T h e AC F a n d D r C o o m b s Nugget Coombs was first and foremost an economist. From 1949 to 1968 he was Governor of the Reserve Bank of Australia. But his lengthy tenure as a top banker did not prevent him from leaving his mark in the conservation field when, in 1967, in his home state of Western Australia, he had urged Premier David Brand to establish national parks in places of particular natural beauty before they were captured ‘by mining companies or other development

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schemes’.15 His interest in the relatively new science of ecology and in the future of the commons grew over the next decade. It was therefore no surprise that after his retirement ten years later from the Chancellorship of the Australian National University he was appointed a Visiting Fellow in the newly established Centre for Resource and Environmental Studies (CRES) at ANU under its founding director, Professor Frank Fenner. He held this prestigious position until 1996, an unprecedented period of tenure. Coombs was a genuine man for all seasons. His intellect, his wide interests, his negotiating skills, his abilities as an advocate for what he saw as just causes, his passions and his boundless energy, were all resources that enabled him to leave his mark on many fields. Not the least of these were the arts, Aboriginal welfare and land rights, and the environment. By all accounts he was also a very accomplished chef! During his lengthy tenure at the CRES, Dr Coombs took the reins as President of the ACF for the 1978–79 year. It was during this period that the Northern Territory’s Kakadu wilderness, sacred to Aboriginals, was declared a national park. The battle to save the Barrier Reef from oil drilling had yet to be concluded, despite the 1975 federal legislation creating the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Authority. During the save-thereef campaign, Judith Wright, poet and ardent conservationist,16 was urging the ACF to take a stronger line against the prodevelopment lobby. Wright wanted the Foundation to engage more vigorously with its enlightened constituency – people who were not impressed by scientific rationalism or the urgent demands of the oil drillers and their claims of more jobs, more progress.This constituency simply wanted to save the reef – all of it; end of story; no ifs, no buts. For her, compromise was not an option. This was a rerun on a much grander scale of the Kelly’s Bush saga in Sydney a few years before. Wright’s position had been clearly stated in an

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address published by the ACF in 1970, and quoted by Tim Rowse in his biography of Coombs: Scientists … tend to retreat from the more ‘unscientific’ brand of conservation, repudiate public campaigns, discredit lay efforts at conservation education, and look at conservation problems as matters of policy rather than publicity. They are right, of course, but they are also wrong … once we know that real damage is being done and have the facts necessary to back up the claim, to refuse to enlist public feeling on our side is just as stupid as to try to enlist it on poor grounds.17

It was during Coombs’ short presidency that the Foundation increased its involvement in the urban issues that had made headlines a few years earlier during the green ban era. Issues like water and air quality, environmental pollution in the cities, and population policy entered the business papers. Mundey saw, this rejuvenated ACF as an ideal vehicle for pursuing his own interests in these matters. But for Mundey, when he first took his seat on the ACF Council in 1974, the experience must have been something of a baptism of fire. There was a huge cultural and ideological gap between Jack the knockabout communist trade unionist with his farming background and sketchy education, and the conservative doctoral pundits and scientific gurus who filled the council seats up to the time of his election, with HRH Prince Philip still in the president’s chair.

Shifting sands and new directions for the ACF On the ACF Council there was always some common ground between members, but within the broad spectrum of beliefs that

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constituted the scientific and philosophical underpinnings of the conservation movement there was room for vigorous ideological debate. How green was green? Was it light, dark or deep? Was there an underlying ethical position? Was good science the only source of information on a particular conservation challenge? What about the intangibles, the spiritual elements? Years later, American academic Ethan Seltzer18 quotes Kathleen Moore and Michael Nelson on this very question: [we] need to rethink human action in the world from a moral, ethical perspective … in essence, facts are a necessary but not sufficient or compelling basis, on their own, to motivate us to act … we need moral conviction – ideas about what it is to act rightly in the world, what it is to be good or just … facts and moral convictions together can help us understand what we ought to do – something neither alone can do.19

Seltzer goes on to say: This is not about reframing issues, but about reconnecting with what makes humanity truly human, and with the responsibilities that this carries with it in the world we’ve come to know. It’s not about a simple recognition of the facts, but a profound recognition of our moral obligations as human beings. This viewpoint provides, literally, a moral high ground for explaining not only our circumstances but also more importantly the agency for hope.

Other related questions arise in this discussion. What about the relationship between conservation, employment, and economic growth? What was the proper way out when the procrastinations of obdurate politicians and bureaucrats were preventing prompt

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moves to save a threatened environmental resource? Was direct action a legitimate option? These were questions that demanded debate, and the incoming ACF councillors were not going to let the opportunity slip away. The strand that bound together these newly elected councillors at the time of Mundey’s arrival in the mid 1970s was simply their singular dedication to the conservation cause, defined in its broadest terms. Kindred spirits included Milo Dunphy from Sydney, already a battle-scarred veteran of numerous green campaigns and the 1972 founder of Sydney’s Total Environment Centre; Geoff Mosley, seasoned conservationist and early ACF director; and Dick Jones and Ian Bayly, who had been blooded in the failed campaign to save Tasmania’s Lake Pedder, which Mundey had supported from his BLF office in Sydney’s Trades Hall. The 1973 council election had been revolutionary, delivering a majority of activists to the governing body. Drew Hutton and Libby Connors describe the fire and brimstone of the first meeting of that new council: The [new] Council then set about electing the vice-presidents, the treasurer, and the executive committee, and co-opting additional members … the eighteen activists on Council voted en bloc to ensure that reformists got these positions … The meeting dissolved into turmoil and seven ‘old guard’ members immediately announced their resignation. Despite the take-over by the reformist bloc, the Duke of Edinburgh stayed on as President – his main concern being that the staff members who were victims of the coup ‘should be treated generously’.20

Clearly the Foundation, with its clutch of firebrands holding majority power on the council, was moving towards fresh challenges that reflected the deeply felt changes in the wider political environ-

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ment outside. In the memoirs of former Prime Minister Malcolm Fraser is the short but telling admission that in the years between his accession to power in 1975 and his defeat in 1983 there was a significant shift in the attitude of the Australian electorate towards conservation: ‘In 1975, conservation of the environment was not a major issue; by the time [of his defeat] it was at the heart of politics.’21 Mundey and the ACF were active players in this shift, and for Mundey there were fresh thresholds to be crossed and new opportunities to be captured as the ACF evolved and matured into a more politically vigorous outfit. For the Foundation the days of clubby, scientific elitism were over. Mundey wasted no time in helping to steer or perhaps drag the organisation into new territory. An early initiative was a meeting at the ACF headquarters in Melbourne in September 1975,‘to discuss worker–conservationist co-operation’. It was held at the time of the congress of the Australian Council of Trade Unions (ACTU) and was addressed by ACF Director Geoff Mosley and BLF veteran Joe Owens. At the time, Mundey was in London at the invitation of the UK Centre for Environmental Studies.22 Owens was accompanied by Eric Elder, and the two were billed as representing The Friends of the Green Bans – the community-based organisation that had been founded by Mosley, Patrick White and Charles Birch after the fervour of the bans movement had subsided with the demise of the NSW BLF. ACTU members were invited to attend and join in a discussion of possibilities for joint activities between the ACF and organised labour, the aim being ‘to build a better environment’. In 1978, during the Coombs presidency, Mundey was able to pursue this theme further when he was elected convener of the ACF Committee for Industry, Employment and the Human Environment (CIEHE). But throughout his term as a councillor, his central focus was on the urban environment, a position that

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occasionally found him at odds with his fellow Sydneysider, Milo Dunphy, whose affections, despite his architectural training, were more green than brown.

M u n d e y a n d e nv i r o n m e n t a l l y r e s p o n s i b l e trade unionism Mundey’s move in 1978 to the position of convener of the Foundation’s CIEHE was almost inevitable. It was a position of considerable influence within the management structure of the nation’s leading environmental NGO. It resonated with the stand he had consistently taken during the green ban period a few years earlier: workers and their respective trade unions ‘had a responsibility and an obligation to become involved in environmental issues’. It was a position that he has carried since that time, part of his wider view that society as a whole stands to benefit from environmental improvements and safeguards: We went beyond what I call the hip-pocket nerve of economism and linked up with wider sections of society … most unlikely alliances, middle to upper-class aware people, together with the enlightened elite sections of the working class in common struggle in social and ecological issues. People couldn’t believe that we could weld together environmentalism and unionism … we argued for an alliance of the enlightened working class with the enlightened middle class. They should be natural allies. They shouldn’t be opposed to each other. And it actually happened.23

In Melbourne in April 1978, Mundey spoke at the launch by the ACF of the Environmentalists for Full Employment (EFFE),

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a new coalition of environment groups, trade unions and related organisations that had been established under the auspices of the Foundation. Jack spoke as the National Co-ordinator of the EFFE and was accompanied by Geoff Mosley, ACF Director. In his speech he revisited the theme of union engagement in environmental matters: ‘The myth that the fight for a decent environment and conservation of non-renewable resources increases unemployment must be exploded … environmental protection and socially-useful work for everyone who wants it are both imperative.’ 24 For Mundey, the core issue here was what the BLF described as ‘socially responsible trade unionism’. Greg Mallory explored this notion further in his 1999 paper on the New Left and the BLF – under the rhetorical question, ‘Is there a Left left?’ – when he quotes Mundey in his opening: All strands of revolutionary thinking have been essentially economist in character, with a concentration on aiming to win control of the means of production, with insufficient consideration as to the ends of production, the social nature of labour, and almost total neglect of ecological consequences of the use of workers’ labour.25

As Mundey also put it: ‘Ecologists with a socialist perspective and socialists with an ecological perspective must form a coalition to tackle the wide-ranging problems relating to human survival.’26 Here, Mundey is talking about human survival into the future. He explored this theme while he was in Canada in February 1977, following his attendance at the Vancouver HABITAT Conference a few months earlier, when he was some three years into his term as a councillor on the ACF. In a paper presented to a gathering of environmentalists in British Columbia, he argued that although ‘human beings have become custodians of the earth, a great many

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people consider they own the earth, ruthlessly using the earth’s resources with scant regard for the present, let alone the future’. Here was Mundey, the redneck communist, preaching to a north American audience that in the interests of mankind’s survival, the contributions that science and technology could make must be directed increasingly into finding ‘humane ecological solutions … maximum re-cycling and re-use of materials based on renewable resources and energy such as solar power.’27 Much later, in May 1991, Mundey was still taking the stand on the survival issue. In Wollongong, and speaking as an ACF councillor to the Illawarra branch of the Foundation, he courageously suggested that ‘the environment movement in the 21st century is going to be what the labor movement was in the 20th century’. He went on to reaffirm his long-held view that ‘it is imperative that the trade union movement addresses environmental problems.’28 This theme was one that Mundey was well placed to pursue as he extended his influence within the ACF Council, and as the council, under Coombs and his successors, moved into the new environmental fields associated with, for example, the management of waste packaging, toxic emissions from motor vehicles, and the conservation of rural landscapes. Pollution in all its forms was already a major topic; climate change had just entered the lists as a subject for debate in the Foundation’s journal Habitat.29 The 1994 ACF agenda included a major review of Aboriginal participation in the management of national parks, and confirmation of the Foundation’s support for Native Title legislation that was then before the parliament.30 Both these projects were consistent with Mundey’s long-standing interest in and sympathy for the Aboriginal cause. Mundey’s tenure with the ACF came to a quiet, yet civilised finale in Melbourne during the 27th Annual General Meeting of the Foundation in November 1993. The following motion was

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moved and passed unanimously: ‘That the AGM appoints Mr Jack Mundey as an honorary life member of the ACF in recognition of his 20 years of service as a Councillor.’

Alder man Mundey In 2004, Hilary Golder, writing from a ringside seat within the Sydney City Council administration, produced a narrative that would seem far-fetched in any other city – a ripping yarn, full of dastardly deeds, intrigues and plots, political back-stabbings, love-ins and outright thuggery. It is not a script for a sitcom, nor is it fictional, even if some characters seem larger than life, and some of the actions preposterous in the extreme. Of all Australian cities, only Sydney could have given rise to such a fascinating and disturbing saga. Only in the nation’s first city could this chain of events have come about. Only in Sydney could be found this mix of ingredients for the conflict between state and city – a mix that had been simmering (and occasionally boiling over) for more than a century and a half. Other cities in Australia and elsewhere have had their scandals, but Sydney was and is different – ever since the days of Governor Phillip and the Rum Rebellion.31 There has always been another side to this place on the harbour, and it has many chapters, Golder’s narrative could properly be seen as one of them.32 In 1842, an act of the state parliament was passed, declaring Sydney to be a city, and establishing the original boundaries of the city. It also prescribed the electoral process for the new council. Since that time, the council of the city, like all municipal councils throughout New South Wales, has been subject to the laws of the state and the vicissitudes of a system that provides the state government with the powers to intervene in local government affairs, as and when

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it thinks fit. And since that time, the council has been the target of five major interventions: [Since 1842] successive state governments have set limits on the autonomy of the City Council. They have re-written the rules of Sydney’s electoral politics by changing the size of the city; the structure and functions of the Council; and/ or the municipal franchise. Four times – in 1853, 1927, 1967 and 1987 – a central (i.e. state) government has overridden the decision of Sydney’s voters, dismissed the City Council and placed the city under the control of unelected commissioners for a significant period.33

According to Golder, each of these dismissals took place at a crisis point in state–city relations, when the state ‘decided that the issues [surrounding city size and powers, for example] could not be resolved through the workings of democratic local politics.’ It was into this political maelstrom that Jack Mundey entered with his election in 1984 as an alderman of the Sydney City Council. In a recent comment, he has described the circumstances of his election. It took place after the tragic death of his only son in a motor accident – an event that ‘flattened’ him: The people down at The Rocks asked me to stand against the right-wing Labor [candidates]. The Council at the time was disgraceful. And the Liberals were really bad, corporate Tories everywhere. I stood against two other resident action groups and I just got in … we were lucky in the City Council with the independents [being] all from communitybased groups.

Mundey, a known Communist, was baptised into city politics as an independent to represent the interests of Gipps Ward, a sector

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Alderman Mundey, c. 1984. Courtesy Sydney City Council

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of the city that included The Rocks. Part of his electorate was memorably saved from demolition by him, Pringle and the green bans of the 1970s. Golder goes on to quote Mundey as having declared to The Australian newspaper on 16 April 1984 that his constituency ran from Park Street to the Quay. Readers familiar with the geography of Sydney can safely assume that any hyperbole in this claim was innocent. In any event, he went on: ‘I am firmly opposed to high-rise and against massive concrete buildings in the area.’ As he admits, there was an element of luck in the fact that all the independent councillors had grass-roots constituencies. But it went further than that. The nine independents held the balance of power in a council where 12 seats, plus the lord mayoralty, were held by Labor, and the remaining six by a conservative minority. Council meetings were nothing if not exciting, unpredictable, and boisterous. At both committee and full council levels the agendas of the day reveal a rich melange of business items, ranging from the sublime to the almost ridiculous – all to be determined by an unwieldy body of 27 alderpersons.34 The independent bloc, while theoretically holding the balance of power, comprised several new faces, and members enjoyed little if any common ground in terms of political ideology. According to Golder, they did not necessarily vote as a bloc: ‘In a council where no group had an outright majority, alliances often shifted and had continually to be negotiated, sometimes issue by issue and sometimes in public.’ Incoming Lord Mayor Doug Sutherland was right when he declared that the 1984 elections had produced an unworkable council. Golder briefly describes this aspect of the city’s political evoluiton in her Sydney’s Electoral History.35 For her, a key reason for the shambles at the Town Hall was the fact that the independents favoured consultation with their constituents before casting their

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vote in the chamber. Major parties on both the left and the right preferred the caucus system to establish their position before the vote, but not so with the free spirits on the crossbenches, who saw loyalty to the folk who elected them as a priority, if not a responsibility. The result was inevitable. Debate about big-picture issues involving big projects and big dollars – an example being the state government’s ambitious plans for the forthcoming bicentennial of colonial settlement – was often thwarted by parochialism, and by the delays incurred in getting responses from the grass roots. Between the two major parties (Labor and Liberal/Civic Reform) there was no love lost; an alliance at that level was inconceivable. Mundey was going to have his hands full, whether or not he was sitting as one of 27 aldermen at a meeting of the full council, or chairing the Major Building and Development and City Planning Committee. The boxed text does not review all the matters that fell onto Mundey’s desk but is a survey of the council archives, especially of the committee minutes, that makes for interesting and sometimes amusing reading and indicates the range of issues that were dealt with under the Mundey chairmanship.

ALDERMAN MUNDEY AT WORK May 1984: Mundey prepared a minute relating to council

participation in the preparations for the redevelopment of the old railway yards and maritime installations in the Darling Harbour–Rocks area on the western edge of the CBD, triggered by the introduction of a bill into the state parliament to establish a Darling Harbour Authority. If the legislation was adopted, the state would assume control of the planning and approval process within the area, thereby sidelining the City Feature continued overleaf

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Council, as it had effectively done in 1968 with the passing of the Sydney Cove Redevelopment Authority Act. The committee appointed a delegation to consult with the state premier and relevant ministers. Aug 1984: The issue of whether the Council should withdraw its

representation from the Sydney Cove Redevelopment Authority was debated as the future of The Rocks area was still in some doubt, even though the green bans held and SCRA was reviewing its position. Mundey successfully argued for the council to retain its place on SCRA so the council could remain informed of its activities. Aug 1985: Alderman Mundey urged the council’s inclusion

in a proposed task force that the Darling Harbour Authority was establishing to study the inclusion of light rail in the redevelopment plans. The council subsequently wrote to the state minister confirming its strong support for the proposal. In the event, it did not proceed. [Mundey has never backed away from his strong commitment to public transport, and his longstanding dream of a car-free CBD.] Sep 1985: Mundey supported a resolution requesting the city

planner to report on development controls and development activity in the historic Circular Quay East precinct, which included the Opera House, Bennelong Point and the grounds of Government House.36 Mar 1986: The state government’s proposal for an overhead

monorail through parts of the city and Darling Harbour was arousing community opposition. On Mundey’s urgings, council resolved to request the city planner to seek the agreement of the relevant state minister to place all details of the monorail proposal on public exhibition.37

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May 1986: Architect Harry Seidler was working on the design of

Grosvenor Place, a high-rise office tower in George Street overlooking The Rocks to its north. With three street frontages, the so-called Johnson Buildings on the intersection of George and Grosvenor streets had state heritage listing and Seidler was urging their demolition. Debated by Mundey’s City Planning Committee, it was resolved ‘to affirm Council’s policy that the six-storey Johnson Buildings are of heritage and urban design value and should not be demolished’. Frank Hansen, City Planner, reported that they ‘contribute significantly to the intersection’ and their demolition will result in the loss of ‘the important identification of the corner’ and that the proposed open plaza ‘does not contribute in any way to the streetscape and urban form’.38 Seidler was forced to delete his plaza proposal. Today, the buildings stand beneath the completed Grosvenor Tower, providing a fascinating aesthetic counter to the massive scale and contemporary design of the tower. Jul 1986: The Sydney branch of the ACF lodged a detailed

submission seeking the council’s support for a challenge to the legality of the monorail project being proposed to run through the CBD and Darling Harbour. The proposal was controversial and generated a great deal of public opposition, including street demonstrations, petitions, and media publicity. As a member of ACF and as Secretary of SCAM, Mundey was an active participant in the anti-monorail campaign.39 Apr 1987: Council’s planning committee, including Mundey,

unsuccessfully sought state government permission to have a council representative sit on the Darling Harbour Transport and Visitor Information Study.40

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These matters are exemplary of many of the council issues that involved Mundey. On the table were items of concern on which he had strong views, and frontline experience in working with community groups outside the council. Some would not be resolved, one way or another, for a decade or more. Some, like the monorail, took two or three decades before their outcomes were set in place. Others were matters where the final resolution lay entirely outside the jurisdiction of the council and debate may have been vigorous but futile, given that the council’s powers had been emasculated by state legislation. To quote one-time Premier Neville Wran, the council of the day had about as much power as a ‘crippled praying mantis’. The council records show that Mundey’s interests were widening to embrace what today would be called ‘urban design’ – the planning and creation of public spaces and the overall enhancement of the public domain including, of course, cherished heritage buildings. But before Mundey’s aspirations in these civic matters could be fully satisfied, the crippled praying mantis was summarily put out of its misery. On Thursday, 26 March 1987, by proclamation of Governor Sir James Rowland, the state Labor Government removed from office the Lord Mayor and all other democratically elected members of the Council of the City of Sydney, Mundey included. The same proclamation installed Sir Eric Neal as administrator and gave him the powers, duties and liabilities of the council. A subsequent proclamation on 5 April appointed former Lord Mayor Sir Nicholas Shehadie and Norman Oakes as commissioners. This unelected triumvirate would govern the city until fresh elections could be called, but the calling of those elections was deferred pending receipt by the state government of a judicial report ‘on the best future boundaries structure and electoral arrangements’ for the city.

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Jack Mundey’s career as an alderman had come to an abrupt and unseemly end. Once again he was out of a job. The outcome of the boundaries inquiry was months away, and Mundey was not going to sit around. He might well have assumed that, the next time around, the new boundaries and ‘electoral arrangements’ that a future conservative state government might favour would not be conducive to his chances of re-election, nor for opportunities for his involvement in city planning decisions.41 In the event, his role as a councillor on the ACF remained as a key outside interest until his appointment as chair of the NSW Historic Houses Trust (HHT) by Labor Premier Bob Carr in 1994.

T h e N S W H i s t o r i c H o u s e s Tr u s t Colonial Governor Arthur Phillip’s first report to Lord Sydney in Whitehall in 1788 left no doubts as to his impressions of the place chosen as the penal colony: Sydney’s Port Jackson was ‘the finest harbour in the world, in which a thousand sail of the line may ride in the most perfect security.’42 A few decades later, a fortunate few free settlers and emancipists gladly accepted the opportunity to build grand houses along the southern and eastern shores of this fine waterway. Those who enjoyed land grants or could purchase land from the Crown along the foreshores would come to be associated with the colonial aristocracy and the wealth and privilege that group would enjoy. One of the earliest of these colonial-era harbourside estates was Vaucluse House in the Sydney suburb of the same name, which was purchased in 1803 by the colourful Sir Henry Brown Hayes, ex-kidnapper and convict. Prominent explorer, barrister and civic identity William Charles Wentworth acquired the estate in

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Vaucluse House, Sydney. Courtesy Brett Boardman and Sydney Living Museums

1823 and progressively transformed it into the handsome house and garden ensemble that we see today. Another was Elizabeth Bay House, built in the 1830s for Colonial Secretary Alexander Macleay. Both these properties enjoy direct links to the early days of the colony, and to people who were influential in the political and cultural life of the day. Both are of great interest as examples of differing architectural styles, domestic interiors, furnishings and landscaping. And both are now owned by Sydney Living Museums,

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the successor to the NSW Historic Houses Trust (HHT), renamed in 2013. The trust was established by the NSW Government in July 1980, and in 1994, Premier and Minister for the Arts Bob Carr appointed Jack Mundey as its fifth chairperson. Mundey held that office for seven years. The trust had an unusual mandate, driven in part by the new conservation-minded Labor Government and in part by the general community-wide support for heritage that followed the bulldozers of the 1960s, the green ban era, and the advent of heritage legislation. The approaching 1988 bicentenary of the foundation of modern Australia was another stimulus to action, with a recognition by the state government that as custodian of some of the country’s most important heritage houses there was a responsibility to ensure that a range of expert conservation skills was on hand, under the one umbrella organisation. The Historic Houses Act 1980 followed the Environmental Planning and Assessment Act of 1979 and the Heritage Act 1978. These and other cognate statutes bore witness to the almost revolutionary zeal with which the new Labor Government had committed itself to addressing the deficiencies in the NSW planning system that had been revealed and reviled during Premier Robert Askin’s administration. Many of these deficiencies had been identified in the boom years of the 1960s, and reflected the community concerns relating to development and heritage that characterised the late 1970s. Something had to be done, and the Labor Government under Premier Neville Wran took up the challenge with gusto. What was so special about the Historic Houses Trust? Former Director Peter Watts says that, ‘unusually the government placed the HHT in the Arts portfolio and not in Heritage or Environment. It saw the Trust developing professional expertise similar to the other great, but older state cultural institutions, such as the Art

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Gallery of NSW, State Library and Australian Museum.’ At the time of its creation as a statutory body the Trust’s mission was unique in Australia, and possibly in the world.The job ahead was challenging: breaking new ground in the heritage field was not without risks, but was potentially very rewarding. The clear yet dry, unemotional language of the Trust’s annual report of 1987–88 says it all: managing and maintaining as house museums the buildings vested in it, having regard to their historic and architectural interest, and managing and maintaining their associated grounds and providing such educational and cultural services in relation to those buildings as, in the opinion of the Trust, would increase public knowledge and enjoyment of those buildings and their place in the heritage of the State … • … the Trust’s role is one of conservation, management and interpretation of the fabric, contents and grounds of the houses in its care and of the society in which they were built and occupied … to bring these environments ‘alive’ through a lively interpretation program … • … the Trust is endeavouring to acquire a range of houses representing different periods, styles, sizes and from different geographic areas.

The trust’s initial property portfolio included both Elizabeth Bay House and Vaucluse House. Elizabeth Farm at Rosehill, overlooking the Parramatta River in Sydney’s west, was acquired in 1982. Dating from 1793, Elizabeth Farm incorporates Australia’s oldest surviving European dwelling – a heritage treasure by any standards. Lyndurst, the historic 1833–35 residence in Darghan Street on the Glebe Point foreshore, was acquired in 1984, having been saved from demolition (as part of a state government expressway project) by the 1972 green ban. The acquisition of Meroogal in Nowra on

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the south coast, Rouse Hill House on the western outskirts of the city, and the contemporary Rose Seidler House at Wahroonga on Sydney’s North Shore followed. Other properties falling within the Trust’s remit include Government House, the Justice and Police Museum, the Francis Greenway-designed Hyde Park Barracks, the Museum of Sydney on the site of the first Government House, and Susannah Place

Rose Seidler House, Wahroonga, Sydney. Courtesy Phyllis Wong Photography and Sydney Living Museums

Following pages: Susannah Place, The Rocks. Photograph by author

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in The Rocks. Government House, once the office and official residence of the Governor, was opened to the public during Mundey’s chairmanship after a rancorous period of public debate and controversy during which his diplomacy and negotiating skills proved crucial to the success of this adventurous move. Susannah Place was a unique acquisition, different in every way from the others in that it comprised four lowly terrace cottages and a tiny corner store that had been continuously occupied by workingclass folk since their construction in the 1840s, and which were still in their original condition. Given its location in the very heart of the 1973 Rocks battleground in which Mundey had played such a leading role, it carried poignant memories for him. As the Trust’s chair, he was determined to ensure that its property portfolio included this remnant cluster of houses and corner shop as reminders of the stories of ordinary working class people during the post-colonial era – stories which were captured so delightfully in Ruth Park’s 1980 novel Playing Beatie Bow. A far cry from Susannah Place – at least in architectural and cultural terms – is the Trust’s flagship property at 10 Macquarie Street, commonly known as The Mint. It adjoins the Hyde Park Barracks and today incorporates an eclectic mix of major buildings, archaeological remnants and architectural elements dating from colonial times to the present. It accommodates the Trust’s headquarters staff, a new auditorium, and the Caroline Simpson Library and Research Collection. A recent trust publication quietly makes the claim that The Mint incorporates Australia’s oldest public offices. In 1988, under curators Joy Hughes and James Broadbent, the Trust staged an exhibition at Elizabeth Bay House, called ‘Demolished for the public good: Crimes, follies and misfortunes’, which pulled no punches in its revelations of the hitherto unmeasured statewide loss of civic buildings, streetscapes, and houses. The trust did not

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claim that all these lost items were of heritage significance but, according to Sydney heritage columnist Geraldine O’Brien, the Trust’s underlying message was only too clear: ‘Our confidence [in the heritage legislation to restrain the urge to demolish anything old] was misplaced.’ O’Brien quoted from HHT Director Peter Watts’s foreword to the exhibition catalogue: Greed and Sydney seem to go together. They come in many guises. The greed of the developer, the property owner, the car … it seems to be infectious, and built into the psyche of the place … it leaves little room for nostalgia or niceties, for memory … instead we seem hell-bent on maximising profit and views, showing off, building big … and tearing down.43

Strong words indeed, and words that helped to underline the fact that in exercising its statutory responsibilities the Trust would in many ways be fighting a rearguard action. A decade after the 1988 exhibition came another HHT initiative that sought to open minds and hearts to a serious consideration of the role of non-violent activism as a conservation tool in a democratic society. Through the months of December 1998 to October 1999, during Mundey’s period as Chair, the Trust presented an exhibition in the Justice and Police Museum at Circular Quay in Sydney. In his foreword to the exhibition catalogue, trust Director Peter Watts made special mention of the ‘progressive Builders Labourers’ Federation’ and its rescue of ‘many special parts of Sydney from inappropriate development’ during the green ban era of the 1970s. Watts closed with the admonition that complacency is an ever-present threat when it comes to protecting the environment: we might have better laws and better mechanisms for conservation, ‘but to imagine that this curtails the need for community involvement and vigilance is a delusion’.44

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Chairing the Trust in executing responsibility for activities such as exhibitions and managing its extraordinarily rich portfolio of national heritage treasures would be Jack Mundey’s primary interest during his seven years on the board. After several years in what might be called a period of career doldrums, his appointment brought new opportunities, new exposure to civic affairs, and a new forum for his undoubted skills as public speaker and staunch advocate for the heritage cause. His busy tenure saw a cavalcade of imaginative exhibitions, public events, talks by visiting experts and open days. His enthusiasm is evident in the Trust’s annual report for the year 1997–98, when he comments that ‘the Trust is an exciting place to be at the moment. The energy within the organisation is boundless … in my long experience with many and diverse organisations I have never been associated with a more competent, yet inspiring body of people … [it is] a unique and valuable organisation.’45 Jack was particularly proud of the Trust’s efforts in raising the public’s awareness and understanding of heritage across all age groups. On this topic, his report of the year’s activities for 1999–2000 throws light on his priorities: visitor statistics [are] only a limited measure of achievement in a cultural organisation like the HHT. It is much more difficult to get a measure of the less tangible aspects of our work – contributions to our knowledge through research, sparking interest in a child, fuelling the imagination, giving simple pleasures through beautiful things, promoting high standards of conservation, contributing to current debates in the community.46

Under Mundey’s chairmanship, in September 1999 the HHT pursued one of his long-held interests in its engagement with the city’s Aboriginal community in the dedication of Cadigal Place

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Above: Mundey, Bob Carr and Peter Watts at NSW Government House, Historic Houses Trust function, 1 July 2001. Courtesy JOM PHOTO and Sydney Living Museums

Left: Mundey and Harry Seidler at launch of biography of Dick Dusseldorp, 2002. Courtesy Sydney Morning Herald, Fairfax Media

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in Bridge Street, at the Museum of Sydney. This was followed a week later by the opening of Bamaradbanga – a three-month celebratory program of Aboriginal culture as part of the Trust’s commitment to the reconciliation process. In his report, Mundey acknowledged that these activities may have been modest, but so too were they important symbolic gestures in the spirit of reconciliation, welcomed by Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal alike. The Rose Seidler House in the northern Sydney suburb of Wahroonga holds a special place in the Trust’s portfolio, and provides an intriguing link between the respective careers of its designer on the one hand, and Mundey the chair of the HHT on the other. The house and its unique collection of 1950s-period furnishings and fittings were gifted to the Trust by Harry Seidler in 1988, some six years before Mundey’s appointment to the chair. The gift was followed by a lengthy period in which Harry and his architect wife Penelope played active roles in many Trust functions. According to ex-Trust Director Peter Watts, they were ‘generous and significant supporters’. As for the relationship between Jack and Harry at the time, it says something about their respective personalities that despite some earlier clashes and their widely differing philosophical positions on planning and heritage issues, they were able to reconcile their differences in a spirit of mutual respect – if not of quiet admiration for each others’ achievements. As for the house, it is a small but impressive single-storey architectural statement in its own right, crafted in the pure modernist design credo by a young Harry Seidler, soon after he had come to Sydney from New York in 1948 to undertake a commission for his migrant Austrian parents, Rose and Max. His visit was not surprising, but its outcome was this small house whose design ‘sent shockwaves through the leafy tranquility of Sydney’s upper north shore’.47 Seidler displayed the freshness and idealism of a

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movement in architectural history that hitherto had had little or no impact on mainstream Australian practice and practitioners. Fresh from Harvard and the tutelage of such modernist greats as Walter Gropius and Marcel Breuer, Seidler was presented with a young architect’s dream: a vacant site, a beautiful bushland setting, a congenial climate, and ideal clients. He made the most of it, despite some furious squabbles with the local council as he sought approval for what many thought was a provocative design, totally alien to the prevailing architectural typology of Sydney’s smart and gentile North Shore, with its sedate triple-fronted brick bungalows, pitched tiled roofs (de rigueur in this and many other local government areas) mock-Tudor mansions, rose gardens, immaculate lawns and petunia beds along the driveway. The Seidler plan rapidly made the front pages of the design and fashion magazines and generated enormous interest and controversy within local architectural circles, as well as in the wider Sydney community. Fame came quickly to the young visitor. His intended return to the United States was cancelled. His Sydney studio suddenly became very busy. The short sojourn as architect for his parents’ home launched an illustrious career that in due course took him to the heights of his profession, and earned him a reputation as one of the few Australian architects to achieve both domestic and international recognition. Twenty-five years after completing his parents’ house in Wahroonga, Harry Seidler met Jack Mundey for the first time. As related earlier, Mundey and the BLF had responded to a request from an influential group of theatre-lovers to place a green ban on the MLC Centre designed by Seidler for Dick Dusseldorp’s Lend Lease Corporation. At stake was the loss of the old Theatre Royal in downtown Sydney. After a heated public controversy, Dusseldorp and Mundey reached a compromise: a new, modern theatre would

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be incorporated in the plans in return for which the BLF green ban would be lifted. Seidler swallowed his pride and amended the plans. Few people today can remember the old playhouse, but most would agree that Seidler’s amended scheme incorporating the new Theatre Royal was a skilful response to a very difficult brief. Extant photographs show Mundey and Seidler enjoying each other’s company in the theatre lobby. After Seidler’s death in March 2006, following 58 years of practice in Australia and abroad, the very theatre that caused him so much angst in 1974, and which was only there because of the BLF’s green ban and Dusseldorp’s sign-off, was the setting for an overflowing memorial service to its architect. In 2001, five years before Seidler’s death, Mundey retired from his lengthy term as chair of the HHT. In the same year he was awarded an Honorary Master of Environment degree by the University of Sydney. In his farewell message of 17 December 2001, NSW Premier and Minister for the Arts Bob Carr offered a warm and heartfelt accolade to the person he had appointed some seven years before. Carr’s words go a long way towards providing for posterity a different picture of the man who had earlier drawn nothing but contempt and enmity from one of Carr’s predecessors, Liberal Premier Robert Askin. The December message is more than the typical politician’s token thank you and goodbye. In his opening, Carr admitted with candour that few appointments had ‘given him such pleasure or yielded such happy results’ as his appointment of Mundey in August 1994. The premier went on to say: [Jack Mundey] has brought to this public office the same zealous commitment that he brought years before, to his Opposite page: Jack Mundey awarded Honorary Degree of Master of Environment, University of Sydney, June 2001. Mundey personal collection

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public campaigns, pursuing in both roles the same objective – the care and preservation of the State’s heritage – with the same devotion and high sense of principle. His appointment … was much more than a symbolic one … much more than a reward, however deserving for Jack’s past services … I was seeking a chair who not only commanded the respect of all who knew him, including those who might not have shared his political beliefs or approved of his methods … but a chair with wisdom, experience and good judgment; one who would engage with passion and enthusiasm … and give leadership and inspiration … In Jack Mundey, all my expectations were fulfilled.48

Carr was obviously speaking from the heart when he also declared that: for his work on the Trust, as much as for his earlier achievements, we are forever in his debt. To this good, gentle and courageous man, loved by all who know him, I extend on behalf of the Government our warmest thanks for his services to the people of New South Wales.49

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Chapter 8

Today and tomorrow Learning from history

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I

t is an extraordinary irony that the future of the western sector of The Rocks area – the setting for the memorable 1970s green bans opposing redevelopment – is back in the Sydney headlines today.The NSW state government has commenced selling 99-year leases of 293 state-owned houses in Millers Point for private sector housing. In an early response from the National Trust, Donald Ellsmore sees this decision as leading to ‘the inevitable loss of the authentic character of an area greatly loved and admired by the majority of Australians and tourists alike – the birthplace of the nation.’1 The government’s position on Millers Point adds weight to the continuing view that there is diminished official support for heritage – at least in New South Wales.2 Jack Mundey, while talking to the author about his current thinking on the issues that have been raised in this book, says it is easy to be worried about the matter: but I am not overly pessimistic about current attitudes about the environment in Australia. Pessimism is easy, but it is not the best position. But looking back to the days of the The Rocks campaign in the 1970s, I think that the lessons of that campaign will become more and more important in the future. And I also think that today’s governments are overlooking the fact that people are increasingly wanting to be involved in environmental and heritage debates and decisions.

The Millers Point case is an interesting one. The houses in question are old and many have been neglected. In 1978 the precinct as a whole, including 127 individual properties, was listed on the National Trust’s Register as the Millers Point and The Rocks Urban Conservation Area.3 In its Position Paper of August 2014, the Trust quotes from the 2003 State Heritage listing: ‘the

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whole place remains a living cultural landscape, valued by both its local residents and the people of New South Wales … Millers Point is an intact residential and maritime precinct of outstanding State and National significance, containing buildings and civic spaces dating from the 1830s.’ According to the Trust, the point is the oldest continuously occupied urban housing area in Australia, but apparently the NSW Heritage Office was not consulted before the decision was made to offer long leases to private buyers. In August 2014, the Board of the Trust responded to the government’s decision by calling for a halt to the eviction of tenants pending a ‘proper consideration and determination of the impacts of the decision on all of the heritage values of Millers Point: historical, social, landmark, archaeological and rarity’. In 2014 the NSW Chapter of the Australian Institute of Architects (AIA) expressed a view sympathetic to that of the Trust, when President Joe Agius wrote to the responsible minister stating that the AIA’s position was that ‘cities are not a mass of interchangeable places and people; they are a collection of distinctive precincts, extended families, and social networks.4 More than any other place in Sydney, Millers Point is defined by its physical and social links to the city’s maritime past.’5 This message resonates powerfully with Jack Mundey’s forceful public statements during the green ban era when he was mounting the barricades to help save The Rocks from the bulldozer. At that time, the threat was total destruction and redevelopment – no questions asked. Today, the threat to the extensive public housing estate in Millers Point is of a different kind: more subtle, more secretive, more uncertain as to its likely impacts on the heritage significance of this nationally listed heritage asset. A state government with clear obligations if not legal responsibilities to protect an officially classified heritage precinct has launched a program that, if successful, could see the area gentrified and

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transformed within a decade or so into a ghetto for the wealthy and privileged. The NSW Minister for Social Housing, the Hon. Brad Hazzard MP, justified the ‘sell-off ’ by stating the cottages in Millers Point represented a ‘goldmine’ for the government as it sought funds to reduce a 60,000-person waiting list for public housing by acquiring dwellings in cheaper suburban areas. 6 This strongly suggests that the inner city’s already dwindling stock of social housing will suffer another irreversible setback. Not surprisingly, the government’s intentions for Millers Point have generated considerable media interest. In April 2015, newspaper columnist Elizabeth Farrelly cited the renowned urban sociologist Jane Jacobs who, back in the 1960s, pointed out that ‘good cities … are demographically mixed … restricting city living to the rich makes the city boring.’7 Farrelly’s headline makes the almost Biblical assertion that ‘Cities are for everyone, the mix is crucial’.8 Letters to the editor have covered the full gamut of opinion. A month earlier, Sydney journalist Miranda Devine had played from a different drum with her scathing description of poor old Millers Point as being ‘a decaying monument to the standover tactics … of the disgraced BLF … a reminder of the city’s bad old days.’9 In August, Nicole Hasham reported that ‘the NSW government has scrapped strict heritage rules for buyers of historic homes at Millers Point … homebuyers will be relieved’10 of the stringent conditions for undertaking the conservation work that the previous Labor government had imposed on new 99-year leases. These grabs from the contemporary press help to illuminate the differences of opinion that surround the latest chapter in the Millers Point story.11 Quite reasonably, some observers ask why a few privileged pensioners pay only peppercorn rents for dresscircle housing while others argue that the inner city needs more rather than less social housing – heritage or no heritage.

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Mundey knows that a lot of people are worried about the Millers Point situation, but as he see it, ‘the wealthy will come regardless. The main thing is that we keep the historical integrity of the place; and that means the state government has to work with all of us to make it happen.’ Whatever the outcome of this debate, the case throws the heritage picture into sharp relief: ‘heritage’ has many dimensions and is open to many interpretations. The irony is that the place whose future is now at stake is just across the road, so to speak, from that very place in which the crucial green ban battles were fought and won back in the 1970s. Today, the locals have once again taken up arms against a powerful state bureaucracy. Elsewhere in Sydney, heritage protection seems to be experiencing a bumpy ride as local councils play heritage politics and skirt around expert opinion in their debates. One of many examples is found in Sydney’s inner suburb of Marrickville. Against the advice of the National Trust, the AIA and its own experts, the local council has shown where its priorities lay with its resolution in July 2014 to allow the redevelopment of a rare example of 1880s brick warehouse architecture for the purposes of a car park. Local newspapers regularly carry stories of heritage battles, one of the fiercest of which took place in Sydney’s upper North Shore in 2007 to 2010. It was the subject of a 2011 documentary film in which Jack Mundey played a major role.12 Director Dennis Grosvenor did not pull his lunches, saying that ‘a culture of political donations and a coterie of powerful lobbyists’ are together ‘helping the bulldozers to move on valued environmental assets,’ and that communities across the state of New South Wales are living in a virtual ‘state of siege’. History will determine the weight to be placed on this passionate 2011 call to arms, but Grosvenor’s somewhat apocalyptic position on the politics of the environment in New South Wales

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could perhaps be likened to what conservationist Helen Proudfoot dubbed ‘environmental fundamentalism’ in a paper she delivered to the NSW Division of the Planning Institute of Australia in 1990.13 Proudfoot, a highly regarded heritage researcher and advisor to the governments of the day, coined the term as a descriptor of what she saw as a creeping malaise, a threat to the legitimacy of the heritage cause as it was being prosecuted at the time. Through her research in the 1950s and 1960s for the Cumberland County Council and its successor (the NSW State Planning Authority), Proudfoot was in at the beginning of the post-war rise of interest in heritage, and was a party to the listing of 19 items in Australia’s first comprehensive plan for a metropolitan region.14 But after four decades of dedicated heritage practice, she was not afraid to record her concern that perhaps the urban conservation pendulum had swung too far. By the late 1980s, ‘conservation had become a moral imperative’. As she saw it, ‘the extreme position of the environmental fundamentalists is that it would have been much better if we had never come to this country, that our presence on this earth is an offence.’ Proudfoot’s message went further, perhaps inadvertently offering ammunition to those who saw heritage conservation as an unacceptable burden for the development industry to carry. Her paper suggested that: in the environmental field we have conveniently disregarded the fact that dynamic change is one of the fundamental motors of the free enterprise democratic system … we must not allow our towns and cities to become rigidified … where every project is so delayed that we kill initiative while we ponder about ‘context’ and ‘cultural significance’.

In hindsight it might be suggested that the ‘environmental fundamentalism’ that was the focus of Proudfoot’s paper might well

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turn out to be the Achilles heel of the heritage movement unless saner minds prevail. She would have happily supported the early NSW Heritage Office definition of heritage as ‘things we want to keep’, but clearly she would have added the proviso that you can’t keep everything. T H E S A G A O F B A R A N G A RO O

If you are looking for heritage, Sydney’s Barangaroo project has very little to offer despite the site’s history, which goes back to the dreaming time of its traditional Aboriginal custodians and the rich stories of its post-colonial evolution into a key waterfront industrial domain. However, on the edge of the northernmost sector of this extensive redevelopment precinct on Darling Harbour lies a striking reminder (symbol?) of the city’s vigorous maritime history in the shape of the abandoned Maritime Control Tower – an 87-metre-high landmark since its construction in the 1970s. Both the Sydney City Council and the National Trust, with expert support from a committee of the NSW Heritage Council, have argued strongly for the retention of this landmark structure. The Barangaroo Delivery Authority (BDA), though, as the responsible delivery agency, proposes its demolition ‘in keeping with the [Authority’s] vision for a spectacular park’ on the encircling headland.15 In July 2015 the NSW Minister for Heritage rejected the Heritage Council’s recommendation to list the tower on the state register, thereby paving the way for the BDA to demolish this simple yet monumentally scaled concrete structure – the only one of its kind in the city, and ‘one of the last remaining

Following pages: Maritime control tower, Millers Point, June 2015. Photograph by author

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historic elements of Millers Point maritime history.’16 One might reasonably have ventured the hope that the spirit which saw the saving of another landmark tower in the East Rocks, the beautifully constructed brick chimney-stack near the northern end of George Street, might have prevailed, but it seems the city may lose yet another familiar harbourside landmark, despite the tower’s previous owner (Sydney Ports Corporation) seeing fit to place the structure on the State’s Heritage Inventory in August 2008, due to its significance ‘in the history and operation of the Port of Sydney’. The controversy over the control tower at Barangaroo is a small matter compared to the arguments that raged during the period 2007 through to 2014 and are continuing, regarding the ownership, design and future management of this huge state government renewel project. As a member of the jury selected to choose winner of the 2005 international urban design competition for this splendid harbourside site, Jack Mundey was involved at the outset.Three years later the state government announced that Lend Lease had been selected to develop the first stage. By this time the integrity of the award-winning design by Sydney architects Hill Thalis had been effectively sabotaged by government-supported modifications that greatly increased its height, bulk and floor space provisions. While these changes were sufficient in themselves to heighten public concerns about the secretive way in which the BDA was going about its business, the real bombshell was the decision by the state Cabinet in 2012 to support the inclusion of a luxury hotel and casino in Stage 2 of the project. Despite winning the 2005 competition, the Hill-Thalis scheme had been sidelined in a secretive Machiavellian game in which lead parts were being played by self-appointed urban design impresario and former Prime Minister Paul Keating, James Packer (the country’s

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wealthiest man), Lend Lease Corporation and the BDA. Community concerns were mounting and organised opposition to the scheme started to grow. In September 2010 Mundey spoke against the governmentapproved amended scheme at a public meeting in Sydney. Other such events followed. Jack became Patron of the Barangaroo Action Group and member of the Friends of Barangaroo. But unlike the successful campaign to save The Rocks back in the 1970s, no amount of belated community outrage was going to stop this massive scheme from going ahead.17 The dice had rolled in Packer’s favour. He announced he was going to build Australia’s most luxurious hotel, replete with its exclusive casino, designed to satisfy the discerning tastes of the ‘whales’ that inhabit the uppermost echelons of the international gambling fraternity. At long last this city could stand proudly, shoulder to shoulder, with Macau, Las Vegas, Monte Carlo and Atlantic City, and at last we could offer these globetrotting millionaire punters the kind of experience that had hitherto been denied them in Sydney. There seems to be no going back. When complete, the three huge towers of Stage 1 together with the hotel complex will stand as unavoidable symbols of the overwhelming power of alliances involving big business and big government as they pursue the mantra of progress at all costs. Mundey had this to say in a recent interview: I am worried about the fact that during the 1960s and 1970s Australia was on the world stage when it came to pushing environmental reforms, but today we have lost the plot. We have lost the initiative and our ability to influence world thinking has lapsed. The rapacious greed of big multinational corporations is the greatest single threat to the environment, locally as well as globally.

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G re e n p o l i t i c s – t h e s c e n e t o d ay Within the green sector, Ellsmore’s concerns as noted above are shared by Jeff Angel and others. Next to his photo on the front page of the Total Environment News, Angel expresses his concern over the federal government’s recent removal of the carbon tax.18 He also notes the official moves to favour commercial and recreational fishing in marine parks over sanctuary areas: ‘It is as if they [the conservative governments] are creating a vacuum into which all good green policies are sucked – never to be seen again.’ Angel concludes with a spirited challenge: ‘this is a democracy, and there is no such thing as a vacuum. The void left by the removal of much-needed environmental protection policies will be filled by ever-growing community anger, ready to be mobilised in mass campaigns and at elections.’ If the Total Environment Centre is ready to express its concerns in such terms, community anger of a similar kind is evident in press reports of a decision by a coalition of other green groups to withdraw from a state government review of timber logging in coastal forests in New South Wales.19 Leading the standoff is the Nature Conservation Council of NSW (NCC), which claims that changes proposed by the review ‘will erode environmental safeguards, and loosen restrictions on grazing and forestry methods’. A kindred body, the North East Forest Alliance, has joined the boycott, saying that the review process had become a farce. According to Sydney Morning Herald reporter Nicole Hasham, the NCC’s position is that it is ‘prepared to work with government to ensure that protections for soil, streams and threatened species are maintained, but we will not put our name to proposals that come out of a flawed process’. These expressions of serious concern from green groups across the nation resonate with those being expressed internationally as

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governments worldwide increasingly become involved in debate about global environmental issues. The notion that humankind is failing to look after its own global nest seems to be taking hold. Well-regarded Sydney economist and journalist Ross Gittins referred to ‘the heavy price of an unhealthy planet’20 in an article commenting on the findings of a 2014 report by the Wentworth Group of Concerned Scientists.21 That report confirmed that across Australia the condition of many vital environmental resources is poor or getting worse. Gittins was not afraid to offer advice to the big end of town: ‘If we want the economy to stay healthy, we must restore the health of the environment. Should we continue to degrade the environment it will rebound on the economy … we need to modify our economic activity to reverse the damage we are doing.’ A congruent view, invoking the potential economic benefits associated with heritage conservation, was offered by Hector Abrahams in his 2014 article discussing ‘the fiscal advantages of heritage listing’ that outlined the ‘major economic allowances for work on heritage properties in New South Wales’.22 Matt Wade picks up this same theme in his review of a recent OECD report that discusses the economic impacts of ‘green tape’ – the environmental counterpart to red tape. He acknowledges that according to conventional wisdom, green tape is ‘a necessary evil’. However, OECD economists have apparently discovered that despite the introduction of increasingly stringent environmental controls worldwide, this ‘increased stringency has not harmed productivity growth or productivity levels’. In fact, new green regulations ‘may translate into a permanent increase in productivity levels in some industries.’23 Across the nation, such concerns are the subject of frequent media coverage and public debate. Some of this media dialogue is encouraging, pointing to the potential for progressive reform; some not so. A complete listing of topics would include recently

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expressed concerns of the National Trust NSW,24 the consequences of climate change, the growing preferences of governments to privatise vital assets such as public rental housing, energy, and water resources, the federal government’s apparent decision to allow dredging and spoil dumping in the waters of the Great Barrier Reef,25 the collapse of investor confidence in the renewable energy sector due to federal government policy uncertainties, and the same government’s faith in its 2014 target of a ‘feeble’ 5% cut in carbon emissions in the face of evidence that cuts of ‘60% or more will be necessary’.26 Overall, the picture is a depressing one, as stories from print and electronic media increasingly suggest that these grass-roots concerns are coming from both sides of the political divide – pointing to what could be a deep-seated loss of faith in the political process, generally, when it comes to dealing with the future of the commons. This loss of faith in official processes is linked to Jack Mundey’s recent comments on the theme:‘ I have always said that the environment should be a top priority at every level of government, and that is still my position.’ As a small yet important current example of this priority at the local government level he cites ‘the work of the Sydney City Council and its urban design and heritage programs.’ ‘I have always said,’ Mundey offers, ‘that the environment should be a top priority at every level of government, and that is still my position. A good example is the work of the Sydney City Council and its urban design and heritage programs.’

P ro f e s s i o n a l b o d i e s Since the establishment of Australia ICOMOS in 1976, the practice of heritage assessment and conservation has evolved

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from its origins, in which the work was typically carried out by interested architects and historians, to today’s situation, in which practitioners are trained professional specialists in their own right. Universities offer courses in conservation practice. University-based seminars, conferences and symposia are frequent. Public authorities newly involved in heritage administration employ salaried heritage experts, often supported by a small but influential consultancy sector. This process of maturation within professional heritage circles has been nourished by architects, landscape architects, local historians and historical societies, and by such special interest groups as the Australian Garden History Society. Inevitably there has been a splintering of the core heritage community as other specialist interest groups emerged, claiming adherents whose focus is on topics as diverse as industrial archaeology, Aboriginal heritage, cemeteries, shipwrecks and domestic interiors. According to Simon Pinnegar and Robert Freestone, the urban planning profession in Australia has been largely sitting on the sidelines in the processes just described.27 Through 2006 and into 2007, these two UNSW researchers focused on urban planning practice as part of the ongoing task of measuring the nation’s urban heritage stock. The work followed earlier research by Freestone that revealed a surprising indifference to heritage during the formative years of the urban planning profession (in New South Wales at least). For Freestone, ‘the town planning movement … embraced the dominant demolish-and-develop ideology of the inter-war years … driven by a mix of garden city, city beautiful and city functional paradigms, the early planners had little sympathy for conservation goals.’28 In their more recent work, Freestone and Pinnegar set out to produce ‘an authoritative research study geared to determining possible sites of national heritage significance but with a view to wider dissemination and discussion’, especially

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within the urban planning profession as it stands alongside other built environment professions. Among these, architecture stands out as the one discipline that has been in the heritage frontline since the 1930s, if not earlier. Given this commitment to the heritage cause by many architects over more than half a century, it is worrying to note that government appears to remain indifferent to the body of expertise on contemporary architectural heritage which the Institute has assembled over time.29 The situation nationally is reflected by concerns in New South Wales.Writing in the NSW National Trust Magazine in 2014, architect John Richardson, a past president of the NSW Chapter of the AIA, deplores the failure of heritage officialdom in NSW to recognise the significance of distinguished 20th-century buildings and include them in official listings as and when appropriate. He cites the ongoing efforts of the NSW Chapter since the 1960s in identifying important works from the last century and notes that many significant projects by leading Australian designers have already been lost to redevelopment without the benefit of any listing other than that of the Institute itself. Numerous award-winning buildings, including several on the prestigious Sulman list, have either been completely demolished or significantly modified. Richardson argues for more effort, more courage, in assessing and listing contemporary buildings with special architectural merit and significance in a heritage context, if only for the purpose of historical record in the event that permanent protection is not possible. He despairs that government in New South Wales is under no obligation to consider National Trust or AIA listings or consult with the Trust, the institute or ICOMOS ‘when assessing (applications) for approval to adapt or demolish’ a building of

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heritage merit. And he argues that the NSW Office of Environment and Heritage and the Heritage Council ‘need to be strong enough to list in the face of commercial resistance to protecting our future.’30 The contemporary context in which Richardson’s views have been presented can be contrasted with the position of modernists such as Harry Seidler and Glenn Murcutt who, according to Freestone, have argued ‘that the conformity imposed by local heritage controls seriously impairs their creative freedom and, thus, good design.’31

S o m e p r o g r e s s i s ev i d e n t Despite the concerns of Mundey and others about current official arrangements for managing conservation in this country, it is self-evident that since the green ban era there has been progress on many fronts, and many significant reforms have taken place nationwide. One might confidently predict that there will be no return to the jungle of the 1960s, given the advent of a heightened awareness of heritage and conservation values within the community generally. Indeed, as the commonwealth discovered in 2006, the national inventory of laws, institutional arrangements, organisations and agencies with a focus on conservation is considerable. On any fair assessment it can be claimed that the country has progressed since the cowboy days of Sydney’s property boom in the 1960s and the world’s first green ban in Sydney’s Hunters Hill in 1973. A selective summary of these official initiatives can be found in the boxed section. This is based on the 2006 Report of the Productivity Commission Inquiry into the Conservation of Australia’s Historic Heritage Places.

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ADVANCES IN HERITAGE CONSERVATION 1960s–2006 • The commonwealth was responsible for 16 ‘historic heritage places’ on the world and national heritage lists. It is now responsible for 19 (three have been added since 2006) UNESCO World Heritage sites: Kakadu National Park, Great Barrier Reef, Willandra Lakes, Tasmanian Wilderness, Australian Fossil Mammal sites, Uluru-Kata Tjuta National Park, Lord Howe Island group, Purnululu National Park, Greater Blue Mountains Area, Gondwana Rainforests, Wet Tropics of Queensland, Shark Bay, Fraser Island, Australian Convict Sites, Sydney Opera House, Ningaloo Coast, Heard and McDonald Islands, Macquarie Island, Royal Exhibition Building and Carlton Gardens (Melbourne). • As of 2006 there are some 6800 places on the lists of government-owned properties. • The total for state and territory register listings was 13,988. • Under recent legislation, the Australian Government has established two statutory lists. The Australian Heritage List comprises places identified as having national significance with values or characteristics that have special meaning for Australians.32 The Commonwealth Heritage List comprises significant places located on commonwealth land, and includes places owned or managed by the commonwealth. Items are placed on the lists after assessment by the Australian Heritage Council, an independent statutory body advising the Australian Government on heritage matters. • All states and territories have separate statutory lists covering places of significance to those jurisdictions. In addition, they have official agencies and procedures for identifying and protecting the listed places. • Heritage Councils have been established at state and territory levels to manage registers and provide advice to government.

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• Funding programs have been established to assist with conservation work on listed properties. • In 2003 the Australian Heritage Council replaced the earlier Heritage Commission.33 Since 2004 the Council has advised successive commonwealth governments on heritage matters and since 2007 has been the curator of the Register of the National Estate, which was inaugurated during the Whitlam Government. In 2007 the register was closed and replaced by the Australian Heritage List: since then the register’s status has been that of a non-statutory archive and educational resource. • Local councils have established statutory lists of places having significance for local communities. Typically, the lists are incorporated as schedules into local plans. Across Australia the total number of listings in local plans exceeds 140,000. • In addition to official lists, registers are kept by NGOs, such as the National Trust branches and the Australian Institute of Architects. In most states, Trust branches own or manage a portfolio of heritage-listed properties. Limited financial assistance from government is generally available, supplemented by membership fees, bequests and fundraising.

What does the future hold? When Jack Mundey took to the barricades back in the 1970s, his spirit radiated optimism, confidence, hope. Subconsciously, he knew that what he was doing was right: right for the unions, right for the affected communities, right for society in general. His Builders Labourers’ Federation played its ace card – withdrawal of labour on threatened heritage sites – with care and due consideration of community sentiment. His definition of heritage conservation was inclusive: social and community values must always be an

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integral part of any brown heritage program. He had no need to seek moral guidance on the matter. Yes, he was an active member of the Communist Party of Australia but, despite the assertions of his numerous opponents in the development industry, he was not playing an ideological game when it came to heritage. Heritage was for everyone, regardless of their political leanings. Whether or not he knew it at the time, writers, thinkers and activists worldwide were starting to move to the same drum. The facts were accumulating and the evidence was mounting that when it came to managing cultural resources, the natural environment and the commons, the record of the past couple of centuries was far from comforting. Despite small and largely localised advances, humankind had a lot to answer for. In mid 2015, even the Vatican became involved, releasing the first Papal Encyclical on climate change and the condition of the global environment. In this lengthy document, Pope Francis calls for fossil fuels to be replaced by renewables, decries the culture of consumerism, and points to the ever-worsening impact of environmental degradation on the world’s poor.34 And here at home – in Mundey’s own backyard, so to speak – there was ample evidence to demonstrate that the pendulum of progress had swung too far in the direction of development for development’s sake. There had been success stories during the inter-war period in some states, and those stories were inspirational at the time, but they were sporadic – scattered – and had little or no impact on the body politic at state or national levels. A correction was overdue. It arrived with the green bans, grass-roots activism, and the wave of fresh thinking within civil society during the 1960s and 1970s across the nation. It provided a breathing space for reformers to gather their forces and push for new laws, new policies and new governmental arrangements that would properly respond to the new conservation paradigms that were surfacing worldwide.

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Mundey knew he was on safe and sure ground when, for the next three decades or so, he channelled his efforts towards bringing heritage reforms to life. Along with fellow reformers and activists such as Milo Dunphy, Jeff Angel, Bob Brown, Judith Wright, David Yencken, Bob Walshe, Meredith Walker, June Poland, Jim Kerr, Elsa Atkin and Geoff Mosley, and NGOs like Australia ICOMOS, ACF, the TEC and the National Trusts, he helped to build a momentum within the conservation lobby that politicians would come to ignore at their peril. As he says, ‘Looking back, the thing I am most proud of was the change from black bans to green. That was the trigger for all the good things that came later.’ For a time, the efforts of these campaigners bore fruit. In every Australian state, new town planning and heritage protection statutes were drafted, exhibited, debated in the parliaments and passed into law. The names of more and more treasured properties found their way onto official lists and registers. Within the relevant legal limits, courts began to impose penalties for non-compliance with environmental laws. Nature conservation found itself with new teeth through laws to protect threatened species and ecological communities. Aboriginal sites and relics were at last being given the recognition they so richly deserved. Demolition of a listed building became an indictable offence and, in most states, a planning permit became necessary before any major demolition could take place. And over and above these changes came an increase in the opportunities for ordinary people to influence the planners and decision makers through better consultation and participation procedures. Storm clouds, though, are reforming today.35 As previously mentioned, Mundey’s original optimism is being diluted by fears that in Australia, a combination of economic rationalism in government and relentless profit seeking in the private sector is in the ascendancy. Jack sees growing evidence of a return to the

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‘growth is good’ mantra of the 1960s and 1970s. Across the nation, right-wing governments committed to a free-enterprise ethos are enjoying a return to power, and the opportunities so presented to fast track the assessment of major development proposals, to reduce red tape, to ease the flow of money into big projects, and to hinder grass-roots organisations from rightful intervention into the assessment and approval of projects bringing potential threats to the environment. Commonwealth funding for state-based Environmental Defenders Offices has been withdrawn. In the property industry, especially, the removal of so-called ‘green tape’ – irritating environmental barriers to investment – is seen by many as an absolute prerequisite for economic progress. Hard-won democratic principles are being eroded through the creation of ‘expert bodies’, such as the New South Wales Planning Assessment Commission and Joint Regional Planning Panels, which operate unaccountably and at arm’s length from locally elected councils. Once strong and independent public service agencies are being emasculated as skilled and experienced permanent officers with long memories are replaced by newcomers on short-term contracts, or by politically unaccountable consultants. The demise of ‘good government’ has become a frequent source of media debate as well as a topic brilliantly covered by award-winning journalist Laura Tingle in her recent Quarterly Essay. She deplores the ‘undermining’ of the public service ‘as a repository of ideas and experience’ in a bureaucratic climate in which corporate memory is lost and ‘politicians shut out or abuse their traditional sources of advice’.36 Meanwhile, in the Australian energy stakes, coal remains king while dozens of nations worldwide are winding down their dependence on what used to be called ‘black gold’ while vigorously promoting investment in wind and solar alternatives. On the heritage front, National and World Heritage sites are being threatened.

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Hugely influential and powerful lobby groups in the mining, energy, property and forestry sectors succeed in enlisting the support of sympathetic politicians and bureaucrats, stifling or delaying reforms designed to serve public as against private interests. In Queensland, ‘the last three years have seen things only become worse for our environment. Queensland’s unique environment is on the line … brought to its knees by years of bad government’.37 In the legal field, heritage laws and environmental controls are being relaxed to the point where, in New South Wales at least, the National Trust can confidently assert that ‘since the enactment of the Heritage Act 1977 and the Environmental Planning and Assessment Act 1979, measures for the protection of heritage have been weakened’. The trust goes further with its claim that ‘social significance has not been given due weight in heritage assessment and listing procedures.’38 In the same vein, CEO Brian Scarsbrick has reported that the Trust has joined ‘a chorus of protest … from a wide range of community and environmental groups’ 39 over proposed legislative changes in New South Wales, noting that the changes ‘enshrine economic growth as a guiding principle’ and will limit community opportunities ‘to challenge so-called complying developments on heritage and environmental grounds.’40 Over and above these concerns is the widespread evidence that a younger generation seems to be floating in a sea of indifference to current social, political and cultural challenges – unable or unwilling to take a public stand, or to demonstrate support for reform in the management and protection of the country’s natural and cultural resources. Within this group, in particular, there seems to be a general distrust of politicians and cynicism about political processes generally. But the news is not all bad.Witness the courageous stand taken in 2014 by leading Wallaby David Pocock, who was arrested while demonstrating against a coal seam gas project in northern

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New South Wales, and the crowd scenes at other demonstrations in which young faces are joining the not-so-young. Nonetheless, it seems that many young people today are drifting, with tens of thousands who are eligible to vote ignoring official invitations to enter the electoral roll.41 Willing or innocent victims of the digital revolution, they often appear detached and isolated from the main currents of debate about the green and brown environments. Incessantly playing the social media game and glued to their screens, they run the risk of losing track of what is happening on the ground outside their own front door, in their own neighbourhoods, let alone in the wider world beyond. Perhaps the pre-occupation with simple survival issues, like finding a job or a place to live, is stifling any reform instincts that might otherwise produce a new crop of inspirational leaders to carry forward the messages left by Mundey, Dunphy, Brown, Angel, Mosley,Yencken, Flannery and others. On this worrying note, Jack offers the following short but inspirational message to today’s youth: My message for young people is that people power saved The Rocks and Woolloomooloo. The people joined up with the unions – who were vilified at the time – but the battle was won, and today the unions are seen as heroes in those struggles. The same can happen today. People power can win the ecological battles, so don’t just stand there; the people can do it!

Opposite page, top: Jack and Judy Mundey. Mundey personal collection

Opposite page, bottom: Jim Colman and Jack Mundey, La Perouse, 2008. Author’s personal collection

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Epilogue

Joan Domicelj

J

ack Mundey is a gift we have received – a magnificent one, as it turns out.Wherever he has been over the years, he has continued to respond to the voices of local people and to their search for the protection of places of particular meaning to them – be it historic, aesthetic, scientific or social. Over time, his views on caring for country have expanded beyond the local to its broader environmental context. Jack’s actions have always paid respect to urban conservationist Jim Kerr’s statement that ‘developments do not take place in a vacuum but at an existing place in existing surroundings.1 This means taking these existing characteristics, both social and physical, into account. Mundey’s values ring out like a clarion call. He listens, then speaks with force and charm and has been, consistently, as stubborn as is necessary.We thank him for that and for the courage it requires. We are in debt to him, his wife Judy, and his many colleagues for all the good that has flowed from their efforts and from the green bans – as this book has shown. Now, however, we shudder at the current undertow we feel dragging us back. Powerful forces – some identified in the text of this book – with a strong distaste for regulation or public input, appear to control, or at least affect, major development decisions that involve our heritage.

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Cycles I loved reading this book as it wound through the cycles of my own life, with Jack popping up in the best parts. In my childhood, through the late 1940s, Chifley’s post-Second World War fervour for nation building was the great boost in which my parents, working with Nugget Coombs, were enthusiastically involved. In the extraordinary 1970s with the world’s environmental awakening, I was teaching in Chile. At the time we could taunt Pinochet’s draconian directives by presenting an ecological approach to development and by encouraging people to think about our world as a global system. Back home, Gough Whitlam’s ‘It’s Time’ had come, along with the green bans (of course) and the consequent establishment of state and national heritage bodies. The World Heritage Convention was born, and the United Nations held its Habitat Conference on Human Settlement in Vancouver, where Jack was such a star. I overheard him politely refusing international offers of work: ‘Thanks a lot, but I’m a builders labourer.’ From the mid 1990s to the early 2000s, Australia tried (and failed) to become a republic, the United Nations set out its millennium goals, the World Heritage Committee’s concepts linking nature and culture were refined and here in New South Wales, the reinvigorated Heritage Council flourished with greater community access and a broadened mandate. And as for the Living Treasure, former longterm communist Dr Jack Mundey AO, he chaired the imaginative Historic Houses Trust of New South Wales, and was appropriately showered with honorary doctorates and other accolades. So, there have been 30-year gaps between each of these three energetic peaks in my lifetime. Where do we stand now, in this

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particular interval? If there is to be another creative leap, must we wait until 2030?

W h a t n ow ? It’s odd. In 2014 Australia hosted the G20 summit in Brisbane that called, principally, for more development and economic growth. Simultaneously, in Sydney, we hosted the World Parks Congress, with its thousands of expert participants urging conservation. There has been little public debate over these apparently contrasting aspirations. How are we to achieve both environmental and economic goals? For many in Australia today, the prospects seem bleak, as we face profound public disenchantment with politicians and with government as a whole, the defunding or dismantling of effective social programs, the de-staffing or abolition of expert environmental agencies, a beleaguered public service, opaque processes, the silencing of dissent, and fast-growing disparities in power and wealth across society. Yet our spaceship earth continues to be an amazing place, a nourishing terrain, worthy of careful custodianship and protection from the myriad attacks upon it. At this moment, governments seem unlikely to lead, so who will? Eventually, change happens through the actions of ordinary people, inspired by special people like Jack Mundey. This story is, above all, about people and their actions in place and time. Communication technology offers the community tools for collective action, such as social media, with its speed and spread of information, and crowdfunding. A single example illustrates the hope for people power through instant information in space. It

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concerns the independent Australian Climate Commission that was set up in 2011 to advise the then Labor Government on the science of climate change. When Labor lost power in 2013, the new Liberal prime minister, a self-proclaimed climate change sceptic, disbanded the commission.There was an immediate public outcry, demanding its reinstatement, initially through social media but later through an online petition. The then Chief Commissioner, Tim Flannery, announced that the former commissioners had decided to form a new nongovernment independent organisation, the Climate Council, and to work pro bono. He sought startup funds for it through crowdfunding. By Friday of the first week, over 20,000 people had donated close to $1 million. At the time of writing the independent council continues to pursue its charter actively. Flannery’s initiative was in the true Mundey tradition: go to the grass roots and build from there. This has been Jack’s lifelong mantra and it works. I hope his story will inspire others to follow those firm and confident footsteps.

Joan Domicelj AM is an architect-planner, heritage adviser and cross-cultural mediator, with special interests in indigenous and non-indigenous cultural links with place; the implementation of UNESCO’s World Heritage Convention; and human rights and conflict resolution. Through the 1990s, she represented Australia on two international advisory bodies to UNESCO’s World Heritage Committee. In 1999 she was admitted to membership of the Order of Australia for ‘national and international service to the conservation of cross-cultural heritage’. She was later awarded the Centenary medal for her leadership in the successful Greater Blue Mountains Area World Heritage nomination.

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Endnote

Meredith Burgmann

I

t is wonderful to read Jim Colman’s book more than 40 years after the events that first propelled Jack Mundey onto the Australian and world stage, and almost 20 years after our book Green Bans: Red Union was published. That book described Jack in the intense industrial and political context of the 1970s, whereas Jim’s book places him in the greater context of battles around heritage, the environment and place. It emphasises the importance of Jack’s part in ‘protecting the commons’. Jim Colman brings to this work his vast knowledge of planning, architecture, heritage and the environment. Thoughts lead to other thoughts. Sometimes the story threatens to roll out of control but it always returns to the essential figure of Jack Mundey in the centre of the tale. Great and important characters inhabit the pages, past histories are revealed and long-forgotten organisations live again. Much of our history of community struggle is recorded. To those of us involved in the Resident Action Groups and BLF Support Groups at the time, Jack and the other BLF leaders inspired in us a sense of hope, an absolute belief that we could change the world … or at least our community. I’m not sure Jack or the BLF leadership was aware of this at the time … the hope that they gave to a new generation of activists. For us, the remarkable liberating effect of the rise of the New Left and the de-Stalinisation of the Australian Communist Party

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were our chief interests. ‘Dare to struggle, dare to win’ was our catch cry, and we weren’t always aware of the need to build the alliances that cemented our gains. Jack was. The fact that Jack’s time in the sun coincided with the coming of the Whitlam and Wran governments was not just a happy coincidence.They were all part of the political radicalisation of the 1960s and 1970s. And the migrant workers, the dogmen, scaffolders, steel-fixers and labourers were a crucial part of the story.These ordinary union members, inspiringly led, became the unlikely saviours of Sydney’s heritage.

In her own words, Dr Meredith Burgmann was ‘radicalised by the anti-Vietnam and anti-Apar theid movements of the 1960s’. She later became heavily involved in the early environment movement in Australia and in the Green Ban campaigns of the 1970s. She wrote her PhD and later, with her sister Verity Burgmann, wrote the book Green Bans: Red Union about Jack Mundey and the BLF. She was elected the first woman President of the Academics Union in New South Wales and later became a Labor member of the NSW parliament – eventually becoming president of the NSW Legislative Council. She has had a continued involvement in equal pay, anti-racism and aid and development issues. She has also written books on misogyny and ASIO.

Endnote

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Appendix 1

Key events in the evolution of the conservation movement in Australia and internationally

YEAR EVENT 1892 1895 1915 1922

1933 1933

1944

302

Sierra Club established in United States – probably the first international conservation body. English National Trust formally constituted – the world’s first national heritage conservation body. Tasmania: Scenery Preservation Act – first heritage statute in Australia. Controversy over timber logging in Royal National Park south of Sydney; ‘first major conservation battle fought in Australia’ Athens Charter – CIAM (Congrès Internationaux d’Architecture Moderne). The demolition of Burdekin House, a grand 1841 mansion in Macquarie Street, Sydney, becomes a landmark event that demonstrates the complete absence of legal safeguards for heritage buildings in New South Wales. Commonwealth of Australia Housing Commission Report.

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Y E A R E V E N T

National Trust of Australia (NSW) established in Sydney. 1945 Local Government legislation in New South Wales amended to allow protection of historic buildings. 1947 NSW Government appoints Historic Buildings Committee. 1949 NSW Chapter of the (then Royal) Australian Institute of Architects initiates the preparation of a historic buildings list. 1951 Cumberland County Plan for metropolitan Sydney includes heritage provisions (first Australian urban plan to do so). 1956 Victorian branch of the National Trust established. 1960 NSW National Trust legally incorporated by act of parliament. 1961 World Wildlife Fund established. 1961 St Malo, a historic house in Hunters Hill in Sydney (c.1856), demolished to make way for freeway after failure of lengthy campaign to save it. 1962 Silent Spring by Rachel Carson published. 1963 National Trust Association of Queensland established in August; incorporated as the National Trust of Queensland by act of parliament in December. 1964-66 Venice Charter – ICOMOS (International Council on Monuments and Sites) established. 1966 Australian Conservation Foundation legally incorporated – Sir Garfield Barwick first president. 1968–74 Property ‘boom’ in Sydney. 1968 Major discovery of Aboriginal remains at Lake Mungo, New South Wales. 1968 Sydney Cove Redevelopment Authority established, triggering community and trade union opposition to the proposed redevelopment of The Rocks area. 1969 Skeffington report on public participation in town planning (United Kingdom) released. 1969 Conservation Council of Victoria established (name changed to Environment Victoria in 1994). 1969 Queensland Conservation Council established. 1945

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YEAR EVENT

World’s first green ban – Kelly’s Bush, Sydney. 1970–75 Green ban era. 1970 Town and Country Planning Board in Victoria appoints Advisory Committee on Historic Area Conservation, protective controls introduced over development in the goldfield towns of Maldon and Beechworth. 1971 Greenpeace established (Vancouver). 1971 City of Sydney Strategic Plan includes heritage list and heritage policies/action plan. 1972 UN Conference on the Human Environment – UN Environment Program established in Stockholm. 1972 Total Environment Centre established in New South Wales. 1972 Friends of the Earth (Australia) established. 1972 UNESCO adopts the Convention concerning the Protection of the World Cultural and Natural Heritage; UNESCO mission to Australia. 1972 Only One Earth by Ward and Dubos published. 1972 First Club of Rome Report, Limits to Growth, released. 1973 Prime Minister Gough Whitlam appoints Committee of Inquiry into the National Estate. 1974 Report of the Commonwealth Committee of Inquiry into the National Estate released. 1974 Australia ratifies UNESCO convention. 1974 Second Club of Rome Report, Mankind at the Turning Point, released. 1975 Australian Heritage Commission established. 1976 UN HABITAT Conference in Vancouver. 1976 Wilderness Society established (Hobart). 1977 Australia ICOMOS established. 1977 Greenpeace Australia founded. 1977 Tbilisi, Georgia – UNEP/UNESCO Environmental Conference held. 1977–78 First heritage legislation in New South Wales – creation of NSW Heritage Council. 1978 UNCHS and UN HABITAT Centre established in Nairobi. 1970–71

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Y E A R E V E N T 1978 1979 1979 1980 1981

1981 1981 1982 1987 1988 1996 2000 2006

2007 2011 2014

2015

Confronting the Future by Charles Birch published. New South Wales introduces first comprehensive urban and environmental planning and assessment legislation. Australia ICOMOS adopts the Burra Charter. NSW Historic Houses Trust established. The Heritage of Australia (a monumental publication with 7500 illustrations and 6600 entries) published by Macmillan in association with the Australian Heritage Commission. Victorian Historic Buildings Act – first of its kind in Australia. Willandra Lakes, New South Wales, inscribed on World Heritage Register. The Conservation Plan (James Semple Kerr, first edition), Australia ICOMOS, released. Report of the World Commission on Environment and Development (the Brundtland Report) released. UN International Panel on Climate Change convened. UN HABITAT Conference in Istanbul. Blue Mountains (New South Wales) gains World Heritage listing. Australian Government Productivity Commission report no. 37 released: Conservation of Autsralia’s Historic Heritage Places. Sydney Opera House listed on World Heritage Register. Aboriginal heritage reform process commences in New South Wales. NSW Government announces proposed sale of some 300 leasehold residences in Millers Point, Sydney, without ‘proper assessment of all heritage impacts’ (National Trust NSW, August 2014). Australia signs Paris Climate Agreement.

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Appendix 2

Jack Mundey – Honours and awards

306

DAT E

HONOUR or AWA R D

CI TATI O N

23.11.1993

Honorary Life Membership, Australian Conservation Foundation

In recognition of his 20 years of service as a Councillor.

17.4.1998

Doctor of Letters (Honoris Causa) – University of Western Sydney

Mr Jack Mundey has had an outstanding public life and career as an activist both in the trade union movement and as a conservationist. He led the Green Bans movement which saved heritage areas of inner Sydney and which fundamentally changed the politics of conservation in Australia.

8.5.1998

Doctor of Science (Honoris Causa), University of New South Wales

Jack Mundey has performed eminent and vital service to society, and to the Sydney community in particular. In the 1960s and ’70s he was crucial in the development of the environmental movement and to increasing public awareness of the environment and the possibility of successful grassroots community action on such issues.

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DAT E

HONOUR or AWA R D

C I TATI O N

26.1.2000

Officer of the Order of Australia

For service to the identification and preservation of significant sections of Australia’s natural and urban heritage through initiating Green Bans and through the Historic Houses Trust of NSW. Through his leadership, the Builders’ Labourers Federation (NSW) was the trade union that pioneered ecological and social responsibility.

1.6.2001

Honorary Degree – Master of the Environment, University of Sydney

For outstanding services to the environment.

8.11.2002

Planning Institute of Australia – Honorary Fellow

For his significant contribution to planning in Australia and our region.

20.8.2003

CFMEU Gold Badge

Jack Mundey has often been described as ‘a living legend’ for his leadership of the BLF Green Ban campaign … but the bans would never have happened without the years of hard work building a union … having established a solid structure, [he] set about ‘civilising the union’ … but their horizons were not limited to job matters. Most famous of all was the Green Ban campaign … enormously controversial at the time but now almost unanimously applauded for its vision and courage; and JM has gone from being Public Enemy Number 1 in the press to a universally respected figure. Jack is without question one of the trade union movement’s finest sons.

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Appendix 3

Jack Mundey – Life/career chronology 1929–

YEAR

EVENT

1929

Born Malanda, Atherton Tableland, North Queensland; attended local schools – then St Augustine’s Marist Brothers College in Cairns. Commenced plumbing apprenticeship in Malanda. Travelled to Sydney to play Rugby League with the Parramatta Club; joined his first union (Federated Ironworkers Association). Became involved in his first political campaign: Ban the Bomb. Joined Communist Party of Australia. Resigns NSW presidency in 1975 and remains a member until the CPA is disbanded in 1991. Joined NSW Branch of the Builders Labourers’ Federation. Elected leader of the rank-and-file committee of the BLF. Elected to the executive of the BLF; in 1962 became full-time union organiser. Arrested for defying police orders – anti-Vietnam War protest – first of six arrests for political action in Sydney. Elected president, Communist Party of Australia (Sydney District Committee). Elected Secretary of the BLF (NSW Branch).

1945 1951

1953 1955

1956 1958 1961 1964 1966 1968

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YEAR

EVENT

Travelled to Moscow as member of Australian Communist Party delegation to attend May Day celebrations. 1970–71 Kelly’s Bush campaign, Hunters Hill, Sydney – first use of the term ‘green ban’. 1971 The Rocks campaign commences in Sydney – green bans follow. 1971 Victoria Street campaign – green ban. 1972 Pitt Street Congregational Church – green ban. 1972 Theatre Royal campaign – green ban – JM meets Lend Lease chief Dick Dusseldorp and architect Harry Seidler. 1972 Centennial Park–Moore park campaign – green ban – JM meets Patrick White. 1973 JM arrested in The Rocks by police – Playfair Building blockade. 1973 Woolloomooloo campaign – green ban. 1973 NSW Liberal Premier Askin vetoes JM appointment to Commonwealth Committee of Inquiry into the National Estate. 1973 November – JM stepped down from BLF Executive under the ‘limited tenure’ policy that he himself had introduced. 1973 BLF (NSW) deregistered; JM loses union ticket; temporarily unemployed; elected to the National Council of the Australian Conservation Foundation. 1974 JM joined National Trust (NSW) – but tenure of membership remains uncertain. 1975 Travelled to United Kingdom on invitation of Centre for Environmental Studies; various lecturing and public appearances in London and provincial cities; advises on a successful green ban to save the Old Birmingham Post Office. 1976 Attended UN Habitat Conference in Vancouver, Canada; attends meetings in various North American cities on west coast; meets Paul Ehrlich, Barbara Ward, Petra Kelly; addresses Sierra Club, World Wildlife Fund and Friends of the Earth; JM is one of 24 international signatories to the NGO Declaration of the Vancouver Symposium (May 31); Petra Kelly returns home inspired by green ban saga and forms first Green Party in Germany. 1969

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YEAR

EVENT

Elected convenor of the ACF Committee for Industry, Employment and the Human Environment. 1981 Publication of JM autobiography; Jack Mundey: Green Bans and Beyond. 1984–87 Elected to Sydney City Council as Alderman for Gipps Ward. 1987 NSW Government dismisses the City Council – administrator appointed. 1988 Stood for election to the NSW Legislative Council as lead candidate for the Community Independent Group. 1993 Retired from ACF Council; awarded Honorary Life Membership. 1995–2001 Appointed chair of NSW Historic Houses Trust (HHT) by Premier Bob Carr. 1997 Named National Living Treasure by National Trust (NSW). 1998 Awarded Doctorate of Letters (Honoris Causa) University of Western Sydney. 1998 Awarded Doctorate of Science (Honoris Causa) – University of New South Wales. 1998 Elected Chair of Save East Circular Quay Committee – leads two-year campaign. 1998 Awarded Life Membership of CFMEU (successor to BLF); awarded Life Membership of Unions New South Wales. 1999 Awarded Life Membership of National Trust, New South Wales. 2000 Appointed as Officer of the Order of Australia. 2000 Subject of Film Australia’s Australian Biography series 2001 Awarded degree of Honorary Master of Environment, University of Sydney. 2001 Retired from Chair of HHT; becomes HHT Patron. 2003 Joined the Greens Party, 2004 Elected Chair, Annual Eureka Symposium (current). 2002 Elected Honorary Fellow of Australian Planning Institute; part of Argyle Street in The Rocks renamed Jack Mundey Place by the NSW Geographical Names Board. 1978

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YEAR

EVENT

2005

Appointed to jury for international Barangaroo urban design competition. Awarded Honorary Life Membership of National Trust New South Wales. Official opening of Jack Mundey Place in The Rocks. Featured in State of Siege documentary film (Dennis Grosvenor, director). Named as Patron of the Barangaroo Action Group and Friends of Barangaroo.

2006 2009 2011 2011

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Appendix 4

Select list of green ban sites c. 1970s

N E W S O U T H WA LE S

ANZ Bank Martin Place National Trust preservation status. Botany High Rise Similar to Mascot High Rise. Botany Municipality Ban in support of council opposition to high-rise flats on single lots; and on industrial development in residential areas. Burwood Ban in support of resident opposition to demolition of historic building as part of a car park proposal. CML Building, Martin Place National Trust preservation status. Colonial Mutual Building, Sydney Temporary ban in support of National Trust listing. Cook Road, Centennial Park High-rise redevelopment proposals abandoned after green ban was placed at request of residents. Darlinghurst Residents, request for medium-density, low-to-middle income housing supported by green ban. Diethnes Restaurant, Castlereagh Street, Sydney Ban in support of tenants’ concern over proposed redevelopment of their premises. Dr Busby’s Cottage, Bathurst Temporary ban.

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Dunbar Park, Ryde Green ban successfully prevented park from being threatened by a proposed council waste tip. Eastern Freeway Similar to bans on freeway projects in the inner west. Eastlakes Ban to ensure retention of parklands in a large residential redevelopment project. Education Department, North Newtown Ban on demolition allowed for a community education plan to be prepared, to include a wide range of facilities for local needs. Freeways BLF ban on all demolition work associated with proposed inner city freeway projects; so-called Nielson Transportation Plan condemned as unacceptable on social grounds. Helen Keller House, Woollahra National Trust listing saved from demolition by green ban. Jeremy Fisher Green ban on building projects at Macquarie University following Fisher’s expulsion because of his homosexuality. Kelly’s Bush Natural bushland in Hunters Hill that was threatened by private high-density residential development project. Kings Cross Temporary ban to enable a community-based plan to be prepared. Lyndhurst, Glebe National Trust listed property saved. Mascot High Rise Ban imposed due to residents’ fear of losing public open space in a large proposed subdivision. Moore Park/Centennial Park Proposed construction of Olympic games facilities in the city’s biggest park abandoned after green ban was placed. Motorway to Newcastle The Blackbutt Forrest Action Group enlisted BLF help in thwarting a freeway proposal through prime busland; redesign followed. Mount Druitt Outer western suburban public housing estate – ban led to design concessions by developers and Housing Commission. National Mutual Building, Martin Place National Trust preservation status. Newcastle/East End Ban in support of civic plans for retaining historic east end precinct. Newcastle Hotel, The Rocks Unsuccessful ban to save a popular hotel in a declared redevelopment area.

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Northwest Expressway, Glebe Proposed freeway threatened destruction of hundreds of houses in this inner-city area; plans abandoned after green ban was imposed at request of residents. Opera House carpark Plans amended after green ban to ensure retention of trees, historic sandstone cliff face and adjoining landscape. Pitt Street Congregational Church The first National Trust listed item to be saved from demolition and redevelopment. Port Kembla Ban supporting local call for rejection of high-rise housing and for reclamation of beachfront parkland. Port Macquarie Ban supporting local opposition to high-rise on beachfront and headland. Pyrmont and Ultimo Ban inspired by resident concern over potential loss of housing resulting from massive freeway proposals in this inner city area. Redfern Aboriginal Centre Ban provided temporary support for this controversial project. Regent Theatre Ban imposed to save this historic theatre from demolition; ban survived for several years but was unable to prevent the later redevelopment. Rileys Island Ban successfully prevented mass environmental degradation of the island, which was the subject of a large residential subdivision proposal – the project proceeded but under strict controls. Royal Australian College of Physicians, Macquarie Street Ban to protect National Trust listed property. South Sydney

Ban in support of opposition to high-rise.

St Johns Park Ban triggered by unwanted property resumptions and inadequate compensation. The Rocks Inner urban historic residential precinct threatened by state government plans for comprehensive redevelopment for high-rise office, residential and hotel uses. Theatre Royal, Castlereagh Street MLC redevelopment project halted by green ban until Lend Lease agreed to inclusion of a new live theatre to replace the original Theatre Royal whose demolition was imminent.

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Tomaree Peninsular Temporary but successful ban leading to lifting of alleged high-rise proposals for this coastal living area. Victoria Street, Potts Point Urban residential – some heritage attributes – facing replacement of low-middle income rental housing with luxury high-rise apartments. Waterloo Ban supporting demolition of houses in preparation for high-rise Housing Commission development. Western Expressway, Leichhardt Proposed freeway threatened destruction of hundreds of houses in this inner-city area; plans abandoned after green ban was imposed at request of residents. Woolloomooloo Official plans for high-rise commercial redevelopment abandoned after green bans and successful negotiations that led to medium-density residential and retention of heritage sites. Note: In the foreword to Green bans – Inspirational Activism (The Greens, NSW, 2013) reference is made to ‘recent green bans’ placed by the CFMEU as the successor to Mundey’s BLF. The list includes • Woolloomooloo Finger Wharf – early 1900s; when demolition was threatened, protests led to a green ban that forced a rethink by the government (as owner) and the subsequent conversion of the structure for hotel and residential use. • Maritime Service Building, Circular Quay west – 2001: green ban prevented demolition, paving the way for the building’s incorporation into the new Museum of Contemporary Art. • Union Square, Pyrmont – 2004: four National Trust listed terrace houses saved from demolition and incorporated into this historic inner city civic space. QU E E N S LA N D

Belle Vue Hotel, Brisbane The Mansions, George Street, Brisbane Queensland Club TA S M A N I A

Colonial-era buildings in Battery Point, Hobart

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V IC TO R I A (mainly Melbourne city and inner suburbs)

19th century townscape in Emerald Hill estate, South Melbourne 61 Spring Street Ancient cypress trees Beaurepaire Pool Blanche Terrace, Fitzroy Bushland habitat, Blackburn Road Bushland in South Warrandyte Cardigan Street, Carlton (parkland site protected) Cathedral Place City Baths Commercial Bank of Australia, Collins Street Construction work on supermarkets seeking to raise their prices Dwelling in Abbotsford (on freeway site) Factory proposal in East Brunswick Flinders Street Station Gordon House (for the homeless) Houses in Mordialloc Mac’s Hotel, Franklin Street Morgue proposal in South Melbourne Mount Eliza Way Natural gas pipeline, Barrier Highway Newport Power Station Princess Theatre Proposed demolition of historic buildings in Yallourn Proposed restaurant, Point Ormond Quarrying at Arthur’s Seat (Mornington Peninsular) Queen Victoria Market Regent Theatre Royal Botanical Gardens St Patrick’s Tower

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Tasma Terrace in Parliament Place Terrace houses in Parkville Terrace housing in Carlton Treasury Building Windsor Hotel restaurant W ES T E R N AU S T R A LI A

Historic maritime buildings, port of Fremantle Palace Hotel, Perth Sources: Burgmann, M and Burgmann, V, 1998; and BLF records

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Acknowledgements

S

erious research for this book commenced with two key starting points: Jack Mundey’s 1981 memoir, Green Bans and Beyond, which he dedicated to ‘community action, environmentalists, and trade unionists with a social conscience’, and Meredith and Verity Burgmann’s monumental Green bans Red Union (1998). Jack and his wife Judy have my heartfelt thanks for giving me the opportunity to get his great story into print. Many others deserve special thanks. My wife Elizabeth has been a constant source of valued advice, encouragement and comment. My daughter Susan, son Tim and his wife Monique provided critical feedback on the first draft, and Tim contributed the photographs of Mundey country. My son Simon executed a tricky photographic assignment in Sydney – covering Kelly’s Bush, The Rocks, Woolloomooloo, and the Pitt Street Congregational Church. My son Ben provided creative suggestions and advice on commercial aspects. For permission to take high-level photographs of The Rocks I am indebted to the Shangri-La Hotel management and Kristen Roman, Communications Executive. Outside family, Sylvia Lawson valiantly and voluntarily undertook a comprehensive preliminary edit – a mammoth task for such a busy person. Valuable comments and suggestions on early drafts were provided by Shirley Fitzgerald, Robert Freestone, Peter Watts, Jeff Angel, Geoff Mosley, Antje Dun, Julie Blyth, Colin Griffiths,

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John and Jocelyn Morris, Peter Webber and Geraldine O’Brien. Sharon Veale and Sheri Burke helped with insights into the important place of women in the heritage story. Writing from his Melbourne base, David Yencken deserves special mention for his hugely important insights and advice on the heritage movement as it evolved outside New South Wales – before and after the first green ban. David’s firsthand memories of the Whitlam-Uren era, during which so many reforms were born and in which he himself played such a key role, are absolutely vital cogs in the ever-turning heritage wheel. Senator Lee Rhiannon, Greens leader and ardent Mundey supporter, offered networking help and useful comments on the final manuscript. Trades Hall archivist Neale Towart was a vital source of help during the research phase. I will always be indebted to him for organising access to some of the Mundey papers and memorabilia, and for the chance to sit down and work in the very room in the Sydney Trades Hall in which some fiery debates took place before, during and after the Mundey era.Through City Historian Lisa Murray, City Archivist Ben Arnfield and his predecessor Mark Stevens, I was able to work through the minutes of Sydney City Council meetings during Jack Mundey’s term as an Alderman. And I enjoyed similar support and assistance from Julie Blyth at the National Trust, Matthew Stephens and Jennifer Rayner at Sydney Living Museums, and the Caroline Simpson Library. My thanks also go to other parties whose help was vital in getting the work to completion. In particular I must mention the following: Professor the Hon. Bob Carr; Joan Domicelj, AO; Dr Meredith Burgmann for her encouragement and general comments; Cox Richardson Architects, Sydney (John Richardson and Charlie Chen) for expert assistance with digital graphics and design; Deborah Dearing (Sydney Harbour Foreshore Authority)

Acknowledgements

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for permission to use archival images of early proposals for the redevelopment of The Rocks; Robert Hannaford for permission to reproduce his portrait of Jack Mundey; The Dusseldorp Forum and Jessica Duffy for permission to reproduce the photograph of Dick Dusseldorp and Jack Mundey; Max Cullen for permission to use extracts from his book Tell ’em nothing, take ’em nowhere, Pan Macmillan, 2010; Dr Adrian Groves and the SEARCH Foundation for financial support and for permission to use the cover of The Tribune (29 August 1972); David Wright for assistance with research at the National Library of Australia; and Frances Miller for web design. Finally I wish to acknowledge the strong support and generous financial assistance of the Sydney City Council through its History Publication Sponsorship Program, and Phillipa McGuinness and the team at NewSouth Publishing for their support and guidance.

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Notes

PREFACE

1 The survival of the NSW EDO is uncertain and, at the commonwealth level, Attorney-General George Brandis has announced the end of federal funding to all Australian EDOs – EDO Qld, What’s Happening – News Archive, 8/12/14. 2 Personal comment to author, 14 October 2015. 3 The exception was the federal council of the Builders Labourers’ Federation, led by Norm Gallagher, and its 1973 Melbourne-based campaign to have the NSW Branch deregistered. CHAPTER 1

From the dairy to the big smoke

1 Mundey, 1981, p. 21. Mundey remained a member until CPA disbanded in 1991 after 30 years of post-war tumult that saw two unsuccessful attempts by conservative federal governments to have it banned. 2 See Appendix 2. 3 Colman, 1969. 4 Reticulated sewage treatment and disposal systems were not connected to places in outer Sydney and Melbourne until the 1970s or later. 5 Among its achievements was the preservation of Port Arthur and many fine Georgian building in Hobart. 6 UNESCO, 1972. 7 Committee of Inquiry into the National Estate, 1974, p. 334. The third point provides a framework for identifying the bulk of heritage items that occur at a local or community level. 8 The BLF had its origins in the 1860s as the United Labourers’ Protection Society (ULPS) and the United Hod Carriers’ Society. In 1900 there was a split in the ULPS and the Builders Labourers Union was formed. It became a federal union in 1910–11. 9 Burgmann and Burgmann, 1998, pp. 93–94. 10 Hammond, 2014. 11 Farrelly, 2014. She makes the despairing admission that ‘we don’t use the word heritage any more … heritage hasn’t just fallen off the agenda; it has been kicked under the table and into the gutter.’ 12 See also Webber, 2014.

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13 Ibid. 14 Farrelly, 2015. 15 Thalis and Cantrill, 2013, p. 170 and 102. CHAPTER 2

How green was my valley … or was it?

1 Boyd, 1968, p. 26. 2 See Taylor, 1986. 3 Co-founded by David Yencken, who later chaired the Interim Committee of the National Estate (1974–75) and served a term as president of the Australian Conservation Foundation. 4 See Colman, 1970. 5 For example, the Carlton Association, North Melbourne Association and Parkville Association. 6 Daly, p. 2. 7 ibid., p. 1. 8 Shaw, p. 86. 9 Mundey, p 32 10 1985 documentary film, Ronin Films. 11 Latta, 1986, p. 1. 12 Committee of Inquiry into the National Estate, p. 28. 13 Harry Seidler AC, OBE was born in Vienna in 1923 and settled in Sydney in 1948, establishing a design studio that achieved national and international fame. He died in 2006. See chapters 6 and 7 for his links with Mundey. 14 Whitford, 1992. 15 In 1966, Bacon travelled from Philadelphia to deliver the keynote address to a planning congress in Sydney. Local architect Colin Griffiths recalled in January 2015 that Bacon’s advice at the time of his visit was to protect the Queen Victoria Building, the Town Hall, St Andrews Cathedral and the (then) Gresham Hotel as a valuable heritage group. 16 As will be seen later in the discussion of The Rocks campaign in Sydney, one of the schemes actually proposed such a ‘transplantation’ for Cadman’s Cottage, the oldest house in the CBD. The concept is abhorrent to heritage purists. 17 Le Corbusier, p. 91; emphasis added. 18 Colman, 1971. 19 Thompson, 2007. 20 Department of Post-War Reconstruction, 1942 21 Troy, 1978, p. 17. 22 See Ruming, 2010. 23 Freestone, 1999. 24 www.TCPA.org.au. 25 James, P, 2013. 26 See Albani and Cotis, 2007; they quote Slade, 1985, with his claim (perhaps questionable) that 1922 saw the ‘first major conservation battle in Australia’ over timber logging in Sydney’s Royal National Park.

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27 Freestone, 1999, pp 44–60. This provides detailed coverage of the efforts of ‘a coalition of pioneering preservationists which confronted a formidable growth mentality which linked preservation with economic and cultural stasis.’ 28 The architect of Burdekin House (1841), a grand three-storey Regency-style mansion, is unknown but sometimes attributed to James Hume. Herman, 1954, claims Hume’s influence was solely that of supervising architect during construction. The site at 197 Macquarie Street is now occupied by St Stephen’s Presbyterian Church (1935). See Pearl, 1970, for two of Wilson’s beautiful pencil and crayon renderings of the house before demolition. 29 Winston, 1957. 30 Constructed c. 1856 by Didier Joubert, émigré French entrepreneur, developer and Hunters Hill pioneer. It is highly probable he named his house after the historic French township of the same name on the Brittany coast. 31 Winston, 1957, p. 11. 32 Jack, 2010. 33 A collection of sandstone building fragments on Sydney’s Bennelong Point offers sad reminders of these losses in what might be called a ‘heritage cemetery’. CHAPTER 3

A city and a river

1 Mundey, 1987. 2 Despite continuing debate about this term, this writer has no doubts on the matter. 3 Forster, 1996, p. 7. 4 Riviere, 1999. 5 Balzac, 1837. 6 Barko, 2004. 7 www.sydneyaldermen.com.au. 8 www.huntershill.nsw.gov.au. 9 Established in 1968, the Trust, according to Sherry, 1989, ‘has been influential in all decisions which have resulted in the preserving and conserving of Hunter’s Hill … [and has] been in the vanguard of the Australian conservation movement.’ 10 Reforms were being pursued in Victoria and South Australia but the Kelly’s Bush green ban provided an unexpected boost to the movement, and to the morale of conservationists across the nation. 11 See Towart, 2004 trade union archivist, who Battlers, 1996. The green ban era generated a spate of small publications. Some were highly polemical, some of dubious veracity, some lightweight reportage; examples include Thomas, 1973; Hardman and Manning, n.d.; Nielsen, c. early 1970s. 12 Mundey, 1981, p. 81. 13 For example, in June 1971 Sheehan requested help from the Federated Miscellaneous Workers Union of Australia (NSW). The union’s secretary was sympathetic, and forwarded her letter to the NSW Labor Council with the request that something be done ‘to preserve this last section of natural bush on the Parramatta River.’

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14 Now the headquarters of Unions NSW. In 1983 the Trades Hall was placed under a Preservation Order by the NSW Heritage Council and was later listed on the NSW Heritage Register. 15 Garden, 1992, p. 248. 16 According to Cavalier, 2004, the subsequent endorsement of the ban by the Labor Council of NSW was a unanimous vote on the motion of John Ducker. He also notes that Jack Cambourne, secretary of the Federated Engine Drivers’ and Firemens’ Association, offered the support of his union. 17 Office of the Minister for Planning and Environment, NSW, May 1986, News Release – Carr releases Kelly’s Bush plan. 18 Peñalosa addressed an audience in the Great Hall of Sydney University on 18 October 1976, following his involvement in the UN Vancouver Conference on Human Settlements in May of that year. Mundey was a signatory to the 31 May Declaration of the Vancouver Symposium, whose rapporteur was Barbara Ward. 19 James, 2013. CHAPTER 4

Grass-roots stirrings

1 See Appendix 4. 2 Builders Labourer’s Federation Archives, The Federation, 1975, p. 7. Gallagher was a controversial Australian trade unionist, and high-profile member of the Communist Party of Australia. 3 The Federated Engine Drivers and Firemen’s Association of Australia (NSW) and the Federated Miscellaneous Workers Union of Australia (NSW) were supportive, as was the Labor Council of NSW. Mundey archives. 4 Burgmann and Burgmann, p. 52. This was probably an oblique recognition of the fact that South Australia and Victoria were under the relatively enlightened leaderships of Don Dunstan and John Cain respectively. At the time, planning in those states was well regarded. 5 Irving and Cahill, 2010, p. 307. 6 Pitt, 2011. 7 The much earlier Tasmanian Scenery Preservation Act 1915 provided for acquisition of ‘lands of scenic or historic interest’ but was not a comprehensive heritage-based statute. 8 Quoted by Lloyd, 1977, p. 12. 9 Worskett, 1969. 10 In 1966 The Venice Charter led to the establishment of ICOMOS and in 1972 UNESCO adopted the Convention concerning the Protection of the World Cultural and Natural Heritage. 11 Lloyd, 1977, p. 13. 12 Lloyd, 1977, p. 15. 13 Mundey, 1981, p. 101. 14 ibid., p. 143. 15 Burgmann and Burgmann, 1998, said at the time of the Kelly’s Bush saga, p. 277. 16 Mundey, 1981, p. 102.

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17 A community-based group seeking a unified architectural solution to the redevelopment of ageing commercial properties fronting Circular Quay east (Sun Herald, p. 55). Mundey admired the visionary plan by Sydney architect Dino Buratini and raised the prospect of a union ‘stop work’ ban on the ‘Toaster’ project. 18 The successor to the BLF, the CFMEU, placed a green ban on the project during the campaign. (See Chapter 6). 19 The paths of Mundey and White crossed several times during the green ban era and after. 20 Friends of Barangaroo, promotional flyer for Sydney Town Hall Rally, 3 August 2010 21 Le Soeur, 2011, p. 16. 22 Parramatta Female Factory Friends. 23 Sydney Morning Herald, 12 April 2014, obituary, p. 50. 24 Poland took a leading role in saving Strickland House in Vaucluse, colonial architect John Verge’s Rose Bay Lodge in Woollahra, and the site of the first Government House in Bridge Street in the city, now a key element in the Museum of Sydney. 25 Australia ICOMOS,1996. 26 Kerr studied in the United Kingdom under famed architectural historian Nikolaus Pevsner, worked for the Australian Heritage Commission in the 1970s, and later chaired the National Trust (NSW) Historic Buildings Committee. Obituary, Sydney Morning Herald, 22 December 2014. 27 Australia ICOMOS has a special relationship with the World Heritage Committee, and participates in the decisions of ICOMOS at the international level. In 1978, the NSW Heritage Council hosted a visit to Sydney of the then Secretary-General (Dr EA Connolly). 28 Domicelj has contributed an epilogue to this book. 29 Boyd, 1963, pp. 99–100. 30 Boyd, p. 100. 31 Burgmann and Burgmann, 1998, pp. 230–31. 32 RAIA, 1966. Apart from the individuals cited here, the committee also included architect Colin Griffiths who went on to a successful career as an associate of Harry Seidler and later as a teacher and consultant in his own right; and John Toon, later Associate Professor of Town and Country Planning at the University of Sydney. 33 Colman, 1968. 34 Colman, 1993. 35 For example, William Holford advised Prime Minister Menzies on the creation of the NCDC; Gareth Roberts became NCDC Director of Architecture; Denis Winston and Gordon Stephenson sat on the NCDC advisory committee; Brian Lewis advised on the early planning of the Australian National University in Canberra and designed University House; the ANU’s first residential college, awarded the Sulman Medal 1953. 36 Proudfoot quoted in Toon and Falk, 2004. 37 Proudfoot, 1967. 38 Freestone, 1994, p. 8.

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39 Other members of the inaugural council included the present author (representing the architectural and planning professions) and John Morris (representing the National Trust). Its Chair was Justice Hope, of National Estate Inquiry fame. 40 The Builder, ‘Editorial’, July 1974, p. 270. 41 The Builder, ‘Editorial’, November 1973, p. 488. 42 Garden, 1992, p. 277. 43 Today, the confidentiality issue remains a matter of serious concern, as was forcibly expressed by Joan Domicelj in her 2015 Jim Kerr Memorial Lecture in Sydney. 44 United Nations, 1976. 45 Committee of Inquiry into the National Estate, 1974, p. 24. 46 Burgmann and Burgmann, 1998, p. S6. 47 ibid. 48 He was quoted as saying the 10–20 million cost of restoring the Sydney Town Hall would lead ‘to further cutbacks on community welfare and services’ by Anita Catalano, Sun-Herald, 11 November 1990. 49 In his report, Bunning drew heavily on historical research by Roseth, 1967. 50 Bunning, 1968, p. 13. 51 Ruming, et al., 2010. 52 See Jackson Teece Chesterman Willis Consultants, 1973. 53 A BLF Green Ban at the time was instrumental in saving Lyndhurst, the grand c. 1833 Glebe house that later became the headquarters of the Historic Houses Trust during the 1980s. 54 See www.glebesociety.org and Strachan, 2009. 55 See www.balmainassociation.org.au. 56 Freestone, 2014. The Society was dissolved in 1982. 57 ibid. 58 Bridgeland, 2012. 59 Stretton, 1989, p. 272. 60 Burgmann and Burgmann, 1998, p. 279. 61 Colman, 1972. 62 Bellear was the first Indigenous Australian to be appointed to the judiciary. His admission to the NSW Bar in 1979 was followed by his move to the District Court bench in 1996. He was a former Redfern resident and founder of the Aboriginal Housing Corporation in 1972. The BLF also provided logistical support for the 1972 establishment of the Aboriginal Tent Embassy in the forecourt of the Old Parliament House in Canberra. 63 Pollock, 2008. 64 See Appendix 4. 65 Burgmann and Burgmann, 1998, pp. 50–51. 66 Sandercock, 1974. 67 Forty years after Sandercock’s position was published, 300-odd state-owned workers’ dwellings in the heritage-listed Rocks area of Sydney are being auctioned by the government, ostensibly to raise funds for social housing elsewhere in metro Sydney. Wealthy owners will replace pensioner tenants; heritage controls will be lifted or emasculated to ease the transition.

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68 Similar bodies exist in South Australia (Conservation Council of SA), Tasmania (Tasmanian Conservation Trust), Queensland (Queensland Conservation Council) and NSW (Nature Conservation Council). 69 Angel, 2008. According to the cover blurb, Angel was the longest-serving environmental campaigner in Australia’ at the time of publication. 70 ibid., p. 41. 71 See, for example, Southern Sydney Regional Organisation of Councils, report of the Botany Bay program 2001. 72 Ward, 1972. 73 The first Greens Party in Australia was formed in Sydney in 1984 and was officially registered in 1985. Greens Senator Lee Rhiannon claims that the party’s roots ‘go back to the community activism of the 1960s and 1970s … when the Green Bans changed the political weather … Jack Mundey is now a proud member of the Greens … he has dedicated his life to the environment and social justice.’ Rhiannon, 2013. 74 The Greens NSW, media release, 11 March 2003, quoting Mundey. According to Sydney historian Shirley Fitzgerald (comment to author, 2014), Mundey was never ‘enamoured of the Labor Party’ and he retained his membership of the Communist Party of Australia until it was disbanded in the 1990s. 75 Burgmann and Burgmann, 1998. p. 10. 76 Brady, 1998, p. 429. 77 www.sierraclub.org. 78 Mundey, 1981, p. 139. 79 Robinson, 1975. 80 Mundey remembers His Royal Highness as somewhat ‘bumptious’ initially, but later in his lengthy presidential term he took a keen interest in the Australian conservation movement and was a staunch supporter of the ACF. 81 See www.foe.org.au/history. 82 The lyrics (unsigned) were printed in a program for the event provided to Jack Mundy by English union leader Pete Carter. 83 Angel, 2008, pp. 40, 60. 84 Mundey, 1981, p. 127. 85 The cover blurb of the 1966 edition states: ‘what we have to face is not an occasional dose of poison which has accidentally got into some article of food, but a persistent and continuous poisoning of the whole human environment’. 86 Ward and Dubos, 1972. 87 Founded in 1968 by Italian industrialist Aurelio Peccei and Scottish scientist Alexander King, the club’s initial mission focused on the likely consequences of unlimited and unrestricted resource consumption at the global level. 88 Birch, 1978, p. 73. At the time of his writing, Birch held the Challis Chair of Biology at the University of Sydney and was an active member of the Club of Rome. This best-selling book was reprinted three times by Penguin. 89 Erhlich, 1971 and 1977. 90 Ward and Dubos, 1972. Emphasis added. 91 Hutton and Connors, 1987, p. 41.

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92 Mundey, 1981, p. 36. 93 Quoted in Searle, 1980. 94 See Troy, 1978, pp. 30–35, for a concise overview of this historically significant shift in official federal attitudes towards the cities. 95 In NSW, cognate legislation included the National Parks and Wildlife Conservation Act 1974. 96 Uren, 1995. 97 ibid.. p 275. 98 Lloyd, 1977, p. 15. 99 Askin’s opinion of Mundey is quoted in Burgmann and Burgmann, 1998,. p. 253: ‘Mundey’s irresponsibility … responsible NSW people have had a gutful of this selfavowed Communist’. 100 Mundey, 1981, pp. 127–28. 101 Bourke later became CEO of the Arts Council. 102 The author was a member of this first council, along with John Morris, Professor Kenneth Cable, Sid Vaughan, Michael Addison, Robert Nicholls, Nigel Ashton, DA Johnstone, JW Thompson and Peter Webber. 103 NSW Minister for Planning and Environment, media release, 7 April 1978. 104 In NSW, Aboriginal relics were already protected under the NSW National Parks and Wildlife Act 1974. 105 Productivity Commission, Conservation of Australia’s Historic Places, 2006, Table 4.1, pp. 56–57. CHAPTER 5

Big issues, big battles

1 Legend has it that NSW Premier Bob Askin told his driver to ‘run over the bastards’ as his car approached a group of anti-Vietnam war protestors during the 1966 war-time visit to Sydney of US President Lyndon B. Johnson. 2 Steketee and Cockburn, p. 59. 3 Burgmann and Burgmann, 1998, p. 258. 4 Mundey, J, pp. 2-3. 5 Blackmore, 1988. The National Trust made representations for the preservation of Cadman’s Cottage, Argyle Bond and Metcalfe Bond according to a file note 1 March 1974, signed by John Morris, Acting Director. 6 Overall, 1995. 7 NT file note, 1 March 1974. 8 The list included Denis Winston, Gordon Stephenson, Gareth Roberts, Brian Lewis and Roger Johnson. As Professor of Town and Country Planning at University College London during the 1960s, Holford taught a number of Australian planners (including the author) who had travelled to the UK to further their professional careers at a time when no Australian university offered an accredited course in the discipline. 9 There was no prior White Paper and no opportunity for public debate on the Bill. 10 In the preface to his 2005 book about The Rocks Magee makes it clear his promotion to Brigadier had been announced shortly before he applied for the SCRA position. The cover blurb refers to his holding the position of Honorary

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Representative Colonel Commandant of the Royal Australian Engineers, and includes his photograph with two rows of service medals. 11 SCRA’s 1978 Annual Report claimed that a 1970 survey revealed about 100 families living in the area. 12 Emphasis added. 13 Magee, 2005, pp. 47–48. 14 Mundey’s language describing these same events in his 1981 memoir is noticeably more temperate. 15 Colman, 1999. 16 ibid. 17 Magee, 2005, pp. 37 and 47. 18 File note dated 1 March 1974 by John Morris, Acting Director. 19 The Trust later shifted its position when in 1978 the area was listed as a historic conservation zone. 20 ‘New brutalism’ was an architectural style that flourished from the 1950s to the mid 1970s in Great Britain, Australia and elsewhere. Typically it produced large, formidable exposed concrete structures, the design conveying messages of strength, functionality and frugal construction. The UTS tower on Sydney’s Broadway is a good example. 21 Burgmann and Burgmann, 1998, p. 197. 22 The same might be said about public attitudes towards the later Barangaroo development in Sydney (2014). 23 The SCRA was required by statute to offer resettlement in the area or elsewhere to those tenants whose dwellings were scheduled for demolition. 24 Although denied control over development in The Rocks, the council vigorously embraced the cause of heritage conservation in its seminal 1971 Strategic Plan, in which the East and West Rocks were (for the first time) officially identified as ‘historic areas’ worthy of priority action. The plan listed 178 structures and areas considered to be of ‘architectural and historic significance’ within the city boundaries. See Council of the City of Sydney strategic plan, 1971, pp. 144 and 146. 25 The ban was lifted in 1975. According to Hoskins (2009, p. 286 et seq.), ‘it was a pivotal moment in the history of planning generally, and foreshore development more particularly. A working class precinct was to be saved because heritage, history and an organically formed sense of place were accepted as significant elements of the city.’ 26 Magee, 2005, pp. 217–22. 27 Created in 1998 to consolidate the work and functions of the City West Development Corporation, the Darling Harbour Authority, and the Sydney Cove Authority. 28 Mosman Council (as the custodian of significant harbourside property in public ownership) was a leading advocate for this program. 29 Signed by Executive Director Elsa Atkin, 24 February 1998. 30 SCA Business Paper, Appendix E, Attachment G, for March 1996 Board Meeting. 31 Extract from speech by Mike Collins, Chair SHFA for opening of Jack Mundey Place, 1 May 2009.

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32 Name derived from Walla-Mulla, the name of a colonial reserve for Aborigines created at the time of Governor Phillip – see Pollon, 1988. 33 James, 1988, p. 108. 34 Urban and Regional Development 1974–75, AGPS, 1974, p. 31. 35 Burgmann and Burgmann, 1998, pp. 203–204. 36 The company was placed in receivership in 1976. 37 James, 1998, p. 111. 38 Burgmann and Burgmann, 1998, p. 205. 39 Quoted in ibid., p. 232. 40 Morton Herman authoritatively claimed that in the productive decade of his professional life in Sydney ‘John Verge contributed a greater amount of fine work … to the architectural picture of the Golden [eighteen] Thirties than any other man.’ See Herman, 1954. 41 ibid., p. 219. 42 In 1967 the Trust had awarded this classification to the group of houses fronting Argyle Place in The Rocks. 43 Nowra, 2013, p. 337. 44 Mundey, 1981, p. 111. 45 Rees, 2004, p. 270. 46 ACF, 1973 – the cover of the proceedings states that the event was organised by voluntary conservation groups in association with the ACF. 47 Between 1947 and 1958, he played 30 test matches with Australia’s international Rugby Union squad. 48 As noted in Burgmann and Burgmann, 1998, p. 185. 49 In due course, an alternative site at Homebush was identified and successfully developed. 50 Stirling, 1998. 51 Shaw, 1987. 52 Council of the City of Sydney, 1971, p. 144. 53 For the record, neither the BLF nor Mundey were directly involved in the QVB campaign. 54 John Overall was Chief Commissioner of the NCDC from 1958 to 1972; in 1966 he advised the NSW Government on the redevelopment of The Rocks. 55 For example, in the 1960s he gave advice to the government of Tanzania, was involved in expansion plans for Darwin, and was an advisor to the UN Environment Program. 56 Others included William Holford, Brian Lewis, Denis Winston and Rolf Jensen, expatriate Liverpudlians who had a very significant influence on Australian architectural teaching and practice during the four decades following the end of Second World War. See Colman, 1993. 57 See Overall, 1995, p. 45. 58 Stephenson, 1992, p. 197. 59 Andrew Andersons presents a detailed account of the state government’s very successful bicentenary urban design program for Macquarie Street in Webber, 1988. Webber (in a comment to author in November 2014) said that decades

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of conservation, restoration and creative additions have produced a street that ‘is unsurpassed anywhere in the world’. 60 Debate continues regarding the relationship between the BLF and the federal government under Whitlam and Uren during the green ban era. Ruming and Freestone (2010) claim that ‘the success of some of the more notable green bans rested … on the capacity of DURD to fill the development void left on the boycotted sites … In themselves the green bans did not necessarily lead to the preservation and renewal of unique urban landscapes … neither the green bans nor the projects implemented by DURD would have had the same level of success and longevity in the absence of the other.’ 61 For example, the creation of the Victorian Land Conservation Council in 1971 provided the Victorian Government with independent advice on the use of public lands (replaced in 1987 by the Environment Conservation Council). In NSW the Environmental Planning and Assessment Act 1979 brought new standards and expectations into local and state planning processes. 62 For example, the introduction of post-graduate conservation studies at the University of Sydney in 1992 by Professor Serge Domicelj. CHAPTER 6

Strange bedfellows

1 White, 1989. In the short foreword to this letter, there is a reference to a postCongress comment made by White to a journalist: ‘I think any story written about Jack Mundey should be entitled “The Wasted Australian”. I consider him to be a great man whose talents have been wasted.’ 2 Cullen, 2010, p. 127. 3 White, 1978. 4 Marr, 1991, pp. 510 and 544. 5 Mundey, 1981, pp. 100–101. 6 Judy Mundey (then Judith Willcocks) recalls her first night out with Jack attending a performance of the Bolshoi Ballet in Sydney in 1963. 7 Gerardus Jozef Dusseldorp, born in Utrecht, Netherlands, in 1918, was known as Dick for most of his life. He came to Australia in 1951 and went on to career heights with his companies Civil and Civic and Lend Lease. 8 Irving and Cahill, 2010, p. 293. 9 The same fate befell the furnishings and fittings of the Hotel Australia next door; for treasure hunters it was an exciting time. 10 Clark, 2002. 11 According to Spigelman (2001, p. 289), Seidler’s office was given three days to design the new theatre, and they met the deadline. 12 Mundey recalls that Dusseldorp’s then sought a meeting with him at the BLF offices. It turned out to be the first of many. 13 Mundey, 1981, p. 97. 14 Magee (2005, p. 99 et seq.) recalls how a proposal to convert a large abandoned garage and vehicle repair workshop into a theatre was ‘blocked’ by the BLF. 15 Mundey, 1981, p. 97.

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16 Clark, 2001, pp. 8, 9, 162, 166, 167 and 222. 17 Sydney journalist Geraldine O’Brien commented to the author that when it came to demolishing his buildings, Seidler had an entirely different view on heritage. 18 Spigelman, 2001, p. 331. 19 Frampton and Drew, 1992. 20 ibid. 21 Noakes, 1994. 22 Bennett, 2008. 23 Opinion section in Trust News magazine, Winter 2011, p. 9. CHAPTER 7

After the bans

1 Gallagher deserves recognition for BLF bans in Victoria prior to Mundey’s later rise to fame in Sydney; for example, in 1969 a black ban saved a historic railway reserve in Carlton, and in 1974 rescued the Regent Theatre. See Appendix 4. 2 Burgmann and Burgmann, 1998. 3 Burgmann and Burgmann, 1998, p. 253. 4 Hardman and Manning, 1976. 5 Burgmann and Burgmann, 1998, p. 211. 6 Rees, 2004, p. 72. 7 Burgmann and Burgmann, 1998, p. 261. 8 Hardman and Manning, n.d. (c. 1975). 9 Mundey, 1981, p. 123. 10 McMichael went on to become head of the federal Department of Environment under Minister Moss Cass during the Whitlam administration (1972–75). 11 Snow, 1961. 12 ACF, 40th Anniversary Poster. 13 ibid.; the flooding of Lake Pedder by the Hydro-Electric Commission of Tasmania in 1972 ‘was one of the greatest tragedies in Australia’s conservation-related history – and can be seen as a turning point’ in the growth of the ACF. 14 Mundey, 1981, p. 127. According to Geoff Mosley when interviewed by the author, Mundey was ‘co-opted to the ACF Council in December 1973’. 15 Rowse, 2002, p. 319. 16 As well as a foundation member of the ACF, Wright was foundation president of the Wildlife Preservation Society of Queensland, and a member of the 1973–74 Commonwealth Inquiry into the National Estate. 17 Rowse, 2002, p. 323. 18 Seltzer, 2013, p. 20. 19 Moore and Nelson, 2010. 20 Hutton and Connors, 1999, p. 136. 21 Fraser and Simons, 2010, p. 326. 22 His term ran from September to December 1975. In July 1976 he was back in the UK when he officially opened the SHELTER (UK National Campaign for the Homeless) Conference in Nottingham. 23 Short, 1988, p. 739.

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24 Mundey archives, speech notes. 25 Mallory, 1999. 26 Mundey, 1981, p. 148. 27 Mundey, 1977. 28 Reported in Wollongong Advertiser, 15 May 1991. 29 ACF web page, ‘The 1970s and a decade of growth’. 30 ACF Habitat, February 1994. 31 See Parker, 2009, p. 258. 32 Birmingham provides a detailed chronicle in his warts and all Leviathan, 2000. 33 Golder, 2004, p. vii. 34 For example, see Minutes of the planning committee of 26 May 1986, in which item 9 deals with the relatively trivial matter of illegal parking in Woolloomooloo, and item 12 deals with a proposal for an Environmental Impact Study for the entire Rocks area, a more significant and potentially more valuable project. 35 Golder, 2000. 36 See Fitzgerald, Ashton and Harvey, 1998. 37 Mundey was later became Secretary of the Sydney Citizens against the Monorail (SCAM). The Monorail was constructed and survived until 2013, when a combination of financial worries, poor patronage and civic disaffection forced its closure and removal. 38 Sydney City Council, Minute Paper to City Planning Committee, 14 May 1986. 39 The campaign failed. 40 Darling Harbour Authority, letter to Town Clerk, Sydney City Council, 27 April 1987. 41 The outcome of the judicial inquiry was the City of Sydney Act 1988, which created a much smaller elected council whose planning powers were to be severely restricted by the concurrent establishment of a new state-government dominated Central Sydney Planning Committee. 42 Parker, 2009, p. 113. 43 O’Brien, 1999. 44 HHT, 1998. Mundey contributed to the catalogue by way of a lengthy personal essay on the green bans and urban environmentalism. 45 HHT, Annual Report 1997–98, p. 5. 46 HHT, Annual Report 1999–2000, p. 3. 47 Sydney Living Museums website, ‘Rose Seidler House’. 48 Carr, Bob, farewell message to Jack Mundey, 17 December 2001. 49 Former HHT Director Peter Watts tellingly said to the author in 2015 that, ‘Jack always joked that the HHT gave him “respectability”. He even had to put on a black tie [at Government House dinners]. He did so reluctantly. But Governor Marie Bashir was one of his greatest admirers, and he hers, so he put it on and enjoyed some splendid occasions where he was often required to speak, which he did with characteristic honesty, humour and great humility. It’s partly true that the Trust gave him respectability that he had not always had with some in the community. It brought him into contact with the “Arts set” and many others and it was always fascinating to see how he wooed them and they came to deeply admire him.’

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CHAPTER 8

Today and tomorrow

1 Ellsmore, 2014. 2 Further evidence can be seen in the seemingly marginal status assigned to heritage agencies at both federal and state levels

3 See Boyd, N, 2014, p. 15. 4 The Institute employs a heritage officer and provides advice on 20th century heritage to members and the general public. 5 Boyd, 2014, p. 2. 6 Sydney Morning Herald, 15 November 2015. 7 See Jacobs, 1961. 8 Farrelly, 2014. 9 Devine, 2014. 10 Hasham, 2014. 11 For earlier chapters in this story see Fitzgerald and Keating, 1992. 12 Grosvenor, 2011. The film’s blurb alleges that ‘from the Green Bans of the 1970s to the present, there has been a constant battle between the forces of conservation and development … the environment has generally come a poor second … many of the planning reforms brought about by activists like Jack Mundey began to be whittled away.’ 13 Proudfoot, 1990. 14 NSW Parliament/Cumberland County Council, County of Cumberland Planning Scheme, 1951. 15 Sydney Morning Herald, 31 March 2014, p. 4. 16 National Trust (NSW) Magazine, Nov/Jan 2016, p. 3. 17 Emeritus Professor Peter Webber labelled the Barangaroo approval process ‘as more corrupted than any other’ that he can recall in his long and distinguished career in architecture, government, teaching and writing (comment to author in October 2014). 18 Issue 1, 2014. 19 Sydney Morning Herald, 4 July 2014. 20 Sydney Morning Herald, 12 November 2014. 21 Blueprint for a Healthy Environment and a Productive Economy, 6 November 2014. 22 Abrahams, 2014. 23 Wade, 2015. 24 National Trust (NSW), National Trust Magazine, Autumn 2015. 25 See also ABC, 4 Corners, 17 August 2014. 26 Sydney Morning Herald, 23 March, 4 July, 24 March, 7 June, 9 July 2014. 27 Pinnegar and Freestone, 2014, p. 36. 28 Freestone, 1999, p. 48. 29 Official indifference to expert advice and opinion was one of a number of themes covered by Joan Domicelj in her inaugural Jim Kerr Memorial Address to Australia ICOMOS at the Sydney Opera House on 18 April 2015. 30 Richardson, 2014, p. 4. 31 Freestone, 1993, p. 21.

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32 The AHL is much smaller than the earlier Register of the National Estate, which it replaced in 2007. 33 The AHC was abolished under the Howard Liberal–National Coalition Government. 34 Sydney Morning Herald, 19 June 2015. 35 Murray Hogarth, Senior Adviser, Green Capital, writes in the TEC Environment News (Issue 3, 2014) that the past year saw ‘the most environmentally regressive Australian Government of the modern era’. 36 Tingle, 2015. 37 Queensland Conservation Council website in April 2015, now deleted. 38 National Trust of Australia (NSW) 2013. 39 The ‘chorus’ includes the influential Total Environment Centre, whose Annual Report of Activities 2013–2014 described the process for framing a new planning act in NSW as a ‘shambles … the proposed law has become less and less environmentally responsible and participatory’. The Bill has so far foundered in the NSW Upper House. 40 National Trust of Australia (NSW), Annual Review 2014, p. 3. 41 According to the Australian Electoral Office (September 2015), more than a million eligible voters are ‘missing’ from the rolls.

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Johnson, W, and Parris, R, 2008, A History of Sydney’s Darling Harbour, Sydney Harbour Foreshore Authority. Keeble, L, 1952, Principles and Practice of Town and Country Planning, Estates Gazette Ltd, London. Kerr, J, 1982, The Conservation Plan, National Trust of Australia (NSW), 1982 (7th edition available to download from australia.icomos.org/publications/theconservation-plan/). Latta, D, 1986, Lost Glories: A memorial to forgotten Australian architecture buildings, Angus & Robertson, North Ryde. Le Corbusier, 1943, The Athens Charter (1973 edition), Grossman Publishers, New York. Le Soeur, A, 2011, National Trust News (Australia), Southern Sydney Regional Organisation of Council, The Tide Is Turning, Final Report of the Botany Bay Program. Lewis, M, 1981, ‘Architecture from Colonial Origins’ in The Heritage of Australia: The Illustrated Register of the National Estate, Macmillan Company of Australia in association with the Australian Heritage Commission, South Melbourne. —— 1994, Melbourne:The city’s history and development, City of Melbourne Council. Lloyd, CJ, 1977, The National Estate: Australia’s heritage, Cassell Australia, Stanmore. Lynch, L (ed.), 2009, The Conservation Movement: How the Glebe Society saved the world, edited transcript of interview with Tony Strachan. Magee, O, 2005, How The Rocks was Won: Plans versus politics, Engineers Media, Crows Nest. Major Cities Unit, Infrastructure Australia, 2010, State of Australian Cities 2010, Commonwealth of Australia. Mallory, G, 1999, ‘Is there a Left Left?’, Social Alternatives, vol. 23, no. 1. Marr, D, 1991, Patrick White: A life, Jonathon Cape, London. Mesarovic´, M, and Pestel, E, 1974, Mankind at the Turning Point:The second report to the Club of Rome, Hutchinson, London. Moore, K, and Nelson, M, 2010, Moral Ground: Ethical action for a planet in peril, Trinity University, Press, San Antonio. Mundey, J, Archives in Builders Labourers’ Federation Archives (un-catalogued material, courtesy N Towart, Archivist, Trade Unions New South Wales). —— 1977, Ecology, Employment, Exploitation, unpublished speech presented to Vancouver HABITAT Conference, JM private papers. —— 1981, Green Bans and Beyond, Angus and Robertson, Sydney. —— 1987, From Red to Green: Citizen-worker alliance in Hutton (ed.), 1987, op. cit. National Trust of Australia (NSW), 2013, Policy on Heritage Legislation. —— 2014, Position Paper – Millers Point – Heritage Conservation, August. —— Reflections, issue 3. NESCO, Convention for the Protection of the World Cultural and Natural Heritage, 17th Session of the General Conference, Paris, 1972. Nielsen, J (ed.), NOW magazine, c. early 1970s. Noakes, F, 1994, ‘Ted Mack bows out’, Green Left Weekly, issue 169, 30 November. Nowra, L, 2013, Kings Cross: A biography, NewSouth Publishing, Sydney. O’Brien, G, 1999, Spectrum feature, Sydney Morning Herald, 17 April.

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Overall, J, 1995, Canberra:Yesterday, today and tomorrow; A personal memoir, Federal Capital Press, Fyshwick. Park, R, 1980, Playing Beatie Bow, Penguin, Melbourne. Parker, D, 2009, Arthur Phillip: Australia’s first governor, Woodslane Press, Warriewood. Pearl, C, 1970, Hardy Wilson and His Old Colonial Architecture, Nelson, Melbourne. Perdon, R (ed.), 1995, Sydney’s Aldermen: A biographical register of Sydney City aldermen, 1842–1992, City of Sydney Council, Sydney. Pinnegar, S, and Freestone, R, 2014, ‘Identifying Australian Sites of Urban Planning Heritage: Results from a national web-based survey’, Australian Planner, vol. 44, no. 4. Pitt, H, 2011, ‘The Kelly Gang’, the (Sydney) magazine, Sydney Morning Herald, 31 March. Pollock, Z, 2008, ‘Aboriginal Housing Company’, Dictionary of Sydney, Sydney City Council; see dictionaryofsydney.org. Pollon, F (ed.), 1988, The Book of Sydney Suburbs (original manuscript by Gerard Healey), Angus & Robertson, Sydney. Proudfoot, H, 1990, ‘The Dangers of Environmental Fundamentalism’, Sydney Luker Memorial Lecture, Australian Planner, Royal Australian Planning Institute (NSW Division), vol. 29, no. 1. Rees, P, 2004, Killing Juanita: A true story of murder and corruption, Allen & Unwin, Sydney. Rhiannon, L, 2013, Green Bans: Inspirational activism, The Australian Greens, Sydney. Richardson, J, 2014, ‘Demolishing the 20th Century – Contemporary Heritage’, National Trust (NSW) Magazine, February. Riviere, MS (trans. and ed.), 1999, The Governor’s Noble Guest: Hyacinthe de Bougainville’s account of Port Jackson, 1825, The Miegunyah Press/Melbourne University Press. Carlton South. Robinson, G, 1975, ‘Commentary – Common Sense in Australia’, Sierra Club Bulletin, vol. 60, no. 4, San Francisco Roddewig, R, 1978, Green Bans:The birth of Australian environmental politics; A study in public opinion and participation, Hale & Ironmonger, Sydney. Roseth, J, 1967, The Extent, Progress and Location of Rehabilitation Activity in Paddington, Sydney, Planning Research Centre, University of Sydney. Rowse, T, 2002, Nugget Coombs: A reforming life, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge. Roxburgh, R, 1974, Early Colonial Houses of New South Wales, Ure Smith, Sydney. Royal Australian Institute of Architects, 1966, Australian Outrage:The decay of a visual environment; A study, D. Gazzard (ed.), Ure Smith, Sydney. Ruming, K, Tice, A, and Freestone, R, 2010, ‘Commonwealth Urban Policy in Australia: The case of inner urban regeneration in Sydney 1973–75’, Australian Geographer, vol. 41, no. 4. Sandercock, L, 1974, ‘Green bans, people, power’, Habitat Magazine, Australian Conservation Foundation, Melbourne, Schumacher, EF, 1975, Small is Beautiful: A study of economics as if people mattered, Abacus, London. Searle, G, 1980, The HABITAT Handbook, Earth Resources Research Ltd, London. Seltzer, E, 2013, ‘Climate Change, the Future, and the Frontiers of Planning’, ISOCARP REVIEW 9, J Colman and C Gossop (eds), Frontiers of Planning:Visionary futures for human settlements, ISOCARP, The Hague.

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INDEX A Aalto, Alvar 34 Abbott, Tony, as federal Member for Warringah 175 Aboriginal Housing Company 123 Aboriginal people Cadigal people 157 Cadigal Place dedicated to 264–266 evicted from Redfern homes 122–123 heritage 38 involvement in national park management 246 post-war attitudes to Aboriginal heritage 29 Wallumedagal clan 58–59 Abraham Mott Hall 225 Abrahams, Hector 283 Adelaide Ecopolitics conference 1989 93 Festival of Ideas 95 planning of, Colonel Light 1836 29 Advisory Committee on Historic Area Conservation,Vic 1970 51 Agius, Joe 273 Aitkin, Don 73 Albers, Josef 35 Angel, Jeff on environmental politics 127, 156 on the Wilderness Society 137 Total Environment Centre 127, 282 archaeological investigation in The Rocks 174 architecture technical advances in 54 urban design and 33–38 Ashton, Nigel 104 Askin Liberal Government (NSW) 161–164, 174, 178–179 Askin, Robert 74, 149, 230

Athens Charter 38–42 Atkin, Elsa 37, 94 Atlas Engineering Company 64 Australia Environmental movement in 153–154, 281 post-war immigration to 44–46 post-war development 22–28, 42–44 post-war education 28–30 ratifies UNESCO Convention 1972 142 town planning legislation 102–105 Australia ICOMOS 98–99, 105, 115, 140 Australia Square project, Sydney 55 Australian Capital Territory, Heritage Act 2004 151 see also National Capital Development Comission Australian Climate Commission 2011 299 Australian Conservation Foundation advocacy by 53 committees 243 establishment of 115, 133 links to Friends of the Green Bans 211 Milo Dunphy on Council of 100–101 Mundey on Executive Committee 92, 138, 191–193, 233–247 National Conference 1983 131 objects to Sydney monorail plans 253 Prince Philip presidency 131 Yencken presidency 140.1 Australian Council of National Trusts 89, 115 Australian Council of Trade Unions 207–208, 243 see also union movement Australian Garden History Society 285 Australian Heritage Act 1975 (Commonwealth) 149

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Australian Heritage Commission establishment of 142, 147–148 publishes National Estate Register 149 replaced by Australian Heritage Council 288–289 Yencken chairs 121 Australian Heritage Council 288–289 Australian Heritage List 288–289 Australian Historical Society, early support for heritage values 46 Australian Institute of Architects see Royal Australian Institute of Architects Australian Institute of Urban Studies 115 Australian Outrage – the Decay of a Visual Environment 100, 102 Australian Ugliness,The 24–25, 99 Australian World Heritage Advisory Committee 38 Australians for Sustainable Development 96 AV Jennings Pty Ltd 69–71, 77–78, 109–110 B Bacon, Ed 37 Bailey, Geoff 176 Baker, Helen Proudfoot 37 Balmain Association Inc 118–119 Bamaradbanga program 1999 266 Banner Theatre, Birmingham 136 Barangaroo Action Group 281 Barangaroo site development 95–96, 277–281, 278–279 Barko, Ivan 61–63 Barnet, James, buildings designed by 16 Barwick, Garfield 233–234 Bashir, Marie 72 Bates Smart and McCutcheon 166–167 Bathurst, heritage buildings in 29 Battery Point and Sullivans Cove Community Association 122 Battlers for Kelly’s Bush 74–78, 82 Bauhaus design academy 35–36, 36–37 Bayer, Herbert 35 Bayly, Ian 242 Bean, Charles 48 Bell, Jo 74

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Bellear, Bob 123 Bennelong Point 252 Bennett, Jennifer, Mundey interview with 226 Bibb, John 186 Bickford, Anne 37 Big Toys 208–210 Birch, Charles 139, 243 Birmingham General Post Office (UK) 135–136, 135 Black Bans placed by BLF 17 Blackbutt Action Committee 123–124 Blues Point Tower Apartments 224 Bougainville, Baron Commander Hyacinthe de 60–61 Bouman, Feiko 223–224 Bourke, Max 149 Boyd, Robin architectural writings 37 on conservation 88 on heritage loss 99 The Australian Ugliness 24–26 Brady,Veronica 131–132 Brand, David 238–239 Breuer, Marcel 35, 267 Bridge Street, Sydney 15–16 Bridgeland, John 120 Briggs, Phillip 119 Brine, Judith 149 Britain, heritage debate in post-war 20–21 British Columbia, Mundey presents paper in 245–246 British National Appeal 133 Broadbent, James 37, 262 Brower, David 134 Brown, Bob 80, 130, 141 Brown and Sherrard, Introduction to Town and Country Planning, 41 ‘brown’ vs ‘green’ groups 128–129 Brundtland, Gro Harlem 144 Brundtland Report: Our Common Future 1987 144–145 Bryant, John 188 bubonic plague, The Rocks resumed due to 158–160 Builder,The 109, 230–232 Builders Labourers’ Federation see also Green Bans

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action to protect heritage properties 12, 14 attention drawn to 192 considers Kelly’s Bush campaign proposal 76–77 deregistration of 107–109, 154–155 Mundey honoured by 190, 229 relations with National Trust 90–91, 186 under Mundey 85, 232–233 Victorian branch active in conservation 82–83 Woolloomooloo campaign 184 building industry, employment in 32, 107 Bunning, Walter 37, 116, 171 Burdekin House, demolition of 49, 99, ps Burgmann, Meredith and Verity Green Bans: Red Union 73–74, 156, 229, 300–301 on Woolloomooloo 185–186 Burke, Sheridan 38 Burnet, Sir Macfarlane 141 Burra Charter 98, 105 Byles, Marie 48 C Cadigal people 157 Cadigal Place, dedication of 264–266 Cahill Expressway 160, 180–181 Cain Labor Government 1982 (Vic) 104 Cambourne, Jack 74, 83 Canberra, planning of 102–103 see also National Capital Development Commission Cantrill, Peter John 16 Cape Barren Goose protection campaign 234 Carlton Association 121 Carlton,Victoria 27 Caroline Simpson Library and Research Collection 262 Carr, Bob appoints Mundey to chair HHT 255, 257 as Minister for Planning and Environment 78 at HHT function 265 foreword by vi–vii on Mundey’s work for HHT 268–270

Carson, Rachel, Silent Spring 138 Carter, Pete 135 Cass, Moss xvi, 193 Catherine Hill Bay campaign 95, 226 Cavalier, Rodney 83 Centennial Park, campaign opposing Olympic stadium 194–196, 207–208 Centre for Environmental Studies (UK) 243 Chappell Island, declared bird sanctuary 234 charity status for conservation bodies 126 Chifley, JB (Ben) 42 Chubb, Kathleen 74 Circular Quay east, development at 252 City of Sydney Strategic Plan, 1971 198 Civic Design Society (UNSW) 74, 114, 119 Clark, Lindie 216 Clerehan, Neil 37 Climate Council 299 Closing Circle,The 139 Club of Rome, reports by 139 Coalition of Resident Action Groups (Sydney) 114 Coleman, Helen 38 Collins, Mike 176, 178–179 Colman, Jim (author) 295, 300 Commercial Travellers’ Club, Sydney 211–212 Committee of Inquiry into the National Estate 100, 149 Commoner, Barry 130, 139 Commonwealth Association of Architects 38 Commonwealth Committee of Inquiry into the National Estate 11–12, 33 Commonwealth Heritage List 288 Commonwealth Housing Commission 42 Commonwealth State Law Courts Building 200–201 Communist Party of Australia de-Stalinisation of 301 Mundey a member of 2, 12, 230, 290 Confronting the Future 139 Congrès Internationaux d’Architecture Moderne 38–42 Connors, Libby 242 Conservation Council of Victoria 126

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conservation movement see also environmental movements charity status for 126 inter-war period 46–50 international 138, 142 key events 302–305 leadership in 79–80 nature conservation 17 revival of 85–88, 114 Conservation News (ACF), Mundey article in 93 Conservation Plan (Kerr) 98 Constitution of Australia 145 Construction, Forestry, Mining and Energy Union 155, 307, 315 construction industry, employment conditions in 32, 107 Convention Concerning the Protection of the World’s Cultural and Natural Heritage 141–142 Coombs, Herbert ‘Nugget’ 42, 238–240, 297 Coronation Hill, federal cabinet urged to preserve 93 Correa, Charles 143 County of Cumberland Planning Scheme 103–104, 182 Cox, Louise 38 Croll, Joan 74 Cullen, Max 209–210 Cumberland County Council 50, 276 Currawong workers’ holiday retreat 95 Curtin Labor Government 42 D Daly, Maurice, Sydney Boom, Sydney Bust 31, 53, 105–106 Darling Harbour 251–252 see also Barangaroo site development Darwin, Japanese bombing of 22 Dawes Point included in redevelopment plan for The Rocks 164 included in Urban Conservation Area 91 Dawson, Christena 74 de Bougainville, Baron Commander Hyacinthe 60–61 de Galaup, Jean-Francois, Comte de La Perouse 60

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de Milhau, Count Gabriel 63 demolition jobs xvii, 33 Department of Education Building, Sydney 16 Department of Lands Building 16 Department of Post-War Reconstruction 42, 238 Department of Urban and Regional Development (DURD) establishment of 43, 236 involved in Woolloomooloo campaign 184 on BLF involvement in conservation 91 Uren as Minister for 43, 118, 140, 193 development, early community opposition to 8–10 Devine, Miranda 177–178, 274 Die Grünen 130 Domicelj, Joan 38, 99, 296–299 Donnison, David 134 Dresden, bombing of 32 Dreyer Foundation Prize 101 Dubos, René 129, 138, 140 Ducker, John 83 Duek-Cohen, Elias 119, 198 Dunphy, Milo as conservation movement leader 80, 291 founds Total Environment Centre 126–128 on ACF Council 100–101, 242, 244 on Committee of Inquiry into National Estate 149 Dunphy, Myles 48, 79–80, 100 Dunstan, Don 226 Dusseldorp, Dick 211–219, 217 E Early Australian Architects and their Work 52, 99 East Rocks brick chimney 280 ecologically sustainable development 144–145 education, post-war 28–30 Edwards, Norman 198 Ehrlich, Ann 139 Ehrlich, Paul 132, 139 Elder, Eric 243

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Elizabeth Bay House, Sydney 256, 258, 262 Elizabeth Farm, Rosehill 258 Ellsmore, Donald 272 Else-Mitchell, Rae 48 ‘enlightened middle class’ 86, 125–126 Environment Victoria 126 Environmental Defenders Offices xii, 292 environmental campaigns 129–132, 276– 277, 282–284 see also conservation movement Environmental Planning and Assessment Act 1979 (NSW) 257 Environmentalists for Full Employment 244–245 Europe heritage protection in, post-war 40 migrants to Australia from 44–45 war damage in 20–21 Evans, Geoff 237–238 F Farrell, Mary 74 Farrelly, Elizabeth 15–16, 274 Federal Park Annandale 118 Federal Power in Australia’s Cities 146 Female Factory, Parramatta 96 Fenner, Frank 141, 239 Fesq, George 63 Finding a Common Interest 216 First National Conservation Study Conference 1973 156, 193 Fiske, Pat 32, 94 Fitzgerald, Marjorie 74 Fitzgerald, Shirley xvi, 38 Fitzpatrick, Kate 209–210 Flannery, Tim 299 Frankel, Otto 141 Fraser Coalition Government 149 Fraser, Hugh 38 Fraser, Malcolm 149, 233, 243 Fraser, Rod 51 Freeland, Max 201 Freestone, Robert 37, 79, 285 freeway proposals, opposition to 117–118, 120, 123–124 Fremantle Society 121–122 French village at Hunters Hill 61–63 Friends of Barangaroo 281 Friends of the Earth 133–136

Friends of the Green Ban Movement 211, 243 Friends of the QVB 198 Fuller, Buckminster 143, 153 G G20 Summit 2014 298 Galaup, Jean-Francois, Comte de La Perouse de 60 Galbraith, JK 3 Gallagher, Norm environmental activism xiv, 17 ‘Green Ban Gallery’ 124 lifts Victoria Street Green Ban 190 on conservation bans in Victoria 83 opposes Sydney Green Bans 229 Garden City Association (UK) 47 Garden, Don 77–78, 109–110 Gazzard, Marea 116 Gazzard, Don 100, 116 Geddes, Patrick 37 Giedion, Siegfried 37 Gipps Local Government Ward, Sydney 248–250 Gittins, Ross 283 Glebe Estate, purchase and renovation of 117–118 Glebe Society 117–118 Globe Street, Mundey mural in 175 Golder, Hilary 247–250 Gottman, Jean 143 Great Barrier Reef, conservation of 237, 239 Green Bans 25th anniversary of 176–177 at Centennial Park 196 at Moore Park 116 at Redfern 123 at The Rocks 172, 174 at Theatre Royal 214–215 at Victoria Street 190 at Woolloomooloo 184 demonstration to support 227 first one imposed 77, 82 imposed by BLF 14 in Sydney and Melbourne 84 list of sites 312–317 Mundey coins term 17–18 outside NSW 124

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‘Green Bans – Inspirational Activism’ 315 Green Bans: Red Union 73–74, 156, 229, 300–301 Green politics 282–284 ‘green tape’, burden of 283, 292 ‘green’ vs ‘brown’ groups 128–129 Greenpeace 136–137 Greens Party NSW, Mundey joins 130 Greenway, Francis, buildings designed by 30, 94, 96, 259 Griffin, Marian Mahony 48, 80 Griffin, Walter Burley 48, 80 Griffiths, Colin 100 Gropius, Walter 34–35, 267 Grosvenor, Dennis 96, 275 Grosvenor Place, Sydney 222, 253 H HABITAT Conference on Human Settlements,Vancouver 245, 297 Habitat Magazine, launch of 237 Hamer, Dick 226 Hamilton, Miriam 74 Hammond, Peter 14 Hansen, Frank 253 Hardie, Martin 214 Hardman, Marion 156 Harris, Thistle 48 Hasham, Nicole 274, 282 Hawke Labor Government, environmental policies 147 Hayes, Henry Brown 255 Hazzard, Brad, as Minister for Social Housing (NSW) 274 Heffron Labor Government (NSW) 160 Henderson, Gerard 93 Heritage Act 1977 (NSW) 150, 257, 293 Heritage Act 2004 (ACT) 151 Heritage Commission see Australian Heritage Commission Heritage Council of New South Wales establishment of 104, 150 failings in 287 re-invigorated 297 recommends listing Sydney’s Maritime Control Tower 277 Heritage Councils, establishment of 288 heritage, defining 10–11 Heritage Inventory, NSW 280

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heritage issues, after World War II 20–22 Herman, Morton Early Australian Architects and their Work 52, 99 contribution to heritage literature 37 on Pitt Street Congregational Church 186–187 on Queens Square redevelopment 201 Hilbersheimer, Ludwig 35 Hill, Octavia 10 Hill Thalis Architecture 96, 280 Historic Buildings Act 1981 (Vic) 87, 149–150 Historic Buildings and Sites Advisory Committee NSW 104 Historic Buildings Committee, NSW 1947 50 ‘Historic Heritage of Cities’ (Athens Charter) 1933 40 Historic Houses Act 1980 (NSW) 257 Historic Houses Trust of New South Wales Mundey chairs xviii, 2, 94, 255–268, 297–298 Seidler supports 221 Hoddle, Surveyor 29 Hogan, Tom 32 Holford, William 165 Home of Man,The 78–79, 139 Hope Committee of Inquiry into the National Estate 91 Hope, Justice 149–150 Hotel Australia, Sydney 212 Housing Commission of NSW 185 How the Rocks was Won 166–168 Howard, Ebenezer 47 Howard, John 175 Hughes, Joy 262 Hughes, Robert 99–100 Hunt, Alan 226 Hunter, John, Captain 61 Hunters Hill 61, 62 see also Kelly’s Bush Hunters Hill Council 69–70, 78 Hunters Hill Trust 69–70 Hutton, Drew 156, 242 Hyde Park Barracks 199–201 I Ideas for Australian Cities 120 immigrants to Australia, post-war 44–46

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Industrial Court of NSW, deregisters BLF 107–109 Inquiry into the Conservation of Australia’s Historic Heritage Places (Productivity Commission) 287–289 Institute of Architects see Royal Australian Institute of Architects Interim Committee of Inquiry into the National Estate 121 international environmental movements 138 International Council on Monuments and Sites 97–99, 140 International Institute for Environment and Development (UK) 79 International Union for Conservation of Nature 142 Introduction to the Study of Town Planning in Australia 41 Introduction to Town and Country Planning 41 Ipoh Garden Berhad 198–199 J Jack Mundey Place, The Rocks 178 Jacobs, Jane 37, 274 James, Betty 74 James, Colin 182–183 James, Peggy 47–48, 79 James, Peter 37 James Wallace Pty Ltd 160–161 Japan 15, 21–22 Jensen, Harry 197–198 Jim Kerr Memorial Address 99 Johnson Buildings, Sydney 253 Johnson, Darlene 214 Johnson, Peter 100 Joint Regional Planning Panels, NSW 292 Jones, Dick 242 Joubert, Didier and Jules 61–63, 68 Justice and Police Museum 263 K Kakadu National Park 93, 239 Kallir, Trude 74 Kandinsky, Wassily 35 Kangaroo Point, Brisbane 95 Keating, Paul 280

Keeble, Lewis, Principles and Practice of Town and Country Planning 41 Kelly, Max 99–100 Kelly, Petra 130–132, 131 Kelly, Thomas Herbert (Bertie) 63–69 Kelly’s Bush 65, 75 campaign to protect 17, 57–80, 75, 82 memorial to first Green Ban 72 proposed subdivision 71 The Rocks compared to 173 Kerr, Jim 37, 98–99, 291, 296 Kerr, Joan 37 Kings Cross,Victoria Street campaign 188–191 Klee, Paul 35 Koenigsberger, Otto 143 L La Perouse, Jean-Francois de Galaup, Comte de 60 La Perouse Memorial 60–61 Latta, David, Lost Glories 33 le Corbusier 34, 39 le Plastrier, Richard 101 le Sueur, Angela, Mundey interview with 226–227 Lehaney, Kath 74 Lend Lease Corporation 96, 211, 213–216, 280–281 Lennon, Jane 37 Lewis, Miles 37, 98 Lewis, Tom 185 Light, Colonel William 29, 120 Limits to Growth, Club of Rome 139 Lincoln coffee bar 213 Lloyd, Clem 90–91 Lost Glories 33 Lucas, Clive 38 Lumsdaine, Geoff 26 Lynch, Kevin 37 Lyndhurst, Glebe Point 258 M Macarthur, John, buildings designed for 29–30 Mack, Ted 223 Macleay, Alexander 256 Macquarie, Lachlan, founds Bathurst 29 Macquarie Street, Sydney 199–200

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Magee, D. O. (Owen), How the Rocks was Won 166–169, 171 Maholy-Nagy, Lazlo 35 Malanda, Queensland countryside 6–7 Malanda Hotel 4 map 5 Mundey born in 2 Mundey Road 4 Mallory, Greg 245 Mankind at the Turning Point, Club of Rome 139 Manning, Peter 156 maps conservation battles in Sydney 183 Green Ban sites, Sydney and Melbourne 84 Hunters Hill and Parramatta River 62 Malanda, Queensland 5 planned development at Kelly’s Bush 71 Port Jackson and Parramatta River 58, 62 Marist Sisters’ Convent, Hunters Hill 68 Maritime Control Tower 277–280, 278–279 Marr, David 210 Marrickville, redevelopment in 275–276 Marsh, Ralph 83 Master Builders’ Association confrontational tactics 218 influence of 173 on BLF deregistration 107–109 on Green Bans 229, 231–232 on Mundey 13 McDonald, Jo 38 McMahon Coalition Government 146, 235 McMichael, Don 233 McNamara, Mick 32 McRae, George 16, 196 McRae, Nita 172 Mead, Margaret 143 Melbourne BLF conservation bans in 83 Green Ban sites 84 International Exhibition, 1902 63 planning of 29 resident action groups 121 slum-clearance programs 27–28

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Melbourne–South Yarra Residents’ Group Inc 121 Menzies, Robert 233 Merchant Builders Pty Ltd 26 Meroogal, Nowra 258–259 Meyer, Hannes 35 Milhau, Count Gabriel de 63 Miller, Peter 54 Millers Point 91, 177–178, 272–280, ps see also Barangaroo site development Mint Building, Sydney 199–201, 262 MLC Centre see Theatre Royal campaign Modern Movement in architecture 33–36, 38–42 Molnar, George, cartoons by 9, 49, 51, 55, 101 Moore, Kathleen 241 Moore Park, Centennial Park campaign 116, 194–196 Moore, Robert 38 Morris, John 92, 170, 186 Morris, William 10 Mort, Thomas Sutcliffe 64 Morton, Pat 71, 74 Mosley, Geoff addresses ACF 243 attends meeting of Environmentalists for Full Employment 245 as conservation movement leader 80, 291 foundation member, Friends of the Green Ban Movement 211 Mumford, Lewis 37 Mundey, Jack, campaigns by Barangaroo campaign 280–281 Centennial Park campaign 196 Green Ban demonstration 227 Kelly’s Bush campaign 74–77 Playfair Building sit-in 158, 159 The Rocks campaign 158, 168, 172–174 Theatre Royal campaign 214–216 Victoria Street campaign 190–191 Woolloomooloo campaign 184–185 Mundey, Jack, honours and awards folk song 136 honorary Master of Environment degree 268

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list of 306–307 Mundey, Jack, personal life and travels chronology 308–311 early life 2, 206–207 football career 2 interests and commitments 93–96, 129–130 UK visit 243 Mundey, Jack, photos and portraits arrested in The Rocks 159 degree ceremony 269 Dusseldorp book launch 265 Globe Street mural 175 National Trust Living Treasure ps portrait by Robert Hannaford v Tribune cover 108 with Jim Colman 295 with Judy Mundey 295 with Petra Kelly 131 with Tom Uren 151 Mundey, Jack, positions held by chairs Historic Houses Trust vii, 255–268 on ACF Council 192–193, 233–247 honorary life member of ACF 247 joins National Trust 90 nominated for Committee of Inquiry into the National Estate 149 SCC Alderman 248–255, 249 Mundey, Jack, relations with others Dick Dusseldorp 211–218, 217 establishment view of 12–13 Harry Seidler 219–222, 265 media coverage 230–232 Owen McGee 168–169 Patrick White 205–211 Mundey, Jack, speeches and writings addresses RAIA (NSW) 100 advocates public housing 115 acknowledged in The Home of Man 79 in documentary film 275 links environmentalism and unionism 244–246 message to young people 294 on BLF relations with National Trust 91–92 on ‘enlightened working class’ 86 on Millers Point houses 272, 275 on NSW government 226–227

on resident action groups 114 Mundey, Judy née Wilcocks xvi, 295 Murcutt, Glenn 287 Museum of Sydney 259, 266 N National Capital Development Commission 102–103, 165–167 National Estate see Register of the National Estate National Living Treasure, Mundey as 92 National Trust Act 1907 (UK) 10 National Trust for Places of Historic Interest and Natural Beauty (UK) 10, 89 National Trust, in Australia branches of 89, 114–115 established in NSW 50 National Trust of New South Wales Conservation Plan 98 classifies Victoria Street 188–189 current concerns 284, 293 Lucas, Clive 38 modern heritage recognised by 286–287 Mundey involved with 89–97 on Millers Point houses 272–273 political clout of 97 The Rocks campaign 164, 170–171, 175 National Trust of South Australia, Mundey speech to 95 Natural Beauty (UK) 9–10 nature conservation 17 see also conservation movement; environmental movements Nature Conservation Council of New South Wales 52–53, 126, 282 Neal, Eric 254 Nelson, Michael 241 neo-colonial architecture 34 ‘New Australians’ 44–46 New South Wales BLF action to protect heritage properties 12 early heritage bodies in 50–53 first Heritage Act 87 Green Ban sites 312–315 logging policy review 282 protection for heritage buildings 149–150, 286–287

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regional conservation movements 123 Newcastle, NSW, conservation activity 123–124 Nielsen, Juanita, disappearance of 190–191 NIMBY mentality 125–126 North Adelaide Society 119–120 North East Forest Alliance 282 North Hobart Residents’ Group 122 North Sydney, development in 223–227 Nowra, Louis 190 O Oakes, Norman 254 O’Brien, Geraldine 263 Office of Environment and Heritage New South Wales 287 O’Keefe, Barry 95, 175 Old Colonial Architecture in New South Wales and Tasmania 52 Old Sydney Town 30 Only One Earth 138, 140 Our Common Future see Brundtland Report Overall, John 161–166, 170–172, 199–202 Owens, Joe addresses ACF 243 arrested at Playfair Building site 158 as BLF leader 32 international interest in 192 replaces Mundey as BLF Secretary 229 P Packer, James 280–281 Paddington Society 114, 116–117 Pallin, Paddy 48 Papal Encyclical on climate change, 2015 290 Paris Agreement on Climate Change, 2015 15 Park, Ruth, Playing Beatie Bow 156, 262 Parkville Association 121 Parramatta Female Factory Friends, Mundey speech to 96 Parramatta, foundation of 58 Parramatta River 57–59 Parramatta Rugby League Club, Mundey plays with 2 Passy colonial residence, Hunters Hill 63 Patrick White Centre, establishment of 95

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Pearl, Cyril 37, 52 Penalosa, Enrique 79 Pettingell, W, Chair SCRA 169 Pettit and Sevitt homes 25–26 Phillip, Governor Arthur 57–60, 255 Pinnegar, Simon 285 Pitt, Helen, Mundey interview with 86 Pitt Street Congregational (Uniting) Church 186–188, 187 Planning and People 41 Planning Assessment Commission of NSW 292 Planning Institute of Australia 276–277 Playing Beatie Bow 156, 262 Pocock, David 294 Poland, June 97 Port Jackson, maps 58, 62 Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh 133, 233–234, 240, 242 Principles and Practice of Town and Country Planning 41 Pringle, Bob approached by Kelly’s Bush campaigners 74, 82 as BLF leader 32 involved in Rocks campaign 172 Magee on 168 on National Trust 92 Pringle, John Douglas 102 Productivity Commission Inquiry into the Conservation of Australia’s Historic Heritage Places 287–289 Proudfoot, Helen née Baker 276–277 public housing, post-war provision of 27–28 public participation in planning 43, 111–114 Q quality-of-life issues 23 Queen Victoria Building, Sydney 196–199 Queens Square, Sydney 199–202 Queensland 293, 317 R Rally Against Inappropriate Development, ‘Currawong’ workers’ holiday retreat 95

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Rasmussen, Steen Eiler 37 Ratcliffe, Francis 233 Redfern campaign 122–123 Rees, Peter 191 Reflections magazine, Mundey piece in 94–95 Regional Landholdings, Woolloomooloo project 182–184 Register of the National Estate Australian Heritage List replaces 289 buildings in Bridge Street 15–16 creation of 147 in Australia 11–12 Report of the National Estate 1974 114 resident action groups 114–115, 124–126 Richardson, John 286 Robinson, Gordon 132 Rocking the Foundations 32, 94 Rocks Resident Action Group 168, 172 Rocks, The see The Rocks Roddewig, Richard 156 Rose Seidler House 259, 259, 266–267 Rosemorrin Smelting Works 64 Rouse Hill House 259 Rowe Street, Sydney 212–213 Rowland, Governor Sir James 254 Rowse, Tim 240 Roxburgh, Rachel 37, 50–52 Royal Australian Institute of Architects, NSW Chapter 1954 Sydney Congress 34–35 early support for heritage values 46 involved in Rocks campaign 168 Louise Cox, leadership in 38 Mundey speech to 100 on Millers Point houses 273 Royal Australian Planning Institute, involved in Rocks campaign 168 Rozelle Bay campaign 118 Rum Hospital building see Mint Building, Sydney Runcie, Neil 196, 207 Ruskin, John 10 S Saarinen, Eliel 37 Sabemo project, North Sydney 223–224 Salamanca Place, Hobart 122

San Francisco Chronicle, Mundey interview 143 Sandercock, Leonie 125–126 Sartor, Frank 94, 226 Saunders, David 37 Save East Circular Quay Committee 94 Save Sydney’s Theatre Royal Committee 214 Scarsbrick, Brian 293 Scenery Preservation Act 1915 (Tas) 10–11 Schilling, Kathleen 38 Schofield, Leo 32 Schumacher, EF 3 Seidler, Harry adds theatre to MLC design 214–216 arranges Gropius visit to Australia 34–35 at Dusseldorp book launch 265 design for Grosvenor Place debated by SCC 253 disputes with heritage bodies 287 Mundey’s relations with 266–268 North Sydney projects 224 technical advances by 54 views on official planning controls 219–222 Seidler, Penelope 221, 266 Seltzer, Ethan 241 Sentis, Louis 63 Sharman, Jim 208 Shaw, John 31–32, 119, 198 Sheehan, Monica 74, 76 Shehadie, Nicholas becomes Sydney commissioner 254 on Green Bans 231 plans for Olympic Stadium at Moore Park 194 signs Woolloomooloo agreement 185 SHELTER NSW 115 shopping centres, regional 30–31 Sibley, Andrew 185 Sierra Club 132–133 Silent Spring 138 Singer, Peter 130 Sir Henry Parkes Oration 2013, Ted Mack delivers 225 Skeffington Report (UK) 111 South Australia see also Adelaide Dunstan government 226

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Spigelman, Alice 222 Spirit of Progress,The 3 St James’ Church, Sydney 30, 199–200 St Joseph’s College for Boys 68 St Malo, colonial residence 50, 63, ps St Vincent’s Hospital project, Mundey works on 229 State of Siege 96 State Planning Authority of New South Wales Heritage research by 37 plan for Kelly’s Bush 70 plans for Woolloomooloo 182 rejects 1971 plan for Victoria Street 189 Stead, David 48 Stephenson, Gordon 200–201 Sterling Lecture: ‘Green Bans and Beyond’ 93 Stobo, Margaret 74 Strachan, Tony 119 Straight Left 148 Stretton, Hugh, Ideas for Australian Cities 120 Strong, Maurice 143 suburbs, post-war growth of 25–27 Sullivan, Sharon 37 Sullivans Cove Citizens’ Committee 122 Sulman, Sir John, Introduction to the Study of Town Planning in Australia 41 Sunline Homes 26 Supreme Court Building, Sydney 201–202 Susannah Place, The Rocks 259, 260–261, 262 Sutherland, Doug 250 Sutherland Shire Environment Centre 128 Sydney campaign to conserve harbour foreshores 175–176 Green Ban sites 84 Japanese submarine attack on 22 lost heritage buildings 99 monorail proposed for 252–253 post-war development 3–8 property boom in 31–33, 105–106 sandstone heritage 16 sites of conservation battles 183 threatened by development 28

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urban redevelopment under Whitlam 43–44 Sydney Boom, Sydney Bust 53, 105 Sydney City Council xviii, 247–255, 284 Sydney Conservatorium of Music 94 Sydney Cove Redevelopment Act 1968 (NSW) 166, 173 Sydney Cove Redevelopment Authority changes priorities 174 drops redevelopment agenda 176 establishment of 166–169 powers of 171 SCC represented on 252 Sydney Harbour Bridge, construction of 160 Sydney Harbour Federation Trust 101, 177 Sydney Harbour Foreshore Authority 96, 175–176, 178–179 Sydney Living Museums 256–257 Sydney Opera House World Heritage precinct 94, 252 Sydney Push 212 ‘Sydney School’, establishment of 26 Sydney Smelting Company 63, 68–69 Sydney’s Electoral History 250–251 T Tanner, Howard 38 Taplin, Judith 74 Tasker, John 214 Tasmania early heritage conservation efforts 46 Green Ban sites 317 Scenery Preservation Act 1915 10–11 World Heritage forests 15 Tasmanian Wilderness Society 137–138 Taylor, Jennifer 37 Thalis, Philip 16 The Australian Ugliness 24–25, 99 The Builder 109, 230–232 The Closing Circle 139 ‘The Historic Heritage of Cities’ in Athens Charter 40 The Home of Man 78–79, 139 The Limits to Growth, Club of Rome 139 The Mint see Mint Building, Sydney The Rocks, Sydney 180–181 campaign to conserve 156–181

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listed as Urban Conservation Area 91 recent plans for 272–276 planned redevelopment of 162–163 school excursions to 30 Susannah Place 260–261, 262 The Spirit of Progress 3 Theatre Royal campaign 211–218, 266–267 Theeman, Frank 189–190, 231 Thompson, John and Pat 116 Thorne, Ross 215 Tingle, Laura 292 Tinker, Jon xv Total Environment Centre environmental advocacy 282 founding of 100 goals of 126–128 Milo Dunphy, founder of 242 state-based role of 114–115 Town and Country Planning Act (UK) 111–112 Town and Country Planning Association (Vic) 47 town planning legislation, development of 102–105 Towndrow, F. E. A. (Tony) 119 Townsville 21–22 trade unions see Builders Labourers’ Federation; Construction, Forestry, Mining and Energy Union; union movement The Tribune, Mundey on front page of 108 Troy, Patrick 146 Turnbull Coalition Government, signs 2015 Paris Agreement 15 U UN HABITAT Conference 1976, Mundey attends 142–143 union movement 83, 244–245 see also Builders Labourers’ Federation; Construction, Forestry, Mining and Energy Union United Kingdom and Europe, post-war reconstruction in 20–21 United Nations Brundtland Report 144

Conference on the Human Environment, Stockholm 140–141 defines ‘heritage’ 11 Environment Program 141 environmental conferences 153 millennium goals 297 UNESCO 11, 142 United Tasmania Group 141 University of Liverpool School of Civic Design 102–103 University of Sydney 100, 268, 269 urban design, architecture and the Modern Movement 33–38 urban planning, professional bodies in 284–289 Uren, Tom advocates public housing 115 as Minister for Urban and Regional Development 43, 118, 140, 193 interest in environmental issues 146–148 involved in Woolloomooloo campaign 184 signs Coronation Hill letter 93 with Mundey 151 Utzon, Joern 101 V Vallance, Keith 149 van de Velde, Henry 35 van der Rohe, Mies 34, 35 Vancouver HABITAT Conference 245, 297 Vancouver Declaration on Human Settlements 143–144 Vancouver Plan of Action 112 Vatican, on climate change 290 Vaucluse House, Sydney 255–256, 256, 258 Venice Charter 97–98, 140 Verge, John 186, 201 Victoria see also Melbourne planning reform in 226 Green Ban sites 316–317 legislative protection for heritage buildings 149–150 state-wide Green Bans 124 Town and Country Planning Association 47

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Victoria Point Co Pty Ltd 189–190 Victoria Street, Kings Cross, campaign to conserve 188–191 Victorian Housing Commission 27–28 Victorian Small Homes Bureau 25–26 Victorian Town and Country Planning Board 51 W Wade, Matt 283 Walker, Meredith 37, 291 Walker, Reg 149, 188 Wallumedagal clan 58–59 Walshe, Bob 128 Ward, Barbara in global green movement 129 invites Mundey to WWF meeting 133 Only One Earth 138, 140 signs NGO Declaration 143 The Home of Man 78–79, 139 Watts, Peter 257–258, 263, 265, 266 Webb, Len 149 Webber, Peter 156, 198, 224 Weekes, Norman 48 Wentworth Group of Concerned Scientists 283 Wentworth, William Charles 255–256 Wentworthville and Riverstone Rugby League Club, Mundey as captain/ coach 2 West Rocks, included in SCRA redevelopment plan 164 WestConnex project 16 Western Australia, Green Ban sites 317 Whelan the Wrecker xvii White House conference on world heritage 141 White, Patrick founds Friends of the Green Ban 243 house of, purchased for public use 95 Mundey’s relations with xvi, 205–211 on Centennial Park 194, 196 White, Unk 156 Whitlam, Gough 100, 146–149, 185, 237

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Whitlam Labor Government see also Department of Urban and Regional Development collaborates on Woolloomooloo urban plan 184–186 conservation policies 235–236 Inquiry into the National Estate 11–12 purchases Glebe Estate 118 purchases Redfern houses 123 quality-of-life concerns 23 Wilderness Society 137–138 Wilson, William Hardy, Old Colonial Architecture in New South Wales and Tasmania 52 Winston, Denis 50–51 Woolley, Ken 26 Woolloomooloo, campaign to conserve 182–186 Woolloomooloo Resident Action Group 182 Woolwich Pier Hotel 68 Workers Online 83 World Commission on Environment and Development 144 World Heritage Convention 297 World Heritage forests, Tasmania 15 World Parks Congress, 2014 298 World War II, aftermath in Britain and Europe 20 World Wildlife Fund 133, 143, 233 Worskett, Roy 88–89 Wran Labor government (NSW) 78, 226, 257 Wran, Neville 154, 254 Wright, Frank Lloyd 34 Wright, Judith 131–132, 149, 239–240, 291 Wyatt, Annie 48, 80, 89 Y Yencken, David 121, 140, 148–149 young people, environmental concerns of 293–294 Yungaba historic building, Brisbane 95

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