philip lowe : remarks at darwin community dinner remarks by mr philip lowe, governor of the reserve bank of australia, at the darwin community dinner, darwin, 2 july 2019. * * * good evening. a very warm welcome to this community dinner with the reserve bank board and senior staff. this morning the board held its monthly meeting here in darwin. we were very kindly hosted at the northern territory parliament building. the last time the board met in darwin was more than 50 years ago. i am sure that we all agree that this was too long ago. i can promise that you will be seeing more of us over the years ahead. this evening i would first like to talk a little about our history in the northern territory and how things have changed and then talk about today ’ s interest rate decision. the previous board meeting in darwin was held on 5 june 1968. the board met here to celebrate the opening of the rba ’ s new branch on bennett street. we operated out of this building for around 30 years, distributing banknotes and providing banking services to the northern territory government. but beyond this, as many of you will know, the building on bennett street has played an important role in the history of darwin. it was one of the few buildings that was virtually unscathed by the fury of cyclone tracy in 1974. this meant that in the aftermath of tracy, we were able to make our banking chamber available to the police to use as their emergency coordination and communications centre. in some ways this experience symbolises the rba itself. we build on strong foundations, we place great weight on stability and resilience, and we seek to serve the public interest. our presence here in darwin did all this. i am very pleased to see that the building is still serving the public interest as the location of tourism top end. in preparation for our meeting today, i looked back at our archives for details of the meeting in 1968, including the minutes of that meeting, which i am glad to be releasing today. that meeting was the second last for governor nugget coombs before he retired. reading this archival material reminded me of how much the world has changed. one obvious change is in the way that monetary policy works. the main decision made by the board at that meeting back in 1968 was that dr coombs recommend to the treasurer that he adjust the interest rates on trading bank fixed deposits and saving bank deposits by a quarter of a per cent. from today ’ s perspective, this

is remarkable on two levels. first, the rba was just making a recommendation to the government – this was obviously before the days of central bank independence. second, monetary policy was exercised partly through direct controls on bank deposit rates. so, it was a very different world. today, the board makes its decisions independently of government and we don ’ t directly control bank interest rates for households and businesses. another difference that struck me was the way the board worked and its approach to risk management. in 1968, the board was made up of nine men ; no women at all. this is very different from our board today. in 1968, the board also took advantage of the trip to darwin to make a one - week tour of northern australia, visiting gladstone, weipa, gove, kununurra, the ord river, dampier, mt tom price and alice springs. almost the entire board travelled together on a private chartered plane. today, our risk management guidelines wouldn ’ t allow this. they don ’ t allow us to travel all together and we certainly don ’ t take private planes. and unfortunately, the demands of today ’ s globalised world make such an extensive trip very difficult in 2019. 1 / 4 bis central bankers'speeches one other area where there has been much change since the board last met here is in the relationship between the original people of this land and the wider australian community. in his last months as governor of the reserve bank, nugget coombs began work as chair of the council for aboriginal affairs. the council was established by prime minister harold holt after the 1967 referendum. coombs worked tirelessly for almost three decades advocating for indigenous rights and social justice. he was a strong advocate of land rights and encouraging pride in the identity of indigenous australians. he cared passionately about their welfare and the preservation of cultural values and traditions. over the years, nugget coombs developed a particularly strong relationship with the people of arnhem land, especially with the yolngu around yirrkala. you might recall that they were responsible for the yirrkala bark petitions submitted to the australian parliament in 1963. the yolngu wanted to be consulted as the traditional custodians of the land before the government granted mining rights. these petitions were an important step towards the native title rights that exist today. coombs travelled to yirrkala many times, the first time being shortly before the board met here in 1968. he wanted