Document ID: chunk:federal_register_of_legislation:F2022L00620:body:0:p31
Version: federal_register_of_legislation:F2022L00620
Segment Type: other
Provision Reference: 
Character Range: 83230–86053

toilet facilities had become inadequate.
A Parliamentary Standing Committee on Public Works report in 1943 noted that while small additions had been made, with the conversion of corridors and balconies into offices, more space was required.  Several solutions were proposed, including enclosing the courtyards to the east and west of A Block, adding an additional story to the building; extending West Block to the north; and the erection of a new temporary building for the cables section (Figure 19).[68]  By June 1943, Cabinet decided that a brick addition to the south-west of the building should be considered, 'comprising first, second and part of third floor, level with an in architectural harmony with the existing building'.[69]  This directive was delivered in the form of D Block (1944), a new wing at the south end of the longitudinal axis designed in the same architectural style as the original building (Figure 20).  The original occupant of D Block was the Department of External Affairs.
With the construction of D Block, the pneumatic tube connections that were installed in 1940-41 to connect the Provisional Parliament House with the Secretariat buildings were moved to the wing. The original sending and receiving terminal was located on the first-floor east corner of B Block, connecting underground to the first floor of East Block. [70]   A second pneumatic tube service then connected East Block to Parliament House.  The connection was altered in 1944 to connect to the second floor of the east corner of D Block (see drawings in Appendix B).  It is possible that the underground tubes, or sections of them, survive, but no investigation has been undertaken.
In 1945, the courtyard entrance to the east of B Block was enclosed and an automatic telephone exchange installed.  The alteration created the present configuration of a light well between the new office space and the central lobby in B Block.  In 1946, the open courtyard to the west of B Block was similarly enclosed to create a new cruciform lobby and entrance to the building (Figure 21).  This change resulted in the present configuration, although the signage on the western elevation has since changed from 'Commonwealth Offices West Block' to simply 'West Block' (Figure 22).

2.6.1               The Dugout
Air raid shelters and trenches were introduced within the Parliamentary Triangle in 1942, following the fall of Singapore (February 1942).  Early in 1943, one of the air raid shelters, dug into the embankment east of West Block, was adapted to accommodate a Typex cypher machine, used for coding and decoding cables (Figure 23).  The Typex machine enabled Prime Minister John Curtin to communicate directly with British Prime Minister Winston Churchill and American President Franklin Roosevelt.  It was accommodated in a