Document ID: chunk:federal_register_of_legislation:F2021L01868:reg:4:p41
Version: federal_register_of_legislation:F2021L01868
Segment Type: reg
Provision Reference: reg 4 (pt 41/63)
Character Range: 457914–460718

there were no immediate accommodation implications arising from this move, it marked a highly significant departure in the usage of the building, signifying that it was no longer the exclusive preserve of the legislature, but now served as a permanent home for the executive as well. The move set a precedent of the utmost importance for the future of the building.41

  Pressure on accommodation in the House was intensified by various other developments, as well. The emergence of the Lang group of five disaffected Labor MPs led to a need to provide them with their own party room. A room was initially found for them on the lower floor but, following a decision to give them better and more conveniently-located accommodation, alterations were made to some of the spaces on the main floor. In early 1935, the Librarian's office (Room M54) was extended to provide office space for the Lang group and their leader, 'Stabber Jack' Beasley, close to the House of Representatives Chamber. At the same time, a set of new rooms were constructed on the 'balcony recess' on the Senate side to accommodate the Librarian and his secretary. A year later, another change was made following a request from the Governor-General that an office be provided for him in Parliament House where Executive Council meetings could be held and where he could have private meetings with ministers and other people. With some difficulty, the Speaker of the House and the President of the Senate were able to reserve for the Governor-General the Public Works Committee room (later Senate Committee Room 3) and an adjacent secretary's office on the lower floor. As the Depression had brought government building projects to a standstill, the Public Works Committee was dormant and its room was therefore unused. The Speaker and President warned, however, that if the committee were re-convened at any stage new arrangements would have to be made for the Governor-General's accommodation in the House.42

  Labouring under the financial straits of the Depression years, successive governments in the 1930s felt unable to devote scarce resources to what many Australians regarded as the quixotic and extravagant scheme to develop a national capital at Canberra. The upshot was a continuing lack of departmental office space close to Parliament House, a situation that fostered the insidious trend of turning the House into a de

    39      Committee of Enquiry on Administrative Building Foundations, 'Interim and Final Reports of Inquiry by Committee of Experts', February 1929, p. 4.
    40      Souter, Acts of Parliament, p. 230
    41      Emerton, 'Report by the Secretary of the Joint House Department', 7 September 1956, p. 8; Souter, Acts of Parliament, pp. 230– 31.
    42      Letter, HVC Thorby to Prime Minister, 13