Backbencher

Lecture four talked about the way Australia and New Zealand were settled. The settlement of the two countries counldn't be more different. Australia was a planned penal colony. It's nice to think that the convicts shipped to Australia were political activists, but most of them were criminals. The first few years of Australian settlement were very hard, but eventually things got better. Shipment of criminals to all the Australian territories was eventually stopped. This lecture complemented the Clark text really well. One thing that Clark mentioned and the lecture didn't to much was the ratio of males to females in Australia. The lack of women in Australia was the cause of many problems.

The settlement of New Zealand was very different from that of Australia. New Zealand was a planned colony. This new colony was supposed to be just like England only better. Convicts were never shipped to New Zealand. Most of the people that went there were younger sons of wealthy families. Each person was only supposed to get a small section of land to farm because larger areas would promote slavery. The plan failed miserably and some people got huge parcels of land that they turned into sheep stations. I find that idea of planning a settlement a little absurd. No matter how hard they tried officials couldn't keep people from acquiring large parcels of land. It is human nature to want to acquire more land.

I found it very interesting that Southern Australia was a planned settlement rather than a convict settlement. Why was Southern Auatralia different from all the other territories?