Some of the events included a change to working conditions to make them fair, the change of rights of aborigines and women to vote and the introduction of the immigration restriction act in 1901. The most important event that occurred is the federation of Australia’s six British colonies.

Australia in 1900 was comprised of a variety of different races but was mostly made up of Anglo-Celtic background. 75.2 percent of people (2,913,997 people) were born in Australia but only 17.2 percent (665,954 people) was born in Great Britain. 1 percent (38,552 people) were born in Germany, 0.8 percent (29,907 people) were born in China, 0.7 percent (25,881 people) were born in New Zealand and 2.7 (105,510 people) were born in other countries. These other countries included Italy, United States, Middle East and Asia.

The Chinese people were some of the first non-white immigrants in Australia. When convicts started to fade away, rich cattle raisers went to Asia and brought back Chinese people to work as farm labourers and shepherds. After 1950, Chinese people started to work on the goldfield but other non-Chinese workers started to treat them badly. There were physical attacks on the Chinese workers because other workers did not tolerate their culture and customs.

There was a lot of conflict in the cities, employers wanted to make more profit by using Chinese workers because of their cheap labour. This also was to make European workers accept reduced wages and worse conditions. There was also an incident where 1000 European miners went on strike and the mine managers hired Chinese as replacements. The Europeans attacked the coaches the Chinese were in and pulled down the building where they were going to stay.

At the turn of the century, working conditions were poor and pay was very little. In the city area, many people worked in factories. Temperatures in the factories reached over 40 degrees Celsius in the summer and the factory managers treated the workers like slaves. People usually worked from 8 am to 6pm; sometimes they worked until 10pm even though they were not paid extra for it. Shop assistants worked 12 hour shifts on weekdays and 14 hour shifts on Saturday. When the first Factories and Shop act was passed, shop managers ignored it and the shop assistants feared complaining on risk of being sacked.

Children sometimes worked even though school was compulsory. They worked in factories, textile mills and in boot trade. Young children were hired because they were cheap labour and could get into and clean the small holes in between machines. Children were paid 2 cents per hour which was half the average woman’s pay; this was because the factory managers wanted to make as much profit as possible.

Working in Australia seemed rigorous until The Conciliation and Arbitration court was formed in 1904. They acted as a referee to decide an agreement between employers and trade unions. The Workers Compensation Act in 1912 was a plan to provide payments to employees who suffered work-related accident or diseases. In 1909 the introduction of aged pensions, provided British citizens over the age of 65 and resident for 20 years with $52 per year. In 1904 the introduction of the Maternity Allowance Act provided mothers with $10 per child birth. Australia was thought to be “worker’s paradise” because of the aged pensions, worker’s compensation and maternity allowances. This was because Australia had better wages and working conditions compared to people in other countries those days.

The issue of stopping non-European people coming to Australia was one of the main reasons that the six British colonies agreed on Federation. The three main reasons that the restriction of immigration was introduced were:

• Economic factors – Europeans were losing their jobs because employers were replacing European workers with imported workers who would work for lower wages.
• Racial attitudes – Europeans commonly believed that white people were superior to other races and prevent intermarriage between races to keep the white race ‘pure’.
• Preservation of democratic freedoms – Australians thought that their new democratic structures were fragile and the Chinese would threaten their new system.

The first election as a whole nation in 1901, involved almost all candidates supporting the “White Australia policy”. There were 3 parties; the Labour Party, the Free Traders and the Protectionists. Australia’s first Prime Minister Edmund Barton believed in stopping cheap labour and cheap imports. The Immigration Restriction Act was then made milder by having migrants take a dictation test. The dictation test made migrants write down a 50 word passage read out by a guard in “any prescribed language”. The language was to be any European language, which meant a person trying to enter Australia would be tested in a language they probably did not know.

Before 1894, only European men and Aborigines had the right to vote. Queensland removed this right in 1885, followed by Western Australia in 1893. Aborigines had their land taken away from them and their votes did not play a large part in arguments leading up to Federation. Colonies did not want the Commonwealth Government to interfere with their Aboriginal policy making. Aboriginal population was not added to states’ population count. The reason being larger states did not want smaller states to have larger population by including aborigines and smaller states did not want to pay for Aborigines’ taxes.

In 1894 women in South Australia were granted permission to vote in its colony’s elections. Individuals began to take action, women’s groups were formed and some women groups campaigned through demonstrations, petitions and literature. Then in 1899 women in Western Australia were granted permission to vote. A Bill was then passed in 1902 to allow all women to vote in federal elections. Gradually the right was extended to state elections and Victoria was the last to do so in 1908.

In conclusion you can see that many important events occurred from 1901-1914. Demonstrations against Chinese workers were made, working conditions and wages were improved, the dictation test was created for migrants and women were granted suffrage in all colonies’ elections. Looking back on the history of Australia near the turn of the century shows you that lives in those days were very harsh and lives in modern days are very luxurious.