1.
Flag of South Australia
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The current state flag of South Australia, was officially adopted by the government of South Australia in 1904. The flag is based on the defaced British Blue Ensign with the state located in the fly. The badge is a disc featuring a piping shrike with its wings outstretched. The badge is believed to have been designed by Robert Craig, a teacher at the School of Arts in Adelaide. The first flag of South Australia was adopted in 1870 and it too was a defaced British Blue Ensign, but with a black disc in the fly containing the Southern Cross and the two pointers. South Australia then adopted a flag in 1876, also a Blue Ensign. The badge design was a rendition of the arrival of Britannia meeting an Aboriginal sitting with a spear on a rocky shoreline. A kangaroo appears to be carved into the rocks behind the Aboriginal and this flag was adopted after a request from the Colonial Office for a new design over the old one due to its similarity to the flags of New Zealand and Victoria. On 29 October 2016, a motion to adopt a new and it has yet to be seen how the State Government will act on this proposal. Coat of arms of South Australia The State Flag of South Australia South Australia at Flags of the World 1870 flag
2.
Coat of arms of South Australia
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The Coat of arms of South Australia is the official symbol of the state of South Australia. It was granted by Queen Elizabeth II on 19 April 1984 and they replaced a coat of arms granted to the State in 1936 by King Edward VIII. The shield has the piping shrike within a disc on a blue background. The piping shrike is the bird emblem of South Australia. The crest is the Sturts desert pea, the emblem of South Australia. The coat of arms has no supporters, the compartment, or base, is a grassland with symbols of agriculture and industry, and a motto with the name South Australia. Flag of South Australia Government of South Australia Heraldry The State Coat of Arms of South Australia Download the State Coat of Arms of South Australia
3.
States and territories of Australia
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Australia is a federation of six states, together with ten federal territories. The Australian mainland consists of five of the six federated states, the state of Tasmania is an island about 200 kilometers from the mainland. The remaining seven territories are classified for some purposes as external territories, aside from the Australian Antarctic Territory, which is Australias claim to part of Antarctica, Australia is the worlds sixth-largest country by total area. Since 2015, federal control has also extended to the formerly self-governing territory of Norfolk Island. Three of the territories are inhabited, the others are uninhabited. The term geographic Australia is used by the Australian government to describe the area covered by demographic statistics such as national population figures and this area comprises Christmas Island and the Cocos Islands in addition to the six states and three mainland territories. Norfolk Island is the territory with a native population that is not part of geographic Australia. Both territories were reincorporated as the Northern Territory at the end of this period, from 1923 to 1968, the United Nations Trust Territory of Nauru was under Australian administration, until independence as the Republic of Nauru. From 1949 to 1975, the Territory of Papua and New Guinea was a territory of Australia, the states originated as separate British colonies prior to Federation in 1901. Upon Federation, the six colonies of New South Wales, Victoria, Queensland, South Australia, Western Australia, the territories, by contrast, are from a constitutional perspective directly subject to the Commonwealth Government, laws for territories are determined by the Australian Parliament. Most of the territories are directly administered by the Commonwealth Government, in the self-governing territories, the Australian Parliament retains the full power to legislate, and can override laws made by the territorial institutions, which it has done on rare occasions. For the purposes of Australian intergovernmental bodies, the Northern Territory, each state has a Governor, appointed by the Queen, which by convention she does on the advice of the state Premier. The Administrator of the Northern Territory, by contrast, is appointed by the Governor-General, Jervis Bay Territory is the only non-self-governing internal territory. Until 1989, it was administered as if it were a part of the ACT, although residents of the Jervis Bay Territory are generally subject to laws made by the ACT Legislative Assembly, they are not represented in the Assembly. They are represented in the Parliament of Australia as part of the Electoral Division of Fraser in the ACT, in other respects, the territory is administered directly by the Federal Government through the Territories portfolio. The external territory of Norfolk Island possessed a degree of self-government from 1979 until 2015, each state has a bicameral parliament except Queensland, which abolished its upper house in 1922. The lower house is called the Legislative Assembly, except in South Australia and Tasmania, Tasmania is the only state to use proportional representation for elections to its lower house, all others elect members from single member constituencies, using preferential voting. The upper house is called the Legislative Council and is elected from multi-member constituencies using proportional representation
4.
Geographic coordinate system
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A geographic coordinate system is a coordinate system used in geography that enables every location on Earth to be specified by a set of numbers, letters or symbols. The coordinates are chosen such that one of the numbers represents a vertical position. A common choice of coordinates is latitude, longitude and elevation, to specify a location on a two-dimensional map requires a map projection. The invention of a coordinate system is generally credited to Eratosthenes of Cyrene. Ptolemy credited him with the adoption of longitude and latitude. Ptolemys 2nd-century Geography used the prime meridian but measured latitude from the equator instead. Mathematical cartography resumed in Europe following Maximus Planudes recovery of Ptolemys text a little before 1300, in 1884, the United States hosted the International Meridian Conference, attended by representatives from twenty-five nations. Twenty-two of them agreed to adopt the longitude of the Royal Observatory in Greenwich, the Dominican Republic voted against the motion, while France and Brazil abstained. France adopted Greenwich Mean Time in place of local determinations by the Paris Observatory in 1911, the latitude of a point on Earths surface is the angle between the equatorial plane and the straight line that passes through that point and through the center of the Earth. Lines joining points of the same latitude trace circles on the surface of Earth called parallels, as they are parallel to the equator, the north pole is 90° N, the south pole is 90° S. The 0° parallel of latitude is designated the equator, the plane of all geographic coordinate systems. The equator divides the globe into Northern and Southern Hemispheres, the longitude of a point on Earths surface is the angle east or west of a reference meridian to another meridian that passes through that point. All meridians are halves of great ellipses, which converge at the north and south poles, the prime meridian determines the proper Eastern and Western Hemispheres, although maps often divide these hemispheres further west in order to keep the Old World on a single side. The antipodal meridian of Greenwich is both 180°W and 180°E, the combination of these two components specifies the position of any location on the surface of Earth, without consideration of altitude or depth. The grid formed by lines of latitude and longitude is known as a graticule, the origin/zero point of this system is located in the Gulf of Guinea about 625 km south of Tema, Ghana. To completely specify a location of a feature on, in, or above Earth. Earth is not a sphere, but a shape approximating a biaxial ellipsoid. It is nearly spherical, but has an equatorial bulge making the radius at the equator about 0. 3% larger than the radius measured through the poles, the shorter axis approximately coincides with the axis of rotation
5.
Adelaide
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Adelaide is the capital city of the state of South Australia, and the fifth-most populous city of Australia. In June 2016, Adelaide had a resident population of 1,326,354 million. South Australia, with a total of 1, the demonym Adelaidean is used in reference to the city and its residents. Adelaide is north of the Fleurieu Peninsula, on the Adelaide Plains between the Gulf St Vincent and the low-lying Mount Lofty Ranges which surround the city. Adelaide stretches 20 km from the coast to the foothills, and 94 to 104 km from Gawler at its northern extent to Sellicks Beach in the south. Named in honour of Adelaide of Saxe-Meiningen, queen consort to King William IV, Colonel William Light, one of Adelaides founding fathers, designed the city and chose its location close to the River Torrens, in the area originally inhabited by the Kaurna people. Lights design set out Adelaide in a layout, interspaced by wide boulevards and large public squares. Early Adelaide was shaped by prosperity and wealth—until the Second World War, it was Australias third-largest city and it has been noted for early examples of religious freedom, a commitment to political progressivism and civil liberties. It has been known as the City of Churches since the mid-19th century, as South Australias seat of government and commercial centre, Adelaide is the site of many governmental and financial institutions. Most of these are concentrated in the city centre along the boulevard of North Terrace, King William Street. Today, Adelaide is noted for its festivals and sporting events, its food and wine, its long beachfronts. It ranks highly in terms of liveability, being listed in the Top 10 of The Economist Intelligence Units Worlds Most Liveable Cities index in 2010,2011,2012 and 2015. It was also ranked the most liveable city in Australia by the Property Council of Australia in 2011,2012 and 2013, prior to its proclamation as a British settlement in 1836, the area around Adelaide was inhabited by the indigenous Kaurna Aboriginal nation. Kaurna culture and language was almost completely destroyed within a few decades of the European settlement of South Australia in 1836, however, extensive documentation by early missionaries and other researchers has enabled a modern revival of both language and culture. South Australia was officially proclaimed as a new British colony on 28 December 1836, the event is commemorated in South Australia as Proclamation Day. The site of the capital was surveyed and laid out by Colonel William Light. Adelaide was established as a colony of free immigrants, promising civil liberties and freedom from religious persecution. Wakefields idea was for the Government to survey and sell the land at a rate that would maintain land values high enough to be unaffordable for labourers and journeymen
6.
Demonym
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A demonym is a word that identifies residents or natives of a particular place, which is derived from the name of that particular place. It is a neologism, previously gentilic was recorded in English dictionaries, e. g. the Oxford English Dictionary, thus a Thai may be any resident or citizen of Thailand, of any ethnic group, or more narrowly a member of the Thai people. Conversely, some groups of people may be associated with multiple demonyms, for example, a native of the United Kingdom may be called a British person, a Brit, or a Briton. In some languages, when a parallel demonym does not exist, in English, demonyms are capitalized and are often the same as the adjectival form of the place, e. g. Egyptian, Japanese, or Greek. Significant exceptions exist, for instance the adjectival form of Spain is Spanish, English widely includes country-level demonyms such as Ethiopian or Guatemalan and more local demonyms such as Seoulite, Wisconsinite, Chicagoan, Michigander, Fluminense, and Paulista. Some places lack a commonly used and accepted demonym and this poses a particular challenge to those toponymists who research demonyms. The word gentilic comes from the Latin gentilis and the English suffix -ic, the word demonym was derived from the Greek word meaning populace with the suffix for name. National Geographic attributes the term demonym to Merriam-Webster editor Paul Dickson in a recent work from 1990 and it was subsequently popularized in this sense in 1997 by Dickson in his book Labels for Locals. However, in What Do You Call a Person From, a Dictionary of Resident Names attributed the term to George H. Scheetz, in his Names Names, A Descriptive and Prescriptive Onymicon, which is apparently where the term first appears. Several linguistic elements are used to create demonyms in the English language, the most common is to add a suffix to the end of the location name, slightly modified in some instances. Cairo → Cairene Cyrenaica → Cyrene Damascus → Damascene Greece → Greek Nazareth → Nazarene Slovenia → Slovene Often used for Middle Eastern locations and European locations. Kingston-upon-Hull → Hullensian Leeds → Leodensian Spain → Spaniard Savoy → Savoyard -ese is usually considered proper only as an adjective, thus, a Chinese person is used rather than a Chinese. Monaco → Monégasque Menton → Mentonasque Basque Country → Basque Often used for French locations, mostly they are from Africa and the Pacific, and are not generally known or used outside the country concerned. In much of East Africa, a person of an ethnic group will be denoted by a prefix. For example, a person of the Luba people would be a Muluba, the plural form Baluba, similar patterns with minor variations in the prefixes exist throughout on a tribal level. And Fijians who are indigenous Fijians are known as Kaiviti and these demonyms are usually more informal and colloquial. In the United States such informal demonyms frequently become associated with mascots of the sports teams of the state university system. In other countries the origins are often disputed and these will typically be formed using the standard models above
7.
Government of South Australia
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The Government of South Australia, also referred to as the South Australian Government, is the Australian state democratic administrative authority of South Australia. The Government of South Australia, a constitutional monarchy, was formed in 1856 as prescribed in its Constitution. Since the Federation of Australia in 1901, South Australia has been a state of the Commonwealth of Australia, under the Australian Constitution, South Australia ceded legislative and judicial supremacy to the Commonwealth, but retained powers in all matters not in conflict with the Commonwealth. South Australia is governed according to the principles of the Westminster system, executive power rests formally with the executive council, which consists of the governor and senior ministers. Each portfolio is led by a government minister who is a member of the Parliament
8.
Constitutional monarchy
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A constitutional monarchy is a form of monarchy in which the sovereign exercises their authorities in accordance with a written or unwritten constitution. A constitutional monarchy may refer to a system in which the acts as a non-party political head of state under the constitution. Political scientist Vernon Bogdanor, paraphrasing Thomas Macaulay, has defined a constitutional monarch as a sovereign who reigns, in addition to acting as a visible symbol of national unity, a constitutional monarch may hold formal powers such as dissolving parliament or giving royal assent to legislation. Many constitutional monarchies still retain significant authorities or political influence however, such as through certain reserve powers, the United Kingdom and the other Commonwealth realms are all constitutional monarchies in the Westminster tradition of constitutional governance. Three states – Malaysia, Cambodia and the Holy See – are elective monarchies, the oldest constitutional monarchy dating back to ancient times was that of the Hittites. These were scattered noble families that worked as representatives of their subjects in an adjutant or subaltern federal-type landscape, the most recent country to move from an absolute monarchy to a constitutional monarchy was Bhutan, between 2007 and 2008. At the same time, in Scotland the Convention of Estates enacted the Claim of Right Act 1689, although Queen Anne was the last monarch to veto an Act of Parliament when in 1707 she blocked the Scottish Militia Bill, Hanoverian monarchs continued to selectively dictate government policies. For instance George III constantly blocked Catholic Emancipation, eventually precipitating the resignation of William Pitt the Younger as Prime Minister in 1801, Queen Victoria was the last monarch to exercise real personal power but this diminished over the course of her reign. In 1839 she became the last sovereign to keep a Prime Minister in power against the will of Parliament when the Bedchamber crisis resulted in the retention of Lord Melbournes administration, today, the role of the British monarch is by convention effectively ceremonial. No person may accept significant public office without swearing an oath of allegiance to the Queen, with few exceptions, the monarch is bound by constitutional convention to act on the advice of the Government. Constitutional monarchy also occurred briefly in the years of the French Revolution. As originally conceived, a monarch was head of the executive branch and quite a powerful figure even though his or her power was limited by the constitution. In many cases the monarchs, while still at the top of the political and social hierarchy, were given the status of servants of the people to reflect the new. In the course of Frances July Monarchy, Louis-Philippe I was styled King of the French rather than King of France, following the Unification of Germany, Otto von Bismarck rejected the British model. However this model of constitutional monarchy was discredited and abolished following Germanys defeat in the First World War. Later, Fascist Italy could also be considered as a constitutional monarchy and this eventually discredited the Italian monarchy and led to its abolition in 1946. After the Second World War, surviving European monarchies almost invariably adopted some variant of the constitutional monarchy model originally developed in Britain, nowadays a parliamentary democracy that is a constitutional monarchy is considered to differ from one that is a republic only in detail rather than in substance. However, three important factors distinguish monarchies such as the United Kingdom from systems where greater power might otherwise rest with Parliament, other privileges may be nominal or ceremonial
9.
Governor of South Australia
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The Governor of South Australia is the representative in the Australian state of South Australia of Elizabeth II, Queen of Australia. The Governor performs the same constitutional and ceremonial functions at the level as does the Governor-General of Australia at the national level. The Governors official residence is Government House, in Adelaide, the states capital, nevertheless, the Governor retains the reserve powers of the Crown, and has the right to dismiss the Premier. The Westminster system is a form of constitutional monarchy, the first Australian-born Governor of South Australia was Major-General Sir James Harrison, and most subsequent governors have been Australian-born. The first South Australian-born governor was Sir Mark Oliphant, the current governor is Hieu Van Le. The term of the governor, Rear Admiral Kevin Scarce. As from June 2014, the Queen, upon the recommendation of the Premier, accorded all current, future and these people administered the government in the absence of the official governor. Three former governors are alive, the oldest being Sir Eric Neal, the latest-serving former governor to die was Dame Roma Mitchell, on 5 March 2000. The most recent death of a governor was that of Sir Keith Seaman. The Official Website of the Governor of South Australia Previous governors on official website
10.
Hieu Van Le
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Hieu Van Le AC is the 35th and current Governor of South Australia, in office since 1 September 2014. He had previously been the states lieutenant-governor since 31 August 2007, as well as a chairman of the South Australian Multicultural, Le is the first person of Asian heritage to be appointed a state governor in Australia. Le was born in Quảng Trị, South Vietnam, in 1954 and he was raised and educated in Đà Nẵng, and attended Dalat University. He fled Vietnam from the new communist regime in November 1977 and their two sons were born in Australia and are named after Australian cricketers Sir Donald Bradman and Kim Hughes. After arriving in Australia, Le attended the University of Adelaide, receiving an MBA and he was a senior investigator and manager with the Australian Securities and Investments Commission from the early 1990s until his retirement in 2009. He is also a member of the Australian Society of Certified Practising Accountants, les appointment as Governor of South Australia to replace Kevin Scarce was announced on 26 June 2014, he took office on 1 September, with Scarces term expiring on 7 August. Le is a Catholic and credits his experiences as a refugee for strengthening his religious convictions, in 2016 he was made a Companion of the Order of Australia
11.
Premier of South Australia
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The Premier of South Australia is the head of government in the state of South Australia, Australia. The Government of South Australia follows the Westminster system, with a Parliament of South Australia acting as the legislature, the current Premier is Jay Weatherill, the Leader of the South Australian Branch of the Australian Labor Party. Weatherill replaced Mike Rann on 21 October 2011, after Rann resigned as Premier, before the 1890s when there was no formal party system in South Australia, MPs tended to have historical liberal or conservative beliefs. The liberals dominated government from the 1893 election to 1905 election with the support of the South Australian United Labor Party, Labor took government with the support of eight dissident liberals in 1905 when Labor won the most seats for the first time. The rise of Labor saw non-Labor politics start to merge into various party incarnations, Labor formed South Australias first majority government after winning the 1910 state election, triggering the merger. The 1910 election came two weeks after federal Labor formed Australias first elected majority government at the 1910 federal election, no Country or rural conservative parties emerged as serious long-term forces in South Australian state politics, often folding into the main non-Labor party. There are six living former premiers, the oldest being Steele Hall, the most recent premier to die was John Bannon on 13 December 2015. In the following timeline, the legend includes the Liberal and Democratic Union, the Liberal Union, the Liberal Party of Australia is represented as Liberal only. The grey area represents the duration of Playmander electoral malapportionment, beginning in 1936, in effect until the 1970 election
12.
Steven Marshall
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Steven Spence Marshall is an Australian politician and the current South Australian Leader of the Opposition. He has been a member of the South Australian Division of the Liberal Party of Australia in the South Australian House of Assembly since 2010 and he has been Leader of the Opposition and the SA Liberals since February 2013. He had previously been the deputy leader from October 2012 to February 2013. Marshall had lived in the Norwood area for most of his life before entering parliament. He attended Ethelton Primary School and Immanuel College, before studying business at the South Australian Institute of Technology and he completed an MBA at Durham University in the United Kingdom. In 1997, Marshalls father retired from running the business, Marshall Furniture. He continued running the firm until 2001, when mounting pressure from imports forced the family to sell the business to Steinhoff International, Marshall served on the South Australian Manufacturing Industry Advisory Board prior to entering politics in 2010. Marshall said in August 2012 that he would be willing to sign a pledge that he would not challenge Isobel Redmond for the Liberal Party leadership or Mitch Williams for the deputy leadership, on 19 October 2012, Martin Hamilton-Smith and Marshall declared a leadership spill against Redmond and Williams. A partyroom ballot occurred on 23 October 2012, Redmond retained the leadership by one vote, at the ballot on 4 February 2013, Marshall was elected unopposed as South Australian Leader of the Opposition and Leader of the South Australian Division of the Liberal Party of Australia. A record, Marshall is the fifth consecutive Leader of the Opposition from the same party, Marshall continued to lead the Liberals in opposition. Former Liberal leader Martin Hamilton-Smith became an independent two months after the election and indicated his support for the government. Following the death of Such and the subsequent 2014 Fisher by-election which Labor won by five votes from a 7. 3% 2PP swing away from the Liberals, brock and Hamilton-Smith maintained their confidence and supply support for the government which provided a 26 to 21 parliamentary majority. The July to September 2014 Newspoll saw Labor begin to lead the Liberals on the vote for the first time since 2009. Marshall has been active in community service and is currently on the Board of the Spastic Centre of South Australia, in 2001 he received a Centenary of Federation Medal for services to the disability sector. South Australian state election,2018 #Polling Liberal Party of Australia StevenMarshall. com. au official website Parliamentary Profile, SA Parliament website SA Liberal profile Official twitter
13.
Liberal Party of Australia
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The Liberal Party of Australia is a major political party in Australia. Founded in 1945 to replace the United Australia Party, the Liberal Party is one of the two parties in Australian politics, along with the Australian Labor Party. Except for a few periods, the Liberal Party and its predecessors have operated in similar coalitions since the 1920s. Internationally, the Liberal Party is affiliated to the International Democrat Union, the partys leader is Malcolm Turnbull and its deputy leader is Julie Bishop. Now the Turnbull Government, the party had been elected at the 2013 federal election as the Abbott Government which took office on 18 September 2013. At state and territory level, the Liberal Party is in office in two states, Will Hodgman Premier of Tasmania since 2014 and Gladys Berejiklian Premier of New South Wales since 2017. The party is in opposition in the states of Victoria, Queensland, Western Australia, South Australia, the partys ideology has been referred to as liberal, conservative, liberal-conservative, and classically liberal. The Liberal Party tends to promote economic liberalism and cultural liberalism, two past leaders of the party, Sir Robert Menzies and John Howard, are Australias two longest-serving Prime Ministers. The Liberal Party has spent more time in government than any other federal Australian political party, the contemporary Liberal Party generally advocates economic liberalism. Historically, the party has supported a higher degree of protectionism and interventionism than it has in recent decades. However, from its foundation the party has identified itself as an anti-socialist grouping of liberals, strong opposition to socialism and communism in Australia and abroad was one of its founding principles. The partys founder and longest-serving leader Robert Menzies envisaged that Australias middle class would form its main constituency, in the 1970s a left-wing middle class emerged that no longer voted Liberal. In country areas they either compete with or have a truce with the Nationals, Menzies was an ardent constitutional monarchist, who supported the Monarchy in Australia and links to the Commonwealth of Nations. Today the party is divided on the question of republicanism, with some being republicans, the Menzies Government formalised Australias alliance with America in 1951, and the party has remained a strong supporter of the mutual defence treaty. Liberal leaders from Menzies to Malcolm Fraser generally maintained Australias high tariff levels, at that time the Liberals coalition partner, the Country Party, the older of the two in the coalition, had considerable influence over the governments economic policies. Socially, while liberty and freedom of form the basis of its beliefs. A West Australian Liberal, Ken Wyatt, became the first Indigenous Australian elected to the House of Representatives in 2010, the party has two factions, the conservative right and the moderate left. Both factions support the market and differ mainly over their level of social conservatism
14.
Letters patent
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Letters patent can be used for the creation of corporations or government offices, or for the granting of city status or a coat of arms. Letters patent are issued for the appointment of representatives of the Crown, such as governors and governors-general of Commonwealth realms, in the United Kingdom they are also issued for the creation of peers of the realm. A particular form of letters patent has evolved into the modern patent granting exclusive rights in an invention. e, the opposite of letters patent are letters close, which are personal in nature and sealed so that only the recipient can read their contents. Letters patent are thus comparable to other kinds of open letter in that their audience is wide, letters patent are so named from the Latin verb pateo, to lie open, exposed, accessible. The originators seal was attached pendent from the document, so that it did not have to be broken in order for the document to be read. Thus letters patent do not equate to a letter but rather to any form of document, deed, contract, letter, despatch, edict, decree. Letters patent are a form of open or public proclamation and an exercise of extra-parliamentary power by a monarch or president. Prior to the establishment of Parliament, the monarch ruled absolutely by the issuing of his written orders. They can thus be contrasted with the Act of Parliament, which is in effect an order by Parliament. No explicit government approval is contained within letters patent, only the seal or signature of the monarch, in their original form they were simply written instructions or orders from the sovereign, whose order was law, which were made public to reinforce their effect. According to the United Kingdom Ministry of Justice, there are 92 different types of letters patent. The Patent Rolls are made up of copies of English royal letters patent. In 1634, during the Thirty Years War, the Holy Roman Emperor Ferdinand II became convinced that his general Albrecht von Wallenstein was plotting treason, on 24 January 1634 the Emperor signed a secret patent removing him from his command. Finally an open patent, charging Wallenstein with high treason, was signed on 18 February, in the patent, Ferdinand II ordered to have Wallenstein brought under arrest to Vienna, dead or alive. On the basis of patent, several of Wallensteins officers assassinated him and were rewarded by the Emperor. The form of patent for creating peerages has been fixed by the Crown Office Order 1992. Part III of the schedule lays down nine pro forma texts for creating various ranks of the peerage, lords of appeal in ordinary, gender-specific differences are highlighted in italics. In Commonwealth realms, letters patent are issued under the powers of the head of state
15.
Responsible government
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Responsible government is a conception of a system of government that embodies the principle of parliamentary accountability, the foundation of the Westminster system of parliamentary democracy. Responsible government of parliamentary accountability manifests itself in several ways, ministers account to Parliament for their decisions and for the performance of their departments. When the lower house has passed a motion of no confidence in the government, lastly, the head of state is in turn required to effectuate his executive power only through these responsible ministers. They must never attempt to set up a government of executives or advisors and attempt to use them as instruments of government. The British colonies that formed the Dominion of Canada in 1867 evolved gradually into responsible government rather than achieving it through a revolution as in the United States, early Canadian governors and administrators were answerable only to British authorities. Even after the formation of elected assemblies, governors and their executive councils did not require the consent of elected legislators in order to govern. Responsible government was an element of the gradual development of Canada towards independence. It did not regain responsible government until it became a province of Canada in 1948, in the aftermath of the American Revolution in 1776, the British government became more sensitive to unrest in its remaining colonies with large populations of British colonists. In his report, one of his recommendations was that colonies which were developed enough should be granted responsible government and this term specifically meant the policy that British-appointed governors should bow to the will of elected colonial assemblies. The plaque in the Nova Scotia House of Assembly erected by the Historic Sites and Monuments Board of Canada reads, the first Executive Council chosen exclusively from the party having a majority in the representative branch of a colonial legislature was formed in Nova Scotia on 2 February 1848. Following a vote of want of confidence in the preceding Council, James Boyle Uniacke, joseph Howe, the long-time campaigner for this Peaceable Revolution, became Provincial Secretary. Other members of the Council were Hugh Bell, Wm. F. Desbarres, doyle, Herbert Huntingdon, James McNab, Michael Tobin, and George R. Young. This was a law that provided compensation to French-Canadians who suffered losses during the Rebellions of 1837–1838 in Lower-Canada, the Governor General, Lord Elgin, had serious misgivings about the bill but nonetheless assented to it despite demands from the Tories that he refuse to do so. Elgin was physically assaulted by an English-speaking mob for this, nonetheless, the Rebellion Losses Bill helped entrench responsible government into Canadian politics. In time, the granting of responsible government became the first step on the road to complete independence, initially, this took the form of appointed or partially elected Legislative Councils. Then, during the 1850s, all Australian colonies except Western Australia, along with New Zealand, the Cape Colony, in Southern Africa, was under responsible self-government from 1872 until 1910 when it became the Cape Province of the new Union of South Africa. A popular political movement for responsible government soon emerged, under local leader John Molteno, not everyone favoured responsible government though, and pro-imperial press outlets even accused the movement of constituting crafts and assaults of the devil. The ensuing period saw a recovery, a massive growth in exports
16.
Australia Act 1986
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While each Act gives its short title as Australia Act 1986, in Australia they are referred to, respectively, as the Australia Act 1986 and the Australia Act 1986. These nearly identical Acts were passed by the two parliaments, to come into effect simultaneously, because of uncertainty as to which of the two parliaments had the authority to do so. The Commonwealth of Australia was formed in 1901 by federation of six British colonies, the Commonwealth Constitution provided for a Commonwealth Parliament, with legislative power on a range of specified topics, leaving the residue of legislative power to the States. That constitution was contained in a British statute, the United Kingdom Parliament retained ultimate legislative power in relation to Australia. The UK Parliaments power to legislate with effect for the Commonwealth itself was mostly ended with the Statute of Westminster 1931, when adopted by Australia in 1942 retroactive to 1939. The Statute provided that no future UK Act would apply to a Dominion as part of its law unless the Act expressly declared that the Dominion had requested and consented to it. Until then, Australia had legally been a colony of the United Kingdom. However, s 4 of the Statute only affected UK laws that were to apply as part of Australian Commonwealth law, thus, the Parliament of the United Kingdom still had the power to legislate for the states and territories. In practice, however, this power was almost never exercised, for example, in a referendum on secession in Western Australia in April 1933, 68% of voters favoured seceding from Australia and becoming a separate Dominion. As a result of decision in London, no action was taken in Canberra or Perth. The Australia Act ended all power of the UK Parliament to legislate with effect in Australia – that is, as part of the law of the Commonwealth, a State or a Territory. State laws would no longer be subject to disallowance or suspension by the Queen – a power that, anomalously, similarly, the Australia Act removed the power of the British government to be involved in the governing of an Australian State. Specifically, only the State Premier could now advise the Queen on appointment or removal of a State Governor, nonetheless, the Queen could still exercise any of her powers with respect to the State if she was personally present in the State. At federation in 1901, the court of each colony became the supreme court of that State. In 1903, a High Court of Australia was established, one of whose functions was to hear appeals from the State supreme courts, however, the British insisted on a compromise. Section 74 of the Constitution as enacted by the Imperial Parliament, and there could be an appeal with permission of the Privy Council. The Commonwealth Parliament was empowered to legislate to limit the path and it did so in 1968 and 1975. Predictably, the High Court proved reluctant to grant certificates for appeal to the Privy Council, the discretion was exercised only once, in 1912
17.
Mount Woodroffe
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Mount Woodroffe is South Australias highest peak, at 1,435 metres. The mountain is known to the Pitjantjatjara Indigenous Australians as Ngarutjaranya, in Indigenous Australian mythology, the mountain embodies the mythological creature Ngintaka. Mount Woodroffe is located in the far northwest of South Australia, the mountain range rises some 700–800 metres from the surrounding plains and comprises massifs of granite and gneiss. William Ernest Giles was the first white man to pass through the area, william Christie Gosse named Mt Woodroffe from Ayers Rock/Uluru on July 20,1873 and passed to the north of the mountain on October 27,1873. Woodroffe was named after George Woodroffe Goyder, Surveyor-General of South Australia, in the 1960s Mount Woodroffe was considered as a potential site for the proposed Anglo-Australian Telescope. It lost out due to its remoteness compared to Siding Spring in New South Wales, access is limited as a permit is required to enter the Anangu Pitjantjatjara lands. List of mountains in Australia State8. net Mount Woodroffe Bonzle. com profile page
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Lake Eyre
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The shallow endorheic lake is the depocentre of the vast Lake Eyre basin and is found in Northern South Australia, some 700 km north of Adelaide. When the lake is full, it has the same salinity level as the sea, but as the lake dries up, the lake was named in honour of Edward John Eyre, who was the first European to see it, in 1840. The lakes official name was changed in December 2012 to combine the name Lake Eyre with the indigenous name, native title over the lake and surrounding region is held by the Arabana people. Kati Thanda–Lake Eyre is located in the deserts of central Australia, even in the dry season there is usually some water remaining in Kati Thanda–Lake Eyre, normally collecting in over 200 smaller sub-lakes within its margins. The lake was formed by aeolian processes after tectonic upwarping occurred to the south subsequent to the end of the Pleistocene epoch, during the rainy season the rivers from the north-east part of the Lake Eyre Basin flow towards the lake through the Channel Country. The amount of water from the monsoon determines whether water will reach the lake and if it does, the average rainfall in the area of the lake is 100 to 150 millimetres per year. The −15 m altitude usually attributed to Kati Thanda–Lake Eyre refers to the deepest parts of the floor, in Belt Bay. The shoreline lies at −9 m, the lake is the area of maximum deposition of sediment in the Lake Eyre Basin. Lake Eyre is divided two sections which are joined by the Goyder Channel. These are known as Lake Eyre North, which is 144 kilometres in length and 65 kilometres wide, and Lake Eyre South, the salt crusts are thickest in the southern Belt Bay, Jackboot Bay and Madigan Gulf sub-basins of Lake Eyre North. Since 1883, proposals have made to flood Lake Eyre with seawater brought to the basin via a canal or pipeline. The purpose was, in part, to increase evaporation and thereby increase rainfall in the downwind of an enlarged Lake Eyre. The salinity in the lake increases as the 450 mm salt crust dissolves over a period of six months of a flood resulting in a massive fish kill. When over 4 m deep the lake is no more salty than the sea, the lake takes on a pink hue when saturated due to the presence of beta-carotene pigment caused by the algae Dunaliella salina. Typically a 1.5 m flood occurs every three years, a 4 m flood every decade, and a fill or near fill a few times a century. The water in the lake soon evaporates with a minor or medium flood drying by the end of the following summer, most of the water entering the lakes arrives via Warburton River. In strong La Niña years the lake can fill, since 1885 this has occurred in 1886–1887, 1889–1890, 1916–1917,1950,1955, 1974–1977, and 1999-2001, with the highest flood of 6 m in 1974. Local rain can also fill Kati Thanda–Lake Eyre to 3–4 m as occurred in 1984 and 1989, torrential rain in January 2007 took about six weeks to reach the lake but put only a small amount of water into it
19.
Time in Australia
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Australia uses three main time zones, Australian Western Standard Time, Australian Central Standard Time, and Australian Eastern Standard Time. Time is regulated by the state governments, some of which observe daylight saving time. Australias external territories observe different time zones, Standard time was introduced in the 1890s when all of the Dominions adopted it. Before the switch to standard time zones, each city or town was free to determine its local time. Daylight saving time is used in South Australia, New South Wales, Victoria, Tasmania, and it is not currently used in Western Australia, Queensland or the Northern Territory. The standardization of time in Australia began in 1892, when surveyors from the six Dominions in Australia met in Melbourne for the Intercolonial Conference of Surveyors, the delegates accepted the recommendation of the 1884 International Meridian Conference to adopt Greenwich Mean Time as the basis for standard time. The Dominions enacted time zone legislation, which took effect in February 1895. The clocks were set ahead of GMT by eight hours in Western Australia, by nine hours in South Australia, and by 10 hours in Queensland, New South Wales, the three time zones became known as Eastern Standard Time, Central Standard Time, and Western Standard Time. Broken Hill in the far west of New South Wales also adopted Central Standard Time due to it being connected by rail to Adelaide but not Sydney at the time. In May 1899, South Australia advanced Central Standard Time by thirty minutes, in doing so, South Australia also adopted a time meridian located outside its boundaries – another departure from international convention. Attempts to correct these oddities in 1986 and 1994 were rejected, when the Northern Territory was separated from South Australia and placed under the jurisdiction of the Federal Government, that Territory kept Central Standard Time. Likewise, when the ACT was broken off from New South Wales, Australia has kept a version of the UTC atomic time scale since the 1990s, but Greenwich Mean Time remained the formal basis for the standard times of all of the states through 2005. All states have adopted the UTC standard, starting on 1 September 2005, such instruments may be valid for only the current year, and so this section generally only refers to the legislation. In New South Wales and Western Australia, the starting and ending dates, however, during World War I and World War II all states and territories used daylight saving time. In 1968 Tasmania became the first state in peacetime to use DST, followed in 1971 by New South Wales, Victoria, Queensland, South Australia, Western Australia and the Northern Territory did not adopt it. Queensland and Western Australia have occasionally used DST during the past 40 years during trial periods. The main DST zones are the following, Central Daylight Saving Time – UTC+10,30, in South Australia Eastern Daylight Saving Time – UTC+11, in New South Wales, the ACT, Victoria, and Tasmania. During the usual periods of DST, the three time zones in Australia become five zones
20.
Parliament of Australia
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It consists of three elements, the Queen of Australia, the Senate and the House of Representatives. The Queen is represented by the Governor-General, through both Houses, however, there is a fused executive, drawn from the Westminster System. The upper house, the Senate, consists of 76 members, twelve for each state, Senators are elected using the single transferable vote proportional representation system and as a result, the chamber features a multitude of parties vying for power. The governing party or coalition rarely has a majority in the Senate and usually needs to negotiate with other parties and this tends to lead to the chamber being dominated by two major parties, the Liberal/National Coalition and the Labor Party. The government of the day must achieve the confidence of this House in order to gain and remain in power, although elections can be called early, each 3 years the full House of Representatives and half of the Senate is dissolved and goes up for reelection. The two Houses meet in separate chambers of Parliament House on Capital Hill in Canberra, Australian Capital Territory, the Commonwealth of Australia came into being on 1 January 1901 with the federation of the six Australian colonies. The inaugural election took place on 29 and 30 March and the first Australian Parliament was opened on 9 May 1901 in Melbourne by Prince George, Duke of Cornwall and York, later King George V. The only building in Melbourne that was enough to accommodate the 14,000 guests was the western annexe of the Royal Exhibition Building. After the official opening, from 1901 to 1927, the Parliament met in Parliament House, Melbourne and it had always been intended that the national Parliament would sit in a new national capital. This was a compromise at Federation due to the rivalry between the two largest Australian cities, Sydney and Melbourne, which wished to become the new capital. The site of Canberra was selected for the location of the capital city in 1908. A competition was announced on 30 June 1914 to design Parliament House, however, due to the start of World War I the next month, the competition was cancelled. It was re-announced in August 1916, but again postponed indefinitely on 24 November 1916, in the meantime, John Smith Murdoch, the Commonwealths Chief Architect, worked on the design as part of his official duties. He had little enthusiasm for the project, as he felt it was a waste of money. Nevertheless, he designed the building by default, the construction of Old Parliament House, as it is called today, was commenced on 28 August 1923 and completed in early 1927. It was built by the Commonwealth Department of Works, using tradesmen, the final cost was about £600,000, which was more than three times the original estimate. It was designed to house the parliament for a maximum of 50 years until a permanent facility could be built, the building was opened on 9 May 1927 by the Duke and Duchess of York. The opening ceremonies were both splendid and incongruous, given the sparsely built nature of Canberra of the time and its small population, the building was extensively decorated with British Empire and Australian flags and bunting
21.
Australian House of Representatives
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The Australian House of Representatives is one of the two Houses of the Parliament of Australia. It is referred to as the house, with the Senate being referred to as the upper house. The House is almost always dissolved earlier, usually alone but sometimes in a double dissolution of both Houses, a member of the House may be referred to as a Member of Parliament, while a member of the Senate is usually referred to as a Senator. The government of the day and by extension the Prime Minister must achieve, the House of Representatives currently consists of 150 members, elected by and representing single member districts, known as electoral divisions. The number of members is not fixed, but can vary with boundary changes resulting from electoral redistributions, the most recent overall increase in the size of the House, which came into effect at the 1984 election, increased the number of members from 125 to 148. It reduced to 147 at the 1993 election, returned to 148 at the 1996 election, each division elects one member using full-preference Instant-runoff voting. This was put in place after the 1918 Swan by-election, which Labor unexpectedly won with the largest primary vote, the Nationalist government of the time changed the lower house voting system from first-past-the-post to full-preference preferential voting, effective from the 1919 general election. This system has remained in place since, allowing the Coalition parties to safely contest the same seats, the Commonwealth of Australia Constitution Act of 1900 established the House of Representatives as part of the new system of dominion government in newly federated Australia. The House is presided over by the Speaker, Members of the House are elected from single member electorates. One vote one value legislation requires all electorates to have approximately the number of voters with a maximum 10% variation. However, the quota for the number of voters in an electorate is determined by the number of voters in the state in which that electorate is found. Meanwhile, all the states except Tasmania have electorates approximately within the same 10% tolerance, voting is by the preferential system, also known as instant-runoff voting. A full allocation of preferences is required for a vote to be considered formal and this allows for a calculation of the two-party-preferred vote. Under Section 24 of the Constitution, each state is entitled to members based on a quota determined from the latest statistics of the Commonwealth. These statistics arise from the census conducted under the auspices of section 51, the parliamentary entitlement of a state or territory is established by the Electoral Commissioner dividing the number of the people of the Commonwealth by twice the number of Senators. This is known as the Nexus Provision, the reasons for this are twofold, to maintain a constant influence for the smaller states and to maintain a constant balance of the two Houses in case of a joint sitting after a double dissolution. The population of state and territory is then divided by this quota to determine the number of members to which each state. Under the Australian Constitution all original states are guaranteed at least five members, the Federal Parliament itself has decided that the Australian Capital Territory and the Northern Territory should have at least one member each
22.
Australian Senate
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The Australian Senate is the upper house of the bicameral Parliament of Australia, the lower house being the House of Representatives. The composition and powers of the Senate are established in Chapter I, there are a total of 76 senators,12 senators are elected from each of the six states and two from each of the two autonomous internal territories. Senators are popularly elected under the single vote system of proportional representation. As a result of proportional representation, the features a multitude of parties vying for power. Senators normally serve fixed terms, unless the Senate is dissolved earlier in a double dissolution. Following a double half the state senators serve terms ending on the third 30 June following the election with the rest serving three years longer. The term of the territory senators expires at the time as there is an election for the House of Representatives. The Commonwealth of Australia Constitution Act of 1900 established the Senate as part of the new system of government in newly federated Australia. From a comparative perspective, the Australian Senate exhibits distinctive characteristics. Unlike upper Houses in other Westminster system governments, the Senate is not a body with limited legislative power. Rather it was intended to play – and does play – an active role in legislation, the Constitution intended to give less populous states added voice in a Federal legislature, while also providing for the revising role of an upper house in the Westminster system. In practice, however, most legislation in the Australian Parliament is initiated by the Government and it is then passed to the Senate, which has the opportunity to amend the bill or refuse to pass it. In the majority of cases, voting takes place along party lines, since 2015, armed officers of the Australian Federal Police have been placed on duty to protect both chambers of the Federal Parliament. The system for electing senators has changed several times since Federation, the original arrangement involved a first-past-the-post block voting or winner takes all system, on a state-by-state basis. This was replaced in 1919 by preferential block voting, block voting tended to produce landslide majorities and even wipe-outs. For instance, from 1920 to 1923 the Nationalist Party of Australia had 35 of the 36 senators, and from 1947 to 1950, the Australian Labor Party had 33 of the 36 senators. From the 1984 election, group ticket voting was introduced in order to reduce a high rate of voting that arose from the requirement that each candidate be given a preference. As a result of the changes, voters may assign their preferences for parties above the line, or individual candidates below the line, both above and below the line voting now use optional preferential voting
23.
Swainsona formosa
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It is one of Australias best known wildflowers. It is native to the regions of central and north-western Australia. Specimens of Sturts desert pea were first collected by William Dampier who recorded his first sighting on 22 August 1699 and these specimens are today in the Fielding-Druce Herbarium at Oxford University in England. The taxonomy of Sturts desert pea has been changed on a number of occasions and it was initially treated in the 18th century in the genus Clianthus as Clianthus dampieri, and later became more widely known as Clianthus formosus. However it was reclassified under the genus Swainsona as Swainsona formosa. A further reclassification to Willdampia formosa was proposed in the publication Western Australian Naturalist in 1999, Sturts Desert Pea is a member of Fabaceae, subfamily Faboideae. It has pinnate, grey-green leaves which are arranged spirally on the axis of the plant. Its flowers are so different from its relatives that it is almost unrecognisable as a member of the pea family, the plant flowers from spring to summer, particularly after rain. There is a pure white form, as well as hybridised varieties which can have flowers ranging from blood scarlet, to pink and even pale cream. Several tricolour variants have been recorded, including the cultivars marginata, tricolour, flowers are bird-pollinated in the wild. The first recorded uses of common names for Swainsona formosa, the small seeds have a long viability, and can germinate after many years. Seeds have a seed coat, which protects them from harsh arid environments until the next rainfall. Once germinated, seedlings quickly establish a deep taproot, vital for desert survival, Sturts Desert Pea is not endangered, but it is illegal to collect specimens of the plant from Crown land without a permit. The plants must not be collected from land without the written consent of the land owner. Sturts Desert Pea was adopted as the emblem of the state of South Australia on 23 November 1961. Sturts Desert Pea has also made appearances in prose and verse. Sturts Desert Pea has appeared in several releases of Australian postage stamps depicting Australian floral emblems, large image of Sturts Desert Pea Sturts Desert Pea Fact-sheet from Gardening Australia, a TV programme of the Australian Broadcasting Corporation. Oxford University Herbaria Sturts Desert Pea costume
24.
Southern hairy-nosed wombat
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The southern hairy-nosed wombat is one of three extant species of wombats. It is found in scattered areas of scrub and mallee from the eastern Nullarbor Plain to the New South Wales border area. It is the smallest of all three wombat species, the young often do not survive dry seasons. It is the animal of South Australia. Among the oldest southern hairy-nosed wombats ever documented were a male and their names were Carver, which lived to be 34, and his mother, Vicky, which lived to be 24. In South Australia in 2010, a domesticated wombat named Wally was also reported as having reached the age of 34, the oldest currently living captive southern hairy nosed wombat is Hamlet at the Toronto Zoo at age 33. The southern hairy-nosed wombat is adapted to digging, it has a stocky and robust build, flattened claws, the body length ranges from 772 to 934 mm with a body mass ranging from 19 to 32 kg. Its short tail is hidden by its fur, the pelage is silky and is typically greyish or tan in colour. The wombat grooms itself with its second and third toes, which are fused together, the head is robust and flattened and the ears are pointed. The snout resembles that of a pig, the animal gets its name from the hairs that cover its rhinarium. The wombats incisors resemble those of rodents, and its molars are widely spaced by the palate, the teeth keep growing for the entirety of the animal’s life, which is likely an adaptation to its harsh diet. Compared to the wombat, the southern hairy-nosed wombat has a larger temporalis muscle. Also, unlike the northern hairy-nosed wombat, the southern hairy-nosed wombat’s nasal bone is longer than the frontal bone, Southern hairy-nosed wombats range though Western Australia, southern South Australia, and south-western New South Wales. They live in semiarid to arid grasslands and woodlands, much of the southern hairy-nosed wombats diet is Stipa nitida, which grows around its warren complex and is trimmed as it grazes. This creates an area with a density of new green shoots. The teeth of the wombat are more effective in grinding food into small particles than the grey kangaroo. Its digestive tract has a tiny caecum and a divided into parts. The anterior part is small and serves as the site for fermentation
25.
Piping shrike
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The piping shrike is the emblematic bird that appears on South Australias flag, State Badge and Coat of Arms. The bird appears displayed proper with its wings outstretched and curved upwards, although the image of the piping shrike is readily identified with South Australia, the bird in its own right has never been formally adopted as a faunal or bird emblem of the state. The term piping shrike for this species of Australian magpie is correct, the term piping shrike is commonly mistaken to refer to the magpie-lark, which is incorrect. The piping shrike first appeared on the Governors ensign in 1903, the original reports credited it to H. P. Gill who was the director of the School of Arts, with input and critique from the Governor General Hallam Tennyson. The nephew of Robert Craig of the School of Arts claims that he was responsible for the original design. A similar argument is made by the relatives of the Adelaide artist Frances Jane Warhurst who claim that she based it on the eagle on the seal of the Prussian consul, there are also reports of a later version also credited to Gill in 1910. The badge design, which set the bird against a backdrop of the risen sun of Australian Federation, was incorporated into the state flag. Because the name piping shrike is not used to any bird. While some think it resembles the magpie-lark, the original reports specify that it is based on the Australian magpie, the connection of this bird to the name piping shrike can be seen in this early observation by explorer Charles Sturt in the 1840s, GYMNORHINA LEUCONOTA GOULD. This bird is larger than, and very much resembles a magpie, but the proportion of white is greater. In South Australia it is a bird, and his clear fine note was always the most heard on the coldest morning. All the species of this genus are easily domesticated, and learn to pipe tunes and they are mischievous birds about a house, but are useful in a garden. I had one that ranged the fields to a great distance round the house, but always returned to sleep in it
26.
Leafy seadragon
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The leafy seadragon or Glauerts seadragon, Phycodurus eques, is a marine fish in the family Syngnathidae, which includes seadragons, pipefish, and seahorses. It is the member of the genus Phycodurus. It is found along the southern and western coasts of Australia, the name is derived from the appearance, with long leaf-like protrusions coming from all over the body. These protrusions are not used for propulsion, they serve only as camouflage, the leafy seadragon propels itself by means of a pectoral fin on the ridge of its neck and a dorsal fin on its back closer to the tail end. These small fins are almost completely transparent and difficult to see as they undulate minutely to move the creature sedately through the water, popularly known as leafies, it is the marine emblem of the state of South Australia and a focus for local marine conservation. Much like the seahorse, the leafy seadragons name is derived from its resemblance to another creature, while not large, they are slightly larger than most seahorses, growing to about 20–24 cm. They feed on plankton and small crustaceans, the lobes of skin that grow on the leafy seadragon provide camouflage, giving it the appearance of seaweed. It is able to maintain the illusion when swimming, appearing to move through the water like a piece of floating seaweed and it can also change colour to blend in, but this ability depends on the seadragons diet, age, location, and stress level. The leafy seadragon is related to the pipefish and belongs to the family Syngnathidae and it differs from the seahorse in appearance, form of locomotion, and its inability to coil or grasp things with its tail. A related species is the weedy seadragon, which is multicoloured and grows weed-like fins, another unique feature are the small, circular gill openings covering tufted gills, very unlike the crescent-shaped gill openings and ridged gills of most fish species. They are mostly found over sand patches in waters up to 50 m deep, around kelp-covered rocks and they are commonly sighted by scuba divers near Adelaide in South Australia, especially at Rapid Bay, Edithburgh, and Victor Harbor. Leafy seadragons usually live a solitary lifestyle, when the time comes, males court the females, they then pair up to breed. From the moment they hatch, leafy seadragons are completely independent, by the age of two, they are typically full grown and ready to breed. The species feeds by sucking up small crustaceans, such as amphipods and mysid shrimp, plankton, as with seahorses, the male leafy seadragon cares for the eggs. The female produces up to 250 bright pink eggs, then deposits them onto the tail with her ovipositor. The eggs then attach themselves to a patch, which supplies them with oxygen. After 9 weeks, the begin to hatch, depending on water conditions. The eggs turn a ripe purple or orange over this period, after which the male pumps his tail until the young emerge, the male aids in the eggs hatching by shaking his tail, and rubbing it against seaweed and rocks
27.
Opal
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Opal is a hydrated amorphous form of silica, its water content may range from 3 to 21% by weight, but is usually between 6 and 10%. Because of its amorphous character, it is classed as a mineraloid, unlike crystalline forms of silica, which are classed as minerals. It is deposited at a low temperature and may occur in the fissures of almost any kind of rock, being most commonly found with limonite, sandstone, rhyolite, marl. Opal is the gemstone of Australia. The internal structure of precious opal makes it diffract light, depending on the conditions in which it formed, it can take on many colors. Precious opal ranges from clear white, gray, red, orange, yellow, green, blue, magenta, rose, pink, slate, olive, brown. Of these hues, the black opals are the most rare, whereas white, opals vary in optical density from opaque to semitransparent. Precious opal shows a variable interplay of colors, and though it is a mineraloid. At microscopic scales, precious opal is composed of silica spheres some 150 to 300 nm in diameter in a hexagonal or cubic close-packed lattice, the regularity of the sizes and the packing of these spheres determines the quality of precious opal. The colors that are observed are determined by the spacing between the planes and the orientation of planes with respect to the incident light, the process can be described by Braggs law of diffraction. Visible light of diffracted wavelengths cannot pass through large thicknesses of the opal and this is the basis of the optical band gap in a photonic crystal. The notion that opals are photonic crystals for visible light was expressed in 1995 by Vasily Astratovs group, in addition, microfractures may be filled with secondary silica and form thin lamellae inside the opal during solidification. The term opalescence is commonly and erroneously used to describe this unique and beautiful phenomenon, contrarily, opalescence is correctly applied to the milky, turbid appearance of common or potch opal. Potch does not show a play of color, for gemstone use, most opal is cut and polished to form a cabochon. Solid opal refers to polished stones consisting wholly of precious opal, opals too thin to produce a solid may be combined with other materials to form attractive gems. An opal doublet consists of a thin layer of precious opal, backed by a layer of dark-colored material, most commonly ironstone, dark or black common opal, onyx. The darker backing emphasizes the play of color, and results in an attractive display than a lighter potch. An opal triplet is similar to a doublet, but has a third layer, the cap takes a high polish and acts as a protective layer for the opal
28.
Spriggina
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Fossils of Spriggina are known from the Ediacaran period, around 550 million years ago. The segmented organism reached about 3–5 cm in length and may have been predatory and its bottom is covered with two rows of tough interlocking plates, while one row covered its top, its front few segments fused to form a head, which may have borne eyes and antennae. Lack of known segmented legs or limbs, and glide reflection instead of symmetric segments, Spriggina is the official fossil emblem of South Australia. It has been nowhere else. Spriggina grew to three centimetres in length, and was approximately oblong. The organism was segmented, with no fused segments, with the segments sometimes being curved, the upper surface of the organism was covered by one row of overlapping cuticular plates, the underside, paired plates. The first two segments formed a head, the front segment was the shape of a horseshoe, with a pair of depressions on its upper surface which may represent eyes. The second segment may have borne antennae, the symmetry observed is not exactly bilaterian, but appears to be a glide reflection, where opposite segments are shifted by half an interval. In some specimens the body segments tilt backwards, making roughly chevron patterns, there appear to be fairly complex variations between these two extremes. Spriggina is known only from beds of Ediacaran age, fossils from the Vindyhan, reliably dated to around 1,200 million years old, have been classified as Spriggina, but in all likelihood represent microbial artifacts. Spriggina possessed a tough, though uncalcified, body, evident from the fossils preservation, like many of the Ediacara biota, the relationship of Spriggina to other groups is unclear. It bears some similarity to the living polychaete worm Tomopteris and Amphinomidae and it was also compared to the rangeomorphs, frondose members of the Ediacara biota that may represent a separate kingdom. Or this similarity can be another example of convergent evolution, Spriggina may have been predatory, and may have played a role in initiating the Cambrian transition. Spriggina floundersi is at present the only accepted species in this genus. The specific name refers to amateur South Australian fossil hunter Ben Flounders. Spriggina ovata has now moved into its own genus, Marywadea. Spriggia wadea is probably a synonym of Aspidella preserved under specific conditions. Yorgia Dickinsonia List of Ediacaran genera Google Image Search, Spriggina
29.
Australia
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Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania and numerous smaller islands. It is the worlds sixth-largest country by total area, the neighbouring countries are Papua New Guinea, Indonesia and East Timor to the north, the Solomon Islands and Vanuatu to the north-east, and New Zealand to the south-east. Australias capital is Canberra, and its largest urban area is Sydney, for about 50,000 years before the first British settlement in the late 18th century, Australia was inhabited by indigenous Australians, who spoke languages classifiable into roughly 250 groups. The population grew steadily in subsequent decades, and by the 1850s most of the continent had been explored, on 1 January 1901, the six colonies federated, forming the Commonwealth of Australia. Australia has since maintained a liberal democratic political system that functions as a federal parliamentary constitutional monarchy comprising six states. The population of 24 million is highly urbanised and heavily concentrated on the eastern seaboard, Australia has the worlds 13th-largest economy and ninth-highest per capita income. With the second-highest human development index globally, the country highly in quality of life, health, education, economic freedom. The name Australia is derived from the Latin Terra Australis a name used for putative lands in the southern hemisphere since ancient times, the Dutch adjectival form Australische was used in a Dutch book in Batavia in 1638, to refer to the newly discovered lands to the south. On 12 December 1817, Macquarie recommended to the Colonial Office that it be formally adopted, in 1824, the Admiralty agreed that the continent should be known officially as Australia. The first official published use of the term Australia came with the 1830 publication of The Australia Directory and these first inhabitants may have been ancestors of modern Indigenous Australians. The Torres Strait Islanders, ethnically Melanesian, were originally horticulturists, the northern coasts and waters of Australia were visited sporadically by fishermen from Maritime Southeast Asia. The first recorded European sighting of the Australian mainland, and the first recorded European landfall on the Australian continent, are attributed to the Dutch. The first ship and crew to chart the Australian coast and meet with Aboriginal people was the Duyfken captained by Dutch navigator, Willem Janszoon. He sighted the coast of Cape York Peninsula in early 1606, the Dutch charted the whole of the western and northern coastlines and named the island continent New Holland during the 17th century, but made no attempt at settlement. William Dampier, an English explorer and privateer, landed on the north-west coast of New Holland in 1688, in 1770, James Cook sailed along and mapped the east coast, which he named New South Wales and claimed for Great Britain. The first settlement led to the foundation of Sydney, and the exploration, a British settlement was established in Van Diemens Land, now known as Tasmania, in 1803, and it became a separate colony in 1825. The United Kingdom formally claimed the part of Western Australia in 1828. Separate colonies were carved from parts of New South Wales, South Australia in 1836, Victoria in 1851, the Northern Territory was founded in 1911 when it was excised from South Australia
30.
Northern Territory
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The Northern Territory is a federal Australian territory in the central and central northern regions of Australia. It shares borders with Western Australia to the west, South Australia to the south, to the north, the territory is bordered by the Timor Sea, the Arafura Sea and the Gulf of Carpentaria. Despite its large area—over 1,349,129 square kilometres, the Northern Territorys population of 244,000 makes it the least populous of Australias eight major states and territories, having fewer than half as many people as Tasmania. The archaeological history of the Northern Territory begins over 40,000 years ago when Indigenous Australians settled the region, makassan traders began trading with the indigenous people of the Northern Territory for trepang from at least the 18th century onwards. The coast of the territory was first seen by Europeans in the 17th century, the British were the first Europeans to attempt to settle the coastal regions. After three failed attempts to establish a settlement, success was achieved in 1869 with the establishment of a settlement at Port Darwin. Today the economy is based on tourism, especially Kakadu National Park in the Top End and the Uluru-Kata Tjuta National Park in central Australia, the capital and largest city is Darwin. The population is not concentrated in regions but rather along the Stuart Highway. The other major settlements are Palmerston, Alice Springs, Katherine, Nhulunbuy, residents of the Northern Territory are often known simply as Territorians and fully as Northern Territorians, or more informally as Top Enders and Centralians. With the coming of the British, there were four attempts to settle the harsh environment of the northern coast. The Northern Territory was part of colonial New South Wales from 1825 to 1863, except for a time from February to December 1846. It was part of South Australia from 1863 to 1911, under the administration of colonial South Australia, the overland telegraph was constructed between 1870 and 1872. A railway was built between Palmerston and Pine Creek between 1883 and 1889. The economic pattern of raising and mining was established so that by 1911 there were 513,000 cattle. Victoria River Downs was at one time the largest cattle station in the world, gold was found at Grove Hill in 1872 and at Pine Creek, Brocks Creek, Burrundi, and copper was found at Daly River. On 1 January 1911, a decade after federation, the Northern Territory was separated from South Australia, alfred Deakin opined at this time To me the question has been not so much commercial as national, first, second, third and last. Either we must accomplish the peopling of the territory or submit to its transfer to some other nation. In late 1912 there was growing sentiment that the name Northern Territory was unsatisfactory, the names Kingsland, Centralia and Territoria were proposed with Kingsland becoming the preferred choice in 1913
31.
Western Australia
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Western Australia is a state occupying the entire western third of Australia. It is bounded by the Indian Ocean to the north and west, the Great Australian Bight and Southern Ocean to the south, the state has about 2.6 million inhabitants, around 11% of the national total. 92% of the lives in the south-west corner of the state. The first European visitor to Western Australia was the Dutch explorer Dirk Hartog, the first European settlement of Western Australia occurred following the landing by Major Edmund Lockyer on 26 December 1826 of an expedition on behalf of the New South Wales colonial government. This was followed by the establishment of the Swan River Colony in 1829, including the site of the present-day capital, york was the first inland settlement in Western Australia. Situated 97 kilometres east of Perth, it was settled on 16 September 1831, Western Australia achieved responsible government in 1890, and federated with the other British colonies in Australia in 1901. Today its economy relies on mining, agriculture and tourism. The state produces 46% of Australias exports, Western Australia is the second-largest iron ore producer in the world. The International Hydrographic Organization designates the body of water south of the continent as part of the Indian Ocean, the total length of the states eastern border is 1,862 km. There are 20,781 km of coastline, including 7,892 km of island coastline, the total land area occupied by the state is 2.5 million km2. Most of the state is a low plateau with an elevation of about 400 metres, very low relief. This descends relatively sharply to the plains, in some cases forming a sharp escarpment. The extreme age of the landscape has meant that the soils are remarkably infertile, even soils derived from granitic bedrock contain an order of magnitude less available phosphorus and only half as much nitrogen as soils in comparable climates in other continents. Soils derived from extensive sandplains or ironstone are even less fertile, nearly devoid of soluble phosphate and also deficient in zinc, copper, molybdenum, the infertility of most of the soils has required heavy application by farmers of chemical fertilisers, particularly superphosphate, insecticides and herbicides. These have resulted in damage to invertebrate and bacterial populations, the grazing and use of hoofed mammals and, later, heavy machinery through the years have resulted in compaction of soils and great damage to the fragile soils. Large-scale land clearing for agriculture has damaged habitats for native flora, large areas of the states wheatbelt region have problems with dryland salinity and the loss of fresh water. The southwest coastal area has a Mediterranean climate and it was originally heavily forested, including large stands of karri, one of the tallest trees in the world. This agricultural region is one of the nine most bio-diverse terrestrial habitats, thanks to the offshore Leeuwin Current, the area is one of the top six regions for marine biodiversity and contains the most southerly coral reefs in the world
32.
Queensland
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Queensland is the second-largest and third-most-populous state in the Commonwealth of Australia. Situated in the north-east of the country, it is bordered by the Northern Territory, South Australia and New South Wales to the west, south-west, to the east, Queensland is bordered by the Coral Sea and Pacific Ocean. Queensland has a population of 4,750,500, concentrated along the coast, the state is the worlds sixth largest sub-national entity, with an area of 1,852,642 km2. The capital and largest city in the state is Brisbane, Australias third largest city, often referred to as the Sunshine State, Queensland is home to 10 of Australias 30 largest cities and is the nations third largest economy. Tourism in the state, fuelled largely by its tropical climate, is a major industry. Queensland was first inhabited by Aboriginal Australians and Torres Strait Islanders, the first European to land in Queensland was Dutch navigator Willem Janszoon in 1606, who explored the west coast of the Cape York Peninsula near present-day Weipa. In 1770, Lieutenant James Cook claimed the east coast of Australia for the Kingdom of Great Britain. The colony of New South Wales was founded in 1788 by Governor Arthur Phillip at Sydney, New South Wales at that time included all of what is now Queensland, Queensland was explored in subsequent decades until the establishment of a penal colony at Brisbane in 1824 by John Oxley. Penal transportation ceased in 1839 and free settlement was allowed from 1842, the state was named in honour of Queen Victoria, who on 6 June 1859 signed Letters Patent separating the colony from New South Wales. The 6th of June is now celebrated statewide as Queensland Day. Queensland achieved statehood with the Federation of Australia on 1 January 1901, the history of Queensland spans thousands of years, encompassing both a lengthy indigenous presence, as well as the eventful times of post-European settlement. The north-eastern Australian region was explored by Dutch, Spanish and French navigators before being encountered by Lieutenant James Cook in 1770, the Australian Labor Party has its origin as a formal organisation in Queensland and the town of Barcaldine is the symbolic birthplace of the party. June 2009 marked the 150th anniversary of its creation as a colony from New South Wales. The Aboriginal occupation of Queensland is thought to predate 50,000 BC, likely via boat or land bridge across Torres Strait, during the last ice age Queenslands landscape became more arid and largely desolate, making food and other supplies scarce. This led to the worlds first seed-grinding technology, warming again made the land hospitable, which brought high rainfall along the eastern coast, stimulating the growth of the states tropical rainforests. In February 1606, Dutch navigator Willem Janszoon landed near the site of what is now Weipa and this was the first recorded landing of a European in Australia, and it also marked the first reported contact between European and Aboriginal Australian people. The region was explored by French and Spanish explorers prior to the arrival of Lieutenant James Cook in 1770. Cook claimed the east coast under instruction from King George III of the United Kingdom on 22 August 1770 at Possession Island, naming Eastern Australia, including Queensland, the Aboriginal population declined significantly after a smallpox epidemic during the late 18th century
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New South Wales
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New South Wales is a state on the east coast of Australia. It borders Queensland to the north, Victoria to the south and it has a coast line with the Tasman Sea on its east side. The Australian Capital Territory is an enclave within the state, New South Wales state capital is Sydney, which is also Australias most populous city. In March 2014, the population of New South Wales was 7.5 million. Just under two-thirds of the population,4.67 million. Inhabitants of New South Wales are referred to as New South Welshmen, the Colony of New South Wales was founded as a penal colony in 1788. It originally comprised a more than half of the Australian mainland with its western boundary set at 129th meridian east in 1825, in addition, the colony also included the island territories of New Zealand, Van Diemens Land, Lord Howe Island, and Norfolk Island. During the 19th century, most of the area was detached to form separate British colonies that eventually became New Zealand. However, the Swan River Colony has never administered as part of New South Wales. Lord Howe Island remains part of New South Wales, while Norfolk Island has become a federal Territory, as have the now known as the Australian Capital Territory. The prior inhabitants of New South Wales were the Aboriginal tribes who arrived in Australia about 40,000 to 60,000 years ago, before European settlement there were an estimated 250,000 Aboriginal people in the region. The Wodi Wodi people are the custodians of the Illawarra region of South Sydney. The Bundjalung people are the custodians of parts of the northern coastal areas. The European discovery of New South Wales was made by Captain James Cook during his 1770 survey along the eastern coast of the Dutch-named continent of New Holland. In his original journal covering the survey, in triplicate to satisfy Admiralty Orders, Cook first named the land New Wales, however, in the copy held by the Admiralty, he revised the wording to New South Wales. After years of chaos and anarchy after the overthrow of Governor William Bligh, macquaries legacy is still evident today. During the 19th century, large areas were separated to form the British colonies of Tasmania, South Australia, Victoria. Responsible government was granted to the New South Wales colony in 1855, following the Treaty of Waitangi, William Hobson declared British sovereignty over New Zealand in 1840
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Victoria (Australia)
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Victoria is a state in southeast Australia. Victoria is Australias most densely populated state and its second-most populous state overall, most of its population is concentrated in the area surrounding Port Phillip Bay, which includes the metropolitan area of its state capital and largest city, Melbourne, Australias second-largest city. Prior to British European settlement, the area now constituting Victoria was inhabited by a number of Aboriginal peoples. With Great Britain having claimed the entire Australian continent east of the 135th meridian east in 1788, Victoria was included in the wider colony of New South Wales. The first settlement in the area occurred in 1803 at Sullivan Bay, and much of what is now Victoria was included in the Port Phillip District in 1836, Victoria was officially created as a separate colony in 1851, and achieved self-government in 1855. Politically, Victoria has 37 seats in the Australian House of Representatives and 12 seats in the Australian Senate, at state level, the Parliament of Victoria consists of the Legislative Assembly and the Legislative Council. Victoria is currently governed by the Labor Party, with Daniel Andrews the current Premier, the personal representative of the Queen of Australia in the state is the Governor of Victoria, currently Linda Dessau. Local government is concentrated in 79 municipal districts, including 33 cities, although a number of unincorporated areas still exist, Victorias total gross state product is ranked second in Australia, although Victoria is ranked fourth in terms of GSP per capita because of its limited mining activity. Culturally, Melbourne is home to a number of museums, art galleries and theatres and is described as the sporting capital of Australia. The Melbourne Cricket Ground is the largest stadium in Australia, and the host of the 1956 Summer Olympics, Victoria has eight public universities, with the oldest, the University of Melbourne, having been founded in 1853. Victoria, like Queensland, was named after Queen Victoria, who had been on the British throne for 14 years when the colony was established in 1851. The first British settlement in the later known as Victoria was established in October 1803 under Lieutenant-Governor David Collins at Sullivan Bay on Port Phillip. In the year 1826 Colonel Stewart, Captain S. Wright, fly and the brigs Dragon and Amity, took a number of convicts and a small force composed of detachments of the 3rd and 93rd regiments. Victorias next settlement was at Portland, on the south west coast of what is now Victoria, edward Henty settled Portland Bay in 1834. Melbourne was founded in 1835 by John Batman, who set up a base in Indented Head, from settlement the region around Melbourne was known as the Port Phillip District, a separately administered part of New South Wales. Shortly after the now known as Geelong was surveyed by Assistant Surveyor W. H. Smythe. And in 1838 Geelong was officially declared a town, despite earlier white settlements dating back to 1826, days later, still in 1851 gold was discovered near Ballarat, and subsequently at Bendigo. Later discoveries occurred at sites across Victoria
35.
Great Australian Bight
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The Great Australian Bight is a large oceanic bight, or open bay, off the central and western portions of the southern coastline of mainland Australia. Two definitions of the extent are in use – one used by the International Hydrographic Organization, the IHO defines the Great Australian Bight as having the following limits, On the North. The south coast of the Australian mainland, a line joining West Cape Howe Australia to South West Cape, Tasmania. A line from Cape Otway, Victoria to King Island and thence to Cape Grim, the AHS defines the bight with a smaller area, from Cape Pasley, Western Australia, to Cape Carnot, South Australia - a distance of 1,160 kilometres. Much of the bight lies due south of the expansive Nullarbor Plain, the Eyre Highway passes close to the cliffs of the bight between the Head of the Bight and Eucla. Outside of Australia, the Great Australian Bight is generally considered part of the Indian Ocean, the AHS considers it to be part of the Southern Ocean, using the expanded Australian definition used for this ocean. The IHO in its Limits of Oceans and Seas includes the bight with the Indian Ocean, while Bass Strait, in the 1953 edition, IHO includes Bass Strait as part of the Indian Ocean. The Great Australian Bight was first encountered by European explorers in 1627 when a Dutch navigator François Thijssen sailed along its western margins, the coast was later first accurately charted by the English navigator Matthew Flinders in 1802, during his circumnavigation of the Australian continent. A later land-based survey was accomplished by the English explorer Edward John Eyre, the bight came into existence when Gondwana broke apart and separated Antarctica from Australia around 50 million years ago. The coastline of the Great Australian Bight is characterised by cliff faces, surfing beaches and rock platforms and this is a popular activity during the southern hemisphere winter, when increasing numbers of southern right whales migrate to the region from their summer feeding grounds in the Antarctic. The whales come to the Bight region, especially to the Head of Bight, to calve and breed and their numbers were severely depleted by whaling, particularly during the 19th Century, but have since recovered to some extent. The Nullarbor Plain, which much of the length of the Bights coastline, is a former seabed, uplifted during the Miocene. Consisting of limestone, it is flat, and has an arid or semi-arid climate with very little rainfall. It has no drainage, but has a karst drainage system through cave formation in the underlying limestone. North of the Nullarbor lies the Great Victoria Desert, which has a drainage system terminating in numerous small salt lakes. The waters of the Great Australian Bight are highly biodiverse, particularly in zooplankton and these patches contain elevated nutrient concentrations and support enhanced levels of primary productivity. High densities of zooplankton to the northwest of the patches indicate that the prevailing southeasterly winds transport the products of this enhanced biological production into the central GAB and these plankton communities support the highest densities of small planktivorous fishes, including sardine and anchovy, in Australian waters. Juvenile southern bluefin tuna migrate into the GAB annually to feed on these rich pelagic resources, as the nutrients are swept up from the deep water ocean floor and pushed in towards the coast, the food chain is injected with a massive influx of the bottom rung
36.
Murray River
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The Murray River is Australias longest river, at 2,508 kilometres in length. It turns south at Morgan for its final 315 kilometres, reaching the ocean at Lake Alexandrina, despite discharging considerable volumes of water at times, particularly before the advent of largescale river regulation, the mouth has always been comparatively small and shallow. As of 2010, the Murray River system receives 58 percent of its natural flow and it is perhaps Australias most important irrigated region, and it is widely known as the food bowl of the nation. The Murray River forms part of the 3,750 km long combined Murray–Darling river system drains most of inland Victoria, New South Wales. Overall the catchment area is one seventh of Australias total land mass, the Murray carries only a small fraction of the water of comparably-sized rivers in other parts of the world, and with a great annual variability of its flow. The Murray River makes up most of the border between the Australian states of Victoria and New South Wales, where it does, the border is the top of the bank of the southern side of the river. This boundary definition can be ambiguous, since the river changes its course over time and this was due to a miscalculation during the 1840s, when the border was originally surveyed. Past this point, the Murray River is entirely within the state of South Australia, the Murray River also supports fringing corridors and forests of the river red gum. Recent extreme droughts have put significant stress on river red gum forests, the Murray has also flooded on occasion, the most significant of which was the flood of 1956, which inundated many towns on the lower Murray and which lasted for up to six months. In some segments of the Murray River, carp have become the species found. Between 2.5 and 0.5 million years ago the Murray River terminated in a vast freshwater lake called Lake Bungunnia, Lake Bungunnia was formed by earth movements that blocked the Murray River near Swan Reach during this period of time. At its maximum extent Lake Bungunnia covered 33,000 km2, extending to near the Menindee Lakes in the north, the draining of Lake Bungunnia occurred approximately 600,000 years ago. Deep clays deposited by the lake are evident in cliffs around Chowilla in South Australia, a species of Neoceratodus lungfish existed in Lake Bungunnia, today Neoceratodus lungfish are only found in several Queensland rivers. The noted Barmah Red Gum Forests owe their existence to the Cadell Fault, about 25,000 years ago, displacement occurred along the Cadell fault, raising the eastern edge of the fault, which runs north-south,8 to 12 m above the floodplain. This created a series of events. A section of the original Murray River channel immediately behind the fault was abandoned, the Goulburn River was dammed by the southern end of the fault to create a natural lake. The Murray River flowed to the north around the Cadell Fault, creating the channel of the Edward River which exists today and these conditions are perfect for River Red Gums, which rapidly formed forests in the area. Thus the displacement of the Cadell Fault 25,000 BP led directly to the formation of the famous Barmah River Red Gum Forests, the Barmah Choke and The Narrows mean the amount of water that can travel down this part of the Murray River is restricted
37.
Convicts in Australia
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Between 1788 and 1868, about 162,000 convicts were transported by the British government to various penal colonies in Australia. The British government began transporting convicts overseas to American colonies in the early 17th century, when transportation ended with the start of the American Revolution, an alternative site was needed relieve further overcrowding of British prisons and hulks. Earlier in 1770, James Cook charted and claimed possession of the east coast of Australia for Britain. Other penal colonies were established in Van Diemens Land in 1803 and Queensland in 1824, while Western Australia, founded in 1829 as a free colony. Victoria and South Australia remained free colonies, penal transportation to Australia peaked in the 1830s and dropped off significantly the following decade. The last convict ship arrived in Western Australia on 10 January 1868, many convicts were transported for petty crimes, while a significant number were political prisoners. More serious crimes, such as rape and murder, were punishable by death, once emancipated, most ex-convicts stayed in Australia and joined the free settlers, with some rising to prominent positions in Australian society. However, convictism carried a stigma, and for some later Australians. Attitudes became more accepting in the 20th century and it is now considered by many Australians to be a cause for celebration to have a convict in ones lineage, around 20% of modern Australians are descended from transported convicts. The convict era has inspired novels, films, and other cultural works. According to Robert Hughes in The Fatal Shore, the population of England and Wales, by the time of the American Revolution, London was overcrowded, filled with the unemployed, and flooded with cheap gin. Poverty, social injustice, child labor, harsh and dirty living conditions, Dickens novels perhaps best illustrate this, even some government officials were horrified by what they saw. Only in 1833 and 1844 were the first general laws against child labour passed in the United Kingdom, crime had become a major problem and in 1784 a French observer noted that from sunset to dawn the environs of London became the patrimony of brigands for twenty miles around. Each parish had a watchman, but British cities did not have forces in the modern sense. Jeremy Bentham avidly promoted the idea of a prison. Virtually all malefactors were caught by informers or denounced to the court by their victims. Pursuant to the so-called Bloody Code, by the 1770s there were 222 crimes in Britain which carried the death penalty, almost all of which were crimes against property. These included such offences as the stealing of goods worth over 5 shillings, the cutting down of a tree, the situation was so dire that hulks left over from the Seven Years War were used as makeshift floating prisons
38.
The Old Gum Tree
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The Old Gum Tree is a historic site in Glenelg North, Australia. On 28 December 1836, the British governor John Hindmarsh delivered the proclamation creating the colony of South Australia, a ceremony is held each year on Proclamation Day, with the current Governor reading out Hindmarshs original speech. The tree itself, probably a red gum, has long since died and its decayed outer surface was encased in concrete in 1963. Holdfast Bay List of Adelaide parks and gardens Glenelg - Old Gum Tree, the Manning Index of South Australian History. City of Holdfast Bay - days at the bay
39.
Aboriginal Australians
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Aboriginal Australians are legally defined as people who are members of the Aboriginal race of Australia. Until the 1980s, the legal and administrative criterion for inclusion in this category was race. In the era of colonial and post-colonial government, access to human rights depended upon your race. If you were a full blooded Aboriginal native, the Constitution of Australia, in its original form as of 1901, referred to Aboriginals twice, but without definition. Section 51 gave the Commonwealth parliament power to legislate with respect to the people of any throughout the Commonwealth. The purpose of this provision was to give the Commonwealth power to regulate non-white immigrant workers, the only other reference, Section 127, provided simply that aboriginal natives shall not be counted in reckoning the size of the population of the Commonwealth or any part of it. The purpose of section 127 was to prevent the inclusion of Aboriginal people in section 24 determinations of the distribution of House of Representatives seats amongst the states and territories, after both of these references were removed by the 1967 referendum, the Australian Constitution had no references to Aboriginals. Since that time, there have been a number of proposals to amend the constitution to specifically mention Indigenous Australians, the change to Section 51 gave the Commonwealth parliament the power to make laws specifically with respect to Aboriginal peoples as a race. The case concerned an application of legislation that would preserve cultural heritage of Aboriginal Tasmanians and it was held that Aboriginal Australians and Torres Strait Islanders, together or separately, and any part of either, could be regarded as a race for this purpose. As to the criteria for identifying a person as a member of such a race, Deane said, It is unnecessary, for the purposes of the present case, to consider the meaning to be given to the phrase people of any race in s.51. Plainly, the words have a wide and non-technical meaning, the phrase is, in my view, apposite to refer to all Australian Aboriginals collectively. Any doubt, which might otherwise exist in regard, is removed by reference to the wording of par. The phrase is also apposite to refer to any identifiable racial sub-group among Australian Aboriginals, while Deanes three-part definition reaches beyond the biological criterion to individuals self-identification, it has been criticised as continuing to accept the biological criterion as primary. It has been difficult to apply, both in each of its parts and as to the relations among the parts, biological descent has been a fall-back criterion. If it is to be used to refer to us as a group of people. This has just really crept up on us and we are very happy with our involvement with indigenous people around the world, on the international forum because theyre our brothers and sisters. But we do object to it being used here in Australia and her lecture offered a new perspective on the terms urban, traditional and of Indigenous descent as used to define and categorise Aboriginal Australians. She said, Not only are these categories inappropriate, they serve to divide us, governments insistence on categorising us with modern words like urban, traditional and of Aboriginal descent are really only replacing old terms half-caste and full-blood – based on our colouring
40.
South Australian Company
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The formation of the company followed considerable lobbying by the South Australian Association, a group consisting of philanthropists, radical thinkers, dissenters and merchants. After a years of negotiation, false starts, changes and amendments to suggested charters, the British Parliament finally gave approval and passed the South Australian Act on 15 August 1834. The founding Board of directors were George Fife Angas, Raikes Currie, Charles Hindley M. P. James Hyde, Henry Kingscote, John Pirie, Alderman, Christopher Rawson, John Rundle M. P. They developed a settlement at Kingscote on Kangaroo Island, in July 1836, the Company provided basic infrastructure for the new colony, as well as sold or leased land to immigrants who came to settle. The first Resident Commissioner was James Hurtle Fisher, James Ruddell Todd 1899–1923 Henry Joslin Directors 1836-18. Henry Waymouth 1880–1911 Major General Sir Stanley De A. C. Clarke, 1889–1919 Sir John H. Kennaway, Bart. Attorneys in South Australia William Bartley 1850–1906 Sir Samuel Davenport, K. C. M. G, 1876–1923 John Warren Bakewell Local Board of Advice, Adelaide 1841–1885 William Bartley 1841-18. Edward Stephens 1856–1870 William Bakewell, M. P, crown Solicitor 1876–1923 John Warren Bakewell 1886-1930+ Joseph Fisher 1894–1932 Sir John Lancelot Stirling K. C. M. G. Accountants Edward Stephens Edward Robert Simpson From 1872, the South Australian Company occupied offices on North Terrace on the corner of Gawler Place, the new building, Gawler Chambers, was completed in 1914. Pearse, Malcolm, Australias Early Managers Australia Pacific Economic and Business History Conference, Wellington, New Zealand, February 2010
41.
Kingscote, South Australia
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Kingscote is a town in the Australian state of South Australia located on Kangaroo Island about 119 kilometres south-west of the state capital of Adelaide. It is South Australias oldest European settlement and the islands largest town, at the 2011 census, Kingscote had a population of 1,763. It is a well-established tourist centre and the administrative and communications centre and it is home to a colony of the smallest penguins in the world, the little penguin. The history of the area is displayed in the museum in Hope Cottage, Hope Cottage was one of the three earliest houses built in Kingscote, circa 1850, with the adjoining cottages of Faith and Charity. The Old Mulberry Tree at Reeves Point was planted in 1836, Reeves Point has been placed on the Australian Heritage Places List. The current town of Kingscote is now immediately to the south of the original Kingscote settlement at Reeves Point in the area known as Queenscliffe. It is the centre for the Kangaroo Island Council, whose offices have recently undergone a significant upgrade. There is a wharf and jetty, formerly used by the roll-on, roll-off vessels, Troubridge. Kingscote has a swimming pool, plus a sports centre and adjoining oval. The Aurora Ozone Seafront Hotel, with its statue, is a well-known landmark on the Kingscote foreshore. In 2007, the Kingscote colony of Little penguins population was 868 adults, in 2011, it was believed to be either declining or stable. In 2012, the fell to 300 adults according to DEWNR figures. In 2013, the Kingscote colony of little penguins had dropped to 20 birds, official 2013 census figures were greater, estimating 154 breeding adults, down 48 per cent from the previous year and 82 per cent since the population peak in 2007. Increasing populations of New Zealand fur seals are believed to be a factor in the decline, other predators of penguins on Kangaroo Island include rats, dogs, cats, goannas and sea eagles. Since the 1990s, penguin tour operators have improved the habitat in the visitation area at Kingscote, through vegetation, habitat protection. Disease and declining fish stocks have also blamed for declines in Little penguin numbers. Other colonies in South Australia have experienced dramatic declines since the 1990s, the nearest examples of colonies in decline are found in Encounter Bay and at Penneshaw on Kangaroo Island. Accounts of little penguins at Kingcote exist from the 1930s, historically, Little penguins have also been observed in burrows on The Spit which lays across the mouth of Bay of Shoals
42.
Kangaroo Island
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Kangaroo Island is Australias third-largest island, after Tasmania and Melville Island. It lies in the state of South Australia 112 km southwest of Adelaide and its closest point to the mainland is Snapper Point in Backstairs Passage which is 13.5 km from the Fleurieu Peninsula. Once occupied by Australian Aborigines, the population disappeared after the land became an island following rising sea levels several thousand years ago. It was subsequently resettled from the early 19th century onwards, at first casually by sealers and whalers, since then the islands economy has been principally agricultural, with a southern rock lobster fishery and with tourism growing in importance. The largest town, and the centre, is Kingscote. The island has several nature reserves to protect the remnants of its vegetation and native animals, with the largest. The island is 150 km long and between 90 km and 57 km wide, its area covering 4,405 km2 and its coastline is 540 kilometres long and highest point is Mount McDonnell at 299 m above sea level. It is separated from Yorke Peninsula to the northwest by Investigator Strait, a group of islets, the Pages, lie off the eastern end of the island. Kangaroo Island separated from mainland Australia around 10,000 years ago, known as Karta by the mainland Aboriginal tribes, the existence of stone tools and shell middens show that Aboriginal people once lived on Kangaroo Island. It is thought that they occupied it as long ago as 16,000 years before the present, a mainland Aboriginal dreaming story tells of the Backstairs Passage flooding, Long ago, Ngurunderis two wives ran away from him, and he was forced to follow them. He pursued them and as he did so he crossed Lake Albert, when he arrived there he saw his wives wading half-way across the shallow channel which divided Naroongowie from the mainland. He was determined to punish his wives, and angrily ordered the water to rise up, with a terrific rush the waters roared and the women were carried back towards the mainland. Although they tried frantically to swim against the wave they were powerless to do so and were drowned. He was closely followed by the French explorer Commander Nicolas Baudin, who was the first European to circumnavigate the Island, although the French and the British were at war at the time, the men met peacefully. They both used the water seeping at what is now known as Hog Bay near Frenchmans Rock. Baudin named the Island Île Borda, in honour of Jean-Charles de Borda, a community of sealers and others existed on Kangaroo Island from 1802 to the time of South Australias colonisation in 1836. The sealers were rough men and several kidnapped Aboriginal women from Tasmania, the women were kept prisoner as wives and virtual slaves. Three Aboriginal women tried to escape and swim back to the mainland, in 1803 sealers from the American brig Union built the schooner Independence, the first ship constructed in South Australia, at what is now American River
Australia – Wikipedia book
Media related to South Australia at Wikimedia Commons
South Australia travel guide from Wikivoyage
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