Department of Trade and Customs
1 January 1901 – 11 January 1956
Original department responsible for customs and excise, the tariff and trade and commerce, which at various times also handled export inspection, quarantine, lighthouses and navigation, import censorship and wartime price control and rationing.
How it came into existence
Established on 1 January 1901 as one of the seven original Departments of State, with Charles Kingston as minister; the colonial customs and excise departments passed to the Commonwealth on that day under section 69 of the Constitution.
Changes during its life
- Commonwealth quarantine administration under the Quarantine Act 1908
- Control of imported films
Constituted under customs regulations to censor films before they could be imported.
- Commonwealth Serum Laboratories
- Australian Institute of Tropical Medicine
- Export inspection and commerce regulation
- Overseas marketing of produce
- Navigation and shipping
- Lighthouses
Unconfirmed: these functions may instead have left Trade and Customs only when the Department of Transport was created in 1930.
- Wartime price control (Commonwealth Prices Commissioner)
How it ended
Abolished on 11 January 1956 by the Menzies government and split in two: customs and excise went to the new Department of Customs and Excise, and trade functions to the new Department of Trade.
- Customs and excise collection
- Tariff administration and bounties
- Import censorship of films and literature
- Trade and commerce with other countries
- Trade agreements
- Tariff policy and the Tariff Board
Main functions
- Customs and excise collection
- Tariff administration and bounties
- Trade and commerce, including trade agreements
- Export inspection and commerce regulation (until 1925)
- Quarantine, the Commonwealth Serum Laboratories and tropical medicine (until 1921)
- Navigation, shipping and lighthouses (until 1928 or 1930)
- Import censorship of films and literature
- Wartime price control and rationing (1939–1950)
Bodies in this portfolio (8)
- Royal Commission on Customs and Excise Tariffs 1904–1907
- Commonwealth Quarantine Service 1909–1921
- Commonwealth Vaccine Depot 1911–1916
- Inter-State Commission 1913–1920
- Royal Commission on the Meat Export Trade 1914
- Commonwealth Board of Censors 1917–1928
- Commonwealth Prices Branch 1939–1948
- Rationing Commission 1942–1950
Lineage
Loading lineage…
Sources
Primary sources
- Administrative Arrangements Order of 1 January 1901 (created it)
- Administrative Arrangements Order of 16 November 1950 (sets it out)
3 more Administrative Arrangements Orders set it out
- Administrative Arrangements Order of 4 April 1912 (sets it out)
- Administrative Arrangements Order of 22 September 1915 (sets it out)
- Administrative Arrangements Order of 13 April 1932 (sets it out)