1 History

However, South Australia was only established as a commercial venture in 1831 by the South Australia Company through the sale of land to free settlers. This differed from other Australian states, which were either established as penal colonies or made use of convict labour. Colonisation of South Australia was largely driven by Edward Gibbon Wakefield, who developed a 'theory of colonisation' and George Fife Angas , the largest landowner in the new colony.

2 Geography

The terrain consists largely of arid and semi-arid rangelands, with several low mountain ranges in which the most important mountains are the Mt Lofty-Flinders Ranges system which extends north about 800 kilometres from Cape Jervis to the northern end of Lake Torrens and salt lakes. Its principal industries and export are wheat, wine and wool. More than half the Australia's wines are produced here.

South Australia has boundaries with every other contiguous Australian state and territory except the Australian Capital Territory. Western Australia lies (unsurprisingly) to its west; the Northern Territory - which was originally the Northern Territory of South Australia - lies (equally unsurprisingly) to its north. Its north eastern corner cuts a wedge into Queensland, while New South Wales and Victoria also lie to its east.

Its south coast is flanked by the Southern Ocean. South Australia's mean temperature range is 29 °C in January and 15°C in July. Daily temperatures in parts of the state in January can be up to 48°C.

3 Government

South Australia is a constitutional monarchy with the Queen of Australia as the head of state. Its bicameral parliament is made up of a House of Assembly and a Legislative Council. The current Premier of South Australia is Mike Rann, a member of the Australian Labor Party.

Initially, the Governor of South Australia (the first was Captain John Hindmarsh ) held almost total power that he derived from the Letters Patent created by the Imperial Government to create the colony. He was only accountable to the British Colonial Office and thus democracy did not exist in the colony. A new body was created to advise the Governor on the adminstration of South Australia was created in 1843 called the Legislative Council. It was made up of three representatives of the British Government and four colonists appointed by the Governor. The Governor retained total executive power.

In 1851, the Imperial Parliament enacted the Australian Colonies Government Act which allowed for the election of representatives to each of the colonial legislatures and the drafting of a Constitution to properly create representative and responsible Government in South Australia and later that year, wealthy male colonists were allowed to vote for 16 members on a new 24 seat Legislative Council. Eight members continued to be appointed by the Governor.

The main responsibility of this body was to draft a Constitution for South Australia. The body drafted the most democratic constitution ever before seen in the British Empire and provided for manhood suffrage. It created the bicameral Parliament of South Australia and the two houses of parliament. For the first time in the colony, the executive was elected by the people and the colony used the Westminster system where the government is the party or coalition that exerts a majority in the House of Assembly. In 1894, South Australia was the first Australian colony to allow women to vote and it had the first Parliament in the world to allow women to be elected as members. Catherine Helen Spence was the first woman in the Australia to be a candidate for political office when she nominated to be one of South Australia's delegates to the constitutional conventions that drafted the Constitution. South Australia became an original state of the Commonwealth of Australia on 1 January 1901.

The flag of South Australia was adopted on January 13, 1904; it is a British Blue Ensign faced with the state badge. The badge is described as a piping shrike with wings outstretched on a yellow disc. There is actually no such bird as a piping shrike, it is often called a White-backed Magpie but is more likely the Magpie-lark. The state badge is believed to have been designed by Robert Craig of the Adelaide School of Arts .

4 See also

• Adelaide
• Local Government Areas of South Australia

5 External links

• SA Central A SA Governement Portal to all things South Australian

Australia
States and mainland territories
Australian Capital Territory | New South Wales | Northern Territory | Queensland | South Australia | Tasmania | Victoria | Western Australia
Jervis Bay Territory
External territories
Ashmore and Cartier Islands | Australian Antarctic Territory | Christmas Island | Cocos (Keeling) Islands | Coral Sea Islands | Heard Island and McDonald Islands | Norfolk Island

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