AGY-4724 | Shire of Gostwyck

Full description

The Shire of Gostwyck was a local government area in the New England region of the eastern division of New South Wales, created under the Local Government (Shires) Act 1905 (Act No.33, 1905). The Shire of Gostwyck bordered the shires of Cockburn, Mandowa and Barraba to the west; Apsley to the south; Dumaresq to the east; and Guyra and Gwydir to the north. Gostwyck encompassed the Municipality of Uralla. (1)

The Local Government (Shires) Act 1905 incorporated all previously unincorporated territory of the Eastern and Central Divisions of New South Wales into new local government areas, to be called shires. Such incorporations had previously been voluntary and based on centres of population, designated as boroughs or municipal districts. The existing municipalities continued but were now embedded within shires, while remaining independent of them. Shires were to be governed by a council of six or nine elected councillors, one of whom was to be chosen as president by the council. (2) The shires were further divided into ridings, the equivalent of municipal wards. (3)

The primary functions of shire councils were construction and management of public places (other than national or railway works), such as public roads, streets and footpaths, jetties and wharves, and public watering places; road and street lighting; regulation of traffic; flood and fire prevention or mitigation; and stormwater drainage, including preventing pollution of waterways. Additional responsibilities such as waste removal, sewerage, town water supplies, parks and recreation grounds, and the licensing of public vehicles and their drivers could be granted to the council on application to the Governor. (4)

In order to fund these services, councils were to levy a general rate on the unimproved value of rateable land within their jurisdiction, paid by the owner. (5) Council-appointed valuers were to conduct valuations every three years. This system was a notable change from the existing municipal rating model, which based the levy on the annual rental value of property and charged the occupant, whether owner or tenant. (6) Municipal rating was subsequently aligned with the new model by the Local Government Act, 1906 (Act No.56, 1906).

The creation of the Shire of Gostwyck was proclaimed on 7 March 1906 (7), followed on 16 May by the appointment of a temporary council to arrange for elections (8), and the division of the Shire into ridings A, B and C. (9) The first election for all shires was to be on 24 November, (10) with the first council meeting to be held within two weeks of that date. (11) Gostwyck was in the first class of the new shires for projected expenditure against rates revenue, those regarded as needing least financial assistance, and received a state endowment of six shillings and eight pence for each pound gathered in rates. (12) By September 1907 they had levied a general rate of 1 penny in the pound of unimproved capital value (13), and other land taxes had been suspended. (14)

In December 1933 a proposal was published to transfer 234 acres from Gostwyck to Cockburn. (15) This alteration was proclaimed the following July. (16)

On 1 January 1948 the Shire of Gostwyck and the Municipality of Uralla were amalgamated to form the new Shire of Uralla, under a provisional council. (17)

Endnotes
1. Joy N. Hughes. Local Government ... Local History. Sydney: Royal Australian Historical Society, 1990, p.xiii.
2. Local Government (Shires) Act 1905 (Act No.33, 1905) s.18. The election of the president was clarified by the Local Government Act 1906 (Act No.56, 1906) s.35(1), (3).
3. Local Government (Shires) Act 1905, ibid., s.6.
4. Local Government Act 1906 (Act No.56, 1906) s.73.
5. Local Government (Shires) Act 1905, op.cit., s.8(1).
6. Municipalities Act 1897 (Act No.23, 1897) s.141.
7. NSW Government Gazette No.121, 7 March 1906, pp.1593, 1612.
8. NSW Government Gazette No. 161, 16 May 1906, pp.2979, 2981.
9. NSW Government Gazette No.161, 16 May 1906, pp.2899, 2912-13.
10. NSW Government Gazette No.221, 5 September 1906, p.5013.
11. NSW Government Gazette No.241, 17 October 1906, p.5754.
12. NSW Government Gazette No.286, 31 December 1906, p.7012.
13. Public Works Department annual report 1906/07, p.111, App.1; in Parliamentary Papers 1907 Session 2, Vol.2, p.559.
14. NSW Government Gazette No.116, 18 September 1907, p.5232.
15. NSW Government Gazette No.211, 15 December 1933, p.4381.
16. NSW Government Gazette No.125, 13 July 1934, pp.2578-80.
17. NSW Government Gazette No.139, 5 December 1947, pp.2821-23.