NEW SOUTH WALES AND PARLIAMENT. 321 



his first and clearly outlined in his third report. The faults of 

 the Government service were in his opinion that it kept the 

 convicts gathered in large numbers in the towns where discipline 

 was difficult to enforce and where the object of their reform 

 was lost sight of, and also where they were put to work on 

 ornamental and often unnecessary public buildings, at great 

 expense to the Crown and with little advantage to the Colony. 

 Nor could he see by what means an efficient scheme of over- 

 seeing could be established and the convict overseers done away 

 with. He considered the employment of the prisoners in- 

 agricultural and pastoral pursuits as more conducive to their 

 reform than their employment on town buildings, but he was 

 not satisfied that the Government could carry on farming or 

 grazing with advantage. The exact reason why he was averse 

 to such a scheme is not clear, but probably lay in the fact that he 

 wished primarily to forward the cause of the sheep farmer and 

 to make the convict labour subservient to that purpose. Thus 

 he came to the conclusion that all convicts should be distributed 

 to the fullest possible extent amongst the settlers, and that those 

 who remained over from the distribution should be dealt with 

 in the following ways. Some would be placed in gangs for the 

 purpose of clearing away the virgin forest ; others for making 

 roads; and the old men and boys only be left in Sydney. 

 Further he proposed that three new settlements (Moreton Bay, 

 Port Bowen and Port Curtis) should be founded and used rather 

 as punishment stations for the prisoners, Newcastle being aban- 

 doned, so far as that purpose was concerned, as being too easily 

 accessible to the rest of the settlement. One notable recom- 

 mendation was to the effect that the whole number of mechanics 

 should be assigned to settlers, though each settler taking a 

 useful tradesman was to take also one or two inferior workmen. 

 The degrading communication of settlers and ex-convict super- 

 intendent should, he thought, be brought to an end, and the 

 assignment of servants become one of the duties of the Colonial 

 Secretary. 1 



i Major F. Goulburn arrived in the Colony as Colonial Secretary in 1821 

 taking the place, under a higher title, of Campbell, who had become Provost- 

 Marshal in ST 9 ! though he continued until Goulburn's arrival to act as Secretary 

 to the Governor. 



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