Turner’s view was now public, and Lyne’s position was impossible.
It seems likely that Turner had told Lyne that he would serve in the Cabinet only if Deakin would, knowing all along that Deakin would never serve, thus wrecking Lyne’s chance of taking the prime ministership while maintaining some rapport and friendliness with him. Lyne was right in pointing to his failure with the Victorians as being the main reason he did not become Australia’s first prime minister.
It is unclear from the records as to whether Hopetoun and Turner communicated directly with each other while the latter was in Sydney, but it is safe to conclude that while Turner could have facilitated Lyne’s commissioning as prime minister, he chose not to do so. Instead, Turner advised Lyne to return his commission and suggest to the governor-general to send for Barton. This is exactly what Lyne did, and Hopetoun, who was not about to make the same mistake twice, asked the popular Barton to take his rightful place as prime minister.
Throughout this ordeal—arguably Australia’s first constitutional crisis—Turner showed good judgement. It would have been an inauspicious start to the Commonwealth to have a divisive anti-federalist as the first prime minister. This may have been Turner’s most profound influence on Australian history, even though his term as Australia’s first treasurer was yet to begin.
First Treasurer of Australia
Barton received a fine Christmas present on 25 December 1900, when the governor-general belatedly invited him to assume the prime ministership. The swearing-in was scheduled to occur on New Year’s Day, so there was little time for reflection in constructing the first federal Cabinet. Barton was determined to pay due deference to the new states by inviting each premier to serve in the Cabinet. An added advantage was that he liked and trusted most of the premiers. Premier Forrest of Western Australia accepted immediately, without reservation, as did the passed-over Lyne and Tasmanian premier Elliott Lewis. Frederick Holder was not contactable, so Barton offered the South Australian place in Cabinet to the former premier and statesman Charles Kingston. Queensland premier Robert Philp declined to join, allowing another Queenslander, Sir Samuel Griffith, to accept.
Turner also accepted. He was guaranteed a place in the Cabinet due to his credentials as premier of Victoria, but it was likely that Barton would have been keen for him to serve in any event, given the steadfast loyalty he had shown the man who was now prime minister. Having appointed each premier who wished to be in Australia’s first federal Cabinet, Barton proceeded to invite his good friend and fellow warrior for federation, Alfred Deakin, and the respected NSW politician Richard O’Connor to also join.
Treasury was the natural portfolio for Turner, given his love of accounting, his active role in financial matters and his reputation as a successful treasurer of Victoria. There was conjecture as to whether Turner would take the Treasury portfolio alone or add customs and excise to it, but Barton decided to appoint a separate minister for customs.
Within a month of being appointed, Turner had invited senior officials from each of the state treasuries to Melbourne to advise him on how the federal Treasury would best be constructed. This was, in effect, the first meeting of the Commonwealth Heads of Treasury (HOTs), which still meet to this day (although no longer with the federal treasurer). Turner told the officials in his opening address:
I wish to thank you, Gentlemen, for your courtesy in coming, at inconvenience, to this state, for the benefit of giving me the benefit of your advice and assistance. I have accepted the difficult position of Treasurer of the Commonwealth and while many of my colleagues have taken over departments in working order, I am taking over a new department. I thought, therefore, that if I could get you gentlemen who have knowledge of the practical working of the departments under you in the various states, to assist me, we should be able to devise some scheme for the financial working of the Commonwealth for the first few months.28
Amazingly, it appears there was some discussion among the officials as to whether the creation of a federal Treasury department was even necessary. TM King, the Queensland under-treasurer, argued:
It will be necessary to have some central authority to whom the information as to revenue and expenditure shall be sent by the different sub-treasury offices. Therefore I think it should be imperative that there should be someone to correspond with, who is constantly near the Federal Treasurer.29
Turner saw the main role of the Treasury as being the accurate keeping of the Commonwealth’s accounts, and the main role of the federal treasurer as ensuring that those accounts balanced, with receipts roughly matching expenditure. He did not desire to make the Treasury a particularly powerful bureaucracy or to impose his will on other ministers, apart from the treasurer of the day having some control over general spending levels to ensure that they did not significantly outweigh revenue. Accordingly, Turner worked to recruit the best accountants from the various state treasuries to populate the new federal department. Unsurprisingly, he chose the Victorian Treasury accountant George Allan as the first secretary of the Commonwealth Treasury. Allan had no formal qualifications but had learnt the art of accountancy ‘on the job’ in the Victorian Treasury, which he’d joined in 1851 at the age of nineteen. Allan would serve in the role of secretary for the next fifteen years. Four other accounting staff were appointed to assist him, and thus the federal Treasury commenced with a complement of five staff.
The emphasis on accounting skills was underlined by prime minister Barton when he wrote to the
