St George County Council was a county council and local government-owned electricity supply utility in the St George area of southern Sydney, Australia. It supplied electricity to consumers in the Kogarah, Hurstville, Rockdale and Bexley Municipalities (Bexley merged with Rockdale in 1949). It existed, from 4 December 1920, until 1 January 1980 when its operations and assets, and those of Mackellar County Council and Brisbane Water County Council, were merged into the existing Sydney County Council. It obtained its bulk power from the New South Wales Government Railways (after 1932, New South Wales Department of Railways), until 1953 when the electricity generation assets of that entity became part of the Electricity Commission of New South Wales.
It was the first of many county councils, which were an important part of the mixed economy that existed in New South Wales, during the interwar and post-war periods of the 20th Century. Of the various publicly owned trading entities, the country councils were the only significant ones controlled by local governments. It was a locally owned enterprise, rather than a state-owned enterprise.
Before the County Council The St George County Council area was that of its four constituent municipalities, Kogarah, Hurstville, Rockdale, and Bexley; the area lying west of the Botany Bay, between Cooks River and Georges River and to the south of Wolli Creek.
The first electricity supply in the St George area, was that for Thomas Saywell's tramway, which ran from Rockdale railway station to the beach at Brighton-le-Sands. It was converted from steam to electric power, in 1900. An Act of the NSW Parliament, would have permitted Saywell to provide electric street lighting, for which he would have been paid, but it was never passed.
Saywell constructed a coal-fuelled powerhouse, in what had been stables at the rear of his New Brighton Hotel, at what is now Brighton-le-Sands. It used a three-wire (-240V — 0V / Ground — +240V) direct current system, giving 480V d.c. for the trams—Saywell's trams had two trolley poles, one positive and the other for negative—and 240V d.c. for other uses. The powerhouse included a large bank of batteries. As well as powering the trams and lighting his hotel, Saywell's powerhouse did supply some other customers with 'electric current'. These consumers included, by around 1911, some street lighting in the Municipality of Rockdale and some shop premises in Rockdale.
As early as 1908, some citizens were advocating that Rockdale, in cooperation with the other municipalities in the St George area, should buy Saywell's 'Electric Works' and tramway, to provide the area with electricity and expand the electric tramways. As the end of his tramway concession neared, Saywell expressed interest in providing electric street lighting for the neighbouring St George municipalities of Bexley and Kogarah, as well as more lighting in Rockdale. More distant Hurstville was almost certainly outside the distance range that Saywell's relatively low-voltage direct current system could serve, even if the small system had sufficient capacity to do that, which was unlikely.
At the expiry of Saywell's 30-year tramway operating concession in 1914, the Government Railways took over the tramway, retiring Saywell's aging trams. The government trams worked on a different current collection arrangement (one trolley pole and rail return). The tramway supply and overhead was reconfigured, and, initially, Saywell's power station continued to provide power for the government tram. In December 1917, a new tramway substation entered service, at Rockdale, supplied by a high-voltage a.c. power line from Newtown, and ultimately powered from White Bay Power Station. It was later stated that it was around the time, when Saywell's concession expired, that the idea of the St George area's being supplied with bulk power, from the NSW Railways, first took hold.
Saywell continued to generate electrical power until October 1923—also continuing to supply power to Rockdale's electric street lighting and his other consumers—despite no longer supplying the electric tramway after 1917. The tramway still was used to move coal wagons from the railway, at Rockdale, to his power station. However, Saywell's d.c. system was far too small, too unreliable, and too antiquated to serve the growing St George area.
By 1920, the St George area had a significant suburban settlement, with a population of around 57,000. It was already serviced by town gas from the Australian Gas Light Company, but there was a pent up demand for electricity. Gas could be used for cooking, space heating, water heating, and gas-powered refrigerators, but gas was an inferior choice for lighting. Moreover, within a few years, radio receivers would require electricity, as would other electrical appliances like toasters, irons, electric jugs, electric stoves and refrigerators. It was time to connect electricity to the St George area.
Origins
Role of local government
Early local government involvement (pre-1919) Local government entities in New South Wales (municipalities and shires) originally had responsibility for supply and distribution of electrical power within their boundaries. This situation led to two municipalities in Sydney having their own power stations. The first was Sydney City Council (also known, particularly relating to electricity undertaking as the City Council, or Sydney Municipal Council (SMC)), which owned Pyrmont Power Station. The second was the Municipality of Balmain, which outsourced its rights to a private company, Electric Light and Power Supply Corporation, which in turn built and operated Balmain Power Station. Municipalities, in proximity to those two, entered into arrangements to extend, into their area, a power reticulation network drawing power from either Pyrmont or Balmain. Some other municipalities, typically outside the inner suburbs, such as Manly, also had smaller power stations, but over time these power stations closed, and these areas reverted to taking their power from larger power generating entities.
Local Government Act (1919) and county councils
The preamble of Local Government Act of 1919, stated its purposes as "An Act to make better provision for the government of areas; to extend the powers and functions of local governing bodies; to establish bodies to take common action on behalf of areas ..."
417 of the Act defined the powers of a council (a city council a municipality or a shire) to establish a trading undertaking, and 418 a) of the Act, defined as a trading undertaking "a) the supply of electricity and the supply and installing of electrical fittings and appliances".
521 of the Act, covered joint undertakings by councils and that such joint undertakings could be managed either by "the councils themselves jointly, or by a joint committee composed of members of the councils." It provided the legislative framework for what would later be known as 'county councils'; a new type of publicly owned trading entity, which was a joint undertaking of more than one council, controlled by a committee composed of members of the jointly-acting councils, and which was empowered to carry out its activities, anywhere within the combined areas of those councils.
The St George County Council would be the first of this new type of trading entity in New South Wales, in 1920, but many more would be established by 1953. In 1935, the existing electricity undertaking of the Sydney City Council (SMC), by then also extending over many smaller municipalities, adopted the 'county council' structure, becoming Sydney County Council. In 1951, the electricity undertakings of Manly and Warringah Shire were merged into Mackellar County Council. By 1953, the only retail electricity suppliers, within the Sydney Metropolitan Area, that were not county councils were the two privately owned electricity utilities, Electric Light and Power Supply Corporation and Parramatta and Granville Electric Supply Company. Their distribution networks were subsequently taken over by Sydney County Council (1956) and Prospect County Council (1957), respectively. Thereafter, the publicly owned county councils controlled all retail electricity distribution in New South Wales, each within their designated areas, seemingly as natural monopolies.
County councils were an important part of the mixed economy that existed in New South Wales, during the interwar and post-war periods of the 20th Century. Of the various publicly owned trading entities, the country councils were the only significant ones controlled by local government, as opposed to state government.
Power for Southern Sydney The four municipalities in the St George area and the neighbouring Sutherland Shire desired to extend reticulated electricity and electric street lighting to their areas. By 1919, SMC was unable to finance an extension, for such a large number of new consumers and, in any case, its generating capacity was already committed to other parts of the metropolitan area. SMC would remain constrained in its generating capacity, until it opened its second and larger power station, Bunnerong Power Station, in 1929.
The third large electricity generating entity, in the Sydney region, was New South Wales Government Railways (NSWGR), after 1932, NSW Department of Railways. It generated power for electric trams, and from 1926, electric trains, at Ultimo Power Station (from 1899) and White Bay Power Station (from 1913). Due to the travel patterns of its tramway passengers, these power stations had some spare capacity, particularly outside peak hours, and the Railway Commissioners were willing to supply bulk power.
With electrification of Sydney's suburban railways imminent, the railways were constructing a transmission line along the Illawarra railway line. The four St George municipalities and Sutherland Shire approached the Railway Commissioners about taking bulk power from the railway's network. At that time, the transmission line was only to extend as far as Hurstville—where a large railway substation was later built—meaning that Sutherland Shire reluctantly had to drop out of the proposed supply arrangement. The four St George municipalities, Kogarah, Hurstville, Rockdale, and Bexley, set up the St George County Council in December 1920.
Sutherland Shire subsequently set up its own electricity supply department, in 1925. It obtained its bulk power from New South Wales Government Railways, which had electrified the railway as far as National Park in 1926. Sutherland Shire's electricity undertaking also took over a small power supply operation at Cronulla. It was absorbed by Sydney County Council in 1954.
Establishment and governance The four St George municipalities had petitioned the Governor of New South Wales to declare their combined area a county. The four municipalities delegated their powers "to establish and conduct an electric light and power supply undertaking," to the new St George County Council. They also delegated their power to borrow, for such purposes, initially up to £100,000.
Each of the municipal councils elected three of their aldermen each, to sit on the new county council. Those twelve members of the new county council, in turn, elected one of their number to be the President of the county council. The Minister for Local Government, Thomas Mutch, called the first meeting of the new county council, in early December 1920. Growth Construction and connections The initial plans to electrify the St George area included lighting over 400 miles of streets. The system would use 11kV high voltage distribution to feed substations and 415/240 V a.c. low voltage reticulation for consumers.