The Great Depression – Sussos.

The Wall Street Crash of 1929 led to a worldwide economic collapse, which quickly spread to the Australian economy and signalled the beginning of the “Great Depression”.

At its worst in 1932, unemployment in Australia reached 32 percent, but this figure did not include women who had lost their jobs or teenagers who had never had one.

To relieve the distress caused by unemployment the Victorian Parliament established a sustenance relief fund.

Many families depended on these government payments and were called “sussos”, which was slang for sustenance.

Payments were only available for the truly destitute, who had been unemployed for a sustained period, and had no assets or savings.

Sustenance payments were made of 8s 6d per week for a man and wife, with an additional 1s 6d per week for each additional child, up to a maximum of 20s 6d per week. By 1932, more than 60,000 people depended on sustenance payments

And individuals receiving sustenance were obliged to work.

A central Unemployment Relief Works Board was formed to assess projects, and allocate money, while local relief committees were created throughout Victoria.

Forests Commission work, unlike major infrastructure projects like the Yarra Boulevard or Melbourne’s water mains, was considered very effective because most of the money was spent on labour, with only about 5 percent on materials.

It also provided much needed employment for rural communities; it could be quickly mobilised and could employ large numbers of city and country men doing unskilled manual labour.

Although it must be said that the unemployment relief program was plagued by political interference, with largess flowing to marginal electorates and party supporters of the Ministers choosing.

Forest camps were in operation as early as 1929 at Ballarat, Bealiba, Beaufort, Beechworth, Castlemaine, Chiltern, Heathcote, Lal Lal, Neerim, Niagaroon, Rushworth, Tarnagulla, Upper Yarra, Wombat, Anglesea, Creswick and the You Yangs.

The camps, generally comprising twenty-five men on the principle of two-thirds from the cities and one-third from the local area.

The program offered eight weeks work, followed by eight weeks off and then eligibility for another eight weeks if alternative employment had not been found in the meantime.

During 1932, the Commission engaged 5295 men with a total expenditure of £11,870 3s. 5d.

The following year, in 1932-33, unemployment relief funds gave work to 8288 married and 504 single men for periods up to 8 weeks. The total expenditure grew to £205,645.

Between 1931 and 1943 the Forests Commission spent approximately £1.5 million pounds and employed about 51,300 people. Some may have been employed more than once, and in different locations.

For some, it was often their first experience of country life, especially in the forests.

Despite the blisters, this taste of open-air life and forestry suited many. Better still, some proved very capable and well suited to forestry work and found ongoing employment on the crew, or as overseers with the Commission.

In the Ovens Valley, the men established softwood plantation and did nursery work at Bright and Porepunkah. The works were arranged and supervised by Commission overseers.

But there was a certain irony to these susso programs during the Great Depression. Thin royalty revenues from the sale of sawlogs and forest products restricted the funds available to the Commission for much needed fire protection and silvicultural works.

The slump in royalty revenue also led to the retrenchment of staff at the same time as the Commission had to manage the employment of large number of relief workers.

The need for unemployment relief funds diminished by 1939-40 with the start of World War Two.

It took almost ten years for the Australian economy to recover from the Great Depression, but it affected people deeply for decades to come. It also radically changed economic thinking and policy in Australia.

Photos: Sustenance workers Ovens Valley – Rob Kaufman