Why I Left Australia

My First Eight Years of Life on the Far Side of the World

I was born in Australia and spent the first part of my life there. In 1972, when I was eight, my family left Australia and moved to South Africa.

Looking back now, it was one of those moments that seemed quite ordinary at the time. I was a child, so I didn't really have much say in the matter. We packed up our belongings, said goodbye to Australia and set off for what was, to me, a completely new world. More likely ‘The Jungle!’.

I remember Australia as the place where my story began. I didn't know then that leaving it would eventually lead to another country, another culture and a very different childhood. It was the first big move of my life and, as it turned out, certainly not the last.

My father's elder brother and sister had moved to South Africa a couple of years earlier. In March 1972, my father's elder brother, who was living in Llandudno in Cape Town at the time, offered to be guarantor for our family and that set many things into motion. This was going to be a big change. My parents had to sell a lot of things, such as their house and car, but they also shipped over some personal belongings. People had money, and sales were fast in that market. My father said there were no worries about selling property in those years. His sister, who had moved to the Eastern Cape in South Africa with her family, confirmed that if we moved to the town of Uitenhage, there were separate boys’ and girls’ schools that would take the five of us — me and my four younger sisters. Incidentally, Uitenhage was also the location of the largest Volkswagen factory in Africa.

My uncle in Cape Town had confirmed that the South African labour market had plenty of jobs for people. They were riding on the back of a boom in the 1960s and were currently in the middle of a remarkably strong period of economic expansion in the early 1970s. The political situation was deeply troubled, but economically there were some very attractive opportunities for a skilled worker such as my father. Strong manufacturing, investment in infrastructure and substantial fixed capital investment were contributing to annual economic growth of around 5%. This boom created a shortage of skilled workers.

South Africa was actively attracting skilled immigrants. The country needed engineers, technicians, managers, artisans and other skilled workers to support its expanding mining, manufacturing, construction and infrastructure sectors. The Reserve Bank itself later noted that the economy had been helped by the immigration of "entrepreneurial and highly skilled people". South Africa had jobs that needed skilled people, and not enough skilled people to fill them. That could make it an attractive proposition to someone looking at opportunities from overseas.

At the time, Australia was also doing well, as a prosperous, highly-developed economy with an exceptionally tight labour market with unemployment as low as 1.5% rather than a more usual 4 to 5% figure. Australia had also enjoyed a long period of economic stability. The Australian Bureau of Statistics describes the period up to 1972 as one in which inflation was generally low, unemployment was low and output was growing steadily.

So we were potentially leaving one prosperous country for another prosperous country, where particular skills were in very high demand. There was another factor that would have made South Africa particularly attractive to someone coming from Australia.

The two countries were culturally quite familiar to one another. Both were also experiencing a property boom, with expansion in major cities.

Both were former British dominions with English widely spoken, Westminster political institutions, British-derived education and legal systems, and substantial British immigrant populations. South Africa also had a large white English-speaking population. There was also a substantial English-speaking, British-derived business culture in South Africa, which would have been very familiar.

And there was already a history of skilled workers moving around the British Commonwealth. Interestingly, British and Australian workers had been recruited into skilled mining positions in South Africa for generations.

So, from my father's perspective, South Africa could have looked less like moving to a foreign country and more like moving to another part of the Commonwealth where there happened to be good opportunities. South Africa looked economically exciting in 1972 while politically and socially it was sitting on a very large problem.

My father and his siblings in South Africa would not necessarily have known how that story was going to unfold. Moving to South Africa wasn't quite the same cultural leap as moving to continental Europe or somewhere in Asia. He would have encountered English-speaking clients, British-influenced legal and business practices, familiar institutions and a substantial expatriate and immigrant community.

That matters when you're taking a young family halfway around the world. South Africa presented what looked like an exciting opportunity in a growing market. So, when the opportunity came along, my father decided to take it.

Ending it there for now.

Regards to everyone,

Greg