Department of Munitions

Department of Munitions
Department overview
Formed	11 June 1940[1]
Preceding Department	Department of Supply and Development (I) - for Commonwealth factories and aircraft production;
Dissolved	6 April 1948[1]
Superseding agency	Department of Supply and Development (II);
Jurisdiction	Commonwealth of Australia
Headquarters	Melbourne[2]
Department executives	Jim Brigden, Secretary (1940‑41); John Jensen, Secretary (1942‑48); Essington Lewis, Director General (1940‑45);

The Department of Munitions was an Australian government department that existed between June 1940 and April 1948.

Scope

Information about the department's functions and/or government funding allocation could be found in the Administrative Arrangements Orders, the annual Portfolio Budget Statements and in the Department's annual reports.

The Department was created during World War II in an effort to speed up munitions production.[1]

In April 1948 the department was wound up and its functions shifted to the Department of Supply and Development, a change necessitated due to the legislation that the munitions department had been established under during wartime, that could not continue indefinitely.[3]

Structure

The Department was a Commonwealth Public Service department, staffed by officials who were responsible to the Minister for Munitions, initially Robert Menzies, and subsequently Philip McBride, Norman Makin, John Dedman and finally John Armstrong.[1]

gollark: And hardware buttons, I suppose.

gollark: Exams. That's basically it.

gollark: I have Desmos. It can plot arbitrary things very fast.

gollark: Anyway. Yes. Graphing calculators are *pure* bee, because they cost about as much as my somewhat low-end phone, despite being worse in basically every way except being allowed into exams.

gollark: Probably.

References

CA 39: Department of Munitions, Central Administration, National Archives of Australia, retrieved 13 April 2014
Smith, Ailie, Corporate entry Department of Munitions (1940 - 1948), Encyclopedia of Australia Science, archived from the original on 31 March 2014
"New Ministry of Industrial Development". The Canberra Times. 17 March 1948. p. 2.

This article is issued from Wikipedia. The text is licensed under Creative Commons - Attribution - Sharealike. Additional terms may apply for the media files.

[NAA_CA_39-1] CA 39: Department of Munitions, Central Administration, National Archives of Australia, retrieved 13 April 2014

[2] Smith, Ailie, Corporate entry Department of Munitions (1940 - 1948), Encyclopedia of Australia Science, archived from the original on 31 March 2014

[3] "New Ministry of Industrial Development". The Canberra Times. 17 March 1948. p. 2.