This video examines the impact of the Great Depression on Australian society during the late 1920s and 1930s. This period saw levels of poverty and despair on a scale never before experienced in contemporary Australia.
A diverse range of opinions and reflections are presented, providing insights to fascinating aspects of Australian society at the time, including the key political figures and government policies, and the involvement of politically-driven interest groups including trade unions, unemployed workers, secret armies, communists and fascists.
In the second half of the 1920s the Australian economy suffered from falling wheat and wool prices, and competition from other commodity-producing countries. Australia was also borrowing vast sums of money, which dried up as the economy slowed.
Then the Wall Street crash of 1929 led to a worldwide economic depression. The Australian economy collapsed and unemployment reached a peak of 32 per cent in 1932.
It took Australia almost a decade to recover from the Great Depression.
Four women recall the hardship of raising children during a period of mass unemployment. The government provided a 'baby bundle’ consisting of poor quality clothing