White supremacy and the name synonymous with the best journalism in this country

In the National Portrait Gallery’s collection in Canberra, there’s a painting of one of Australia’s most prominent oil barons, William Gaston Walkley. Walkley founded the petroleum company Ampol, and in 1956 established Australia’s premier journalism awards, which he named after himself.

Walkley was also an active participant in public policy discussions of the time. For example, the description on his portrait says: “Walkley was enthusiastic about development and encouraging investment in industry and other enterprises, in 1961 claiming that Australia was ‘under-populated and under-developed’.”

William Walkley in 1973.Credit: Wayne Russell Black

But what is missing from the gallery’s description, and The Walkley Foundation’s official description of the history of the awards, is the extraordinarily racist basis for Walkley’s concerns around “under-population” and the fact his public intervention in the political debate over Australia’s future was largely focused on a white supremacist fear of “coloured” migration.

In April 1961, Walkley wrote a column for The Sydney Morning Herald as part of a series where prominent businessmen were asked to answer the question, “What would you do if you were the ruler of Australia?”

Walkley’s contribution to the series was titled “Australia would double its population by 1980”. At first glance, it could be just another entry in the long-running political debate over a “big Australia”. But immediately, Walkley makes it very clear that while part of his concern is around Australia’s economic future, he is primarily anxious that the country could soon “cease to become a white man’s country”.

In the first paragraph of his column, Walkley somewhat ironically evokes the spectre of Nazi Germany. He claims that Hitler failed to defeat the Russians because there were “too many” of them, then argues that Australia could also be lost if there were “too few” Australians. Lost to whom? Well, Walkley is very specific about that.

William Walkley’s column for the Sydney Morning Herald in April 1961, in which he answers the question: “What would you do if you were the ruler of Australia?”Credit: Sydney Morning Herald

“Today Australians are but a drop of white in a sea of colour that teems with more than 1,200 million land-hungry Asiatics,” he says, clearly laying out his perceived battle lines between a racially pure, white vision of Australia and hordes of Asians desperate to plunder the country.

Walkley goes on to say that as the population in Asia increases, Australia will face pressure to “open our gates to coloured migrants”.

Walkley’s piece is a full-throated defence of the White Australia Policy, at a time it was being steadily dismantled by the federal government.

A cartoon of William Walkley in his 1961 column for the Sydney Morning Herald.Credit: Sydney Morning Herald

Three years earlier, the racist dictation test had been abolished, creating a simpler pathway for Asian migration to Australia. Two years before Walkley wrote his piece, senior Labor figures such as future premier Don Dunstan and Gough Whitlam were seeking to remove the White Australia Policy from the party’s platform.

Walkley wasn’t simply reflecting attitudes of the time; he was choosing to weigh in on a pressing political debate, arguing for the retention of a racist immigration policy and using incendiary, dehumanising language to do so. His was also the only column in the Herald’s series to focus explicitly on the need to keep Australia racially pure.

What’s remarkable is that Walkley’s comments have never been widely reported, even though the most prestigious journalism awards in the country bear his name. I don’t think this is part of some grand conspiracy but rather a reflection on the fact that Australia is particularly bad at reckoning with the racist history of its institutions.

It was only this year The Sydney Morning Herald issued an apology for its coverage of the Myall Creek massacre, where the paper effectively campaigned on behalf of the men accused of murdering 28 Indigenous people. The massacre occurred 185 years ago.

Walkley’s comments were published 60 years ago – five years after he launched the Walkley Awards. They are hardly in the long-distant past. And even if they were, the fact that his name is still synonymous with the best journalism this country has to offer should force some reflection.

I don’t have a Walkley Award, so thankfully I am not experiencing any kind of internal conflict or guilt about having a prize on my mantelpiece that bears the name of someone who sought to keep Australia as a country for the white man, even as the discriminatory immigration restrictions were collapsing around him.

But this year, amid growing calls for a boycott of the awards due to Ampol’s sponsorship, I was still astonished by what I discovered when I went into our paper’s archives to find out more about Walkley.

The fact that both the National Portrait Gallery and the Walkley Foundation have extensively covered Walkley’s history and even discussed his contribution to political debate but not mentioned his racist views feels like an omission (of course, it’s possible they weren’t aware).

At the very least, institutions that recognise and laud Walkley should add the full context to his participation in Australian public life.

But, frankly, that should only be the beginning. In an era where The Guardian is reckoning with its historical ties to slavery and the Herald is acknowledging its past wrongs, Australian journalists need to think hard about whether they are happy with their most significant awards being named after someone who tried to keep Australia white and prevent us from becoming the kind of country we are today.

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