In 1784 an Act was passed which empowered the Crown to appoint by Order-in-Council any place deemed fitting for the transportation of convicts to it.
For a brief time it was thought that Southern Africa would be selected, and Orders-in-Council on the subject were passed in 1785.
A ship (the Nautilus) was sent to explore the African coast, but the report was to the effect that it was unfit for settlement. A discussion took place in the House of Commons on the subject (April, 1785). Burke assailed the project as cruel, and Pitt recommended him not to make statements "without any better authority than report." Let him wait for the returns called for.
(Such was the report made in the days when Parliamentary reporting made no pretensions to verbal accuracy.)
Ere long the occupation of New South Wales was resolved upon by Pitt's ministry. Orders in Council were passed, and within three years of his accession to office the plan of colonization was matured. The name of Thomas Townshend (Lord Sydney, connected by marriage with Pitt's family) was coupled with the scheme under which that plan was matured; Lord Sydney being the Secretary of State immediately charged with carrying it on. A scheme so vast in importance and so onerous in execution must nevertheless be credited to the head of the ministry of the day, without whose approval and co-operation Lord Sydney could have neither originated nor carried it out, whatever he might have suggested. It is pleasant to think that as be had joined the elder Pitt in denouncing the American war, he may, with the younger, have hoped to redress in the south the misfortunes of the west. That they had some other motive beyond the mere removal of convicts is apparent to those who reflect that there were many nearer places to which convicts could be sent at less expense, and that efforts were made as soon as possible to induce free settlers to make Australia their home. That their motives were not sufficiently apppreciated may be inferred from the fact that they were taunted with having created a settlement which would be a perpetual drain upon the mother-country for a supply of food.
