The Department of Information, Central Office, was established on 12 September 1939 (1) as a result of a decision by the Government that machinery should be established to undertake the large publicity program necessary to support the war effort. (2)
By 18 October 1939, the first Minister for Information, Mr Henry Gullett, had obtained the approval of Cabinet for a scheme of organisation. In the Cabinet agendum supporting the organisation the Minister said that the Departments purposes were:
 
 "(a) Constantly to increase and sustain the faith of the
      Australian people in the cause for which we are engaged
      in war;
  (b) To promote the interest and thought calculated to
      support the Government in the necessary security, the
      raising of money, the acceptance of the inevitable
      taxation and its activities generally;  and
  (c) To distribute sound facts upon all phases of the war,
      direct and indirect, through every kind of available
      channel". (3)
More specifically this meant the tasks of issuing news and notices of a war nature from government departments (previous to the Department's establishment, distribution of publicity material was a function of the Minister's parliamentary staff), the supplying of information on Government activities of every kind, the supplying of particular information on individual request, inaugurating and taking of films for public exhibition and acting as a clearing house of information passing between the many departments of the Government, and the taking over of wartime censorship from the Defence Department.
Gullett established a central office of the new department in Melbourne.  The organisation consisted of the following: (4)
 
 Censorship Branch
- Publicity Censorship (delegated from Department of
  Defence [II] (CA 19) on 18 September 1939, formally
  transferred on 2 November 1939)
 Administration Branch
   - responsible for all news bulletin, paragraphs, articles,
     leaflets, pamphlets and talks required by the Department
   - distribution of photographs to the press (5)
 Organiser
- responsible through the Deputy Directors for the
  Committees and Councils (State Information Consultative
  Councils and Associated Committees).  In addition there
  were honorary councils composed of people from all walks
  of life.  A report prepared for the Minister on the
  first six months activities tells of the formation of 93
  group committees embracing 852 organisations in the
  states) (6)
 Advertising Section
 Broadcasting Section
 Cinema and Photographs Section
 Distribution Section
 Library. (7)
On 1 February 1940 the Cinema Branch from the Department of Commerce (CA 28) was transferred to the Department of Information (7a).
Towards the end of February 1940, the Short Wave Broadcasting Division of the Department was established to broadcast propaganda overseas. Transmissions were made in five languages to Europe, North America, India, South America, Asia and South Africa. A Cinema Branch was also created to provide material and facilities to newsreel companies. (8)
Around this time also the Department was re-organised to consist of three main branches: Censorship, Information and Administration.
Censorship:
The responsibility for wartime censorship was principally concentrated under two headings, (i) Communications Censorship, initially under the control of Department of Defence [II], then to the Department of the Army, (CA 36) in December 1939. This consisted of censorship of servicemens' letters, overseas cables, posts and telegraphs within Australia; and (ii) Publicity Censorship, made responsible to the Minister for Information in 1939. On 6 October 1939 a Press Censorship Order was gazetted providing for the creation of such press censorship authorities as the Minister might direct and giving such an authority power, by an order in writing, to require any editor, printer, publisher or author, to submit, before printing, any matter intended for publication and to forbid the printing of the whole or any portion of the matter submitted or direct that alterations be made in it. In applying this order, however, the Publicity Censorship continued the method of voluntary censorship which had originally been sketched by the Army. (9)
Some time later a Film Censorship Order and a Broadcasting Censorship Order were gazetted to bring those media within the system of publicity censorship. (10)
Publicity Censorship, which had moved its location from Melbourne to Canberra during 1941, was transferred to the Department of Defence [III] in 1942 because of its special relationship to national security and the fighting services.
Following the appointment of Mr Arthur Calwell to the Ministry of Information in September 1943, Publicity Censorship was returned to the Department and Mr E G Bonney, Chief Publicity Censor, was created also Director of Information; several weeks later the position was upgraded to Director-General of Information. (11)
 
Information:
The Information Branch carried out the following functions during the war:
 (a) Operational reporting;
 (b) Distribution, both locally and overseas, of news,
     special articles, films, photographs and other
     information relating to the war; 
 (c) Internal feature broadcasting;
 (d) Operational and diplomatic background service. (12)
The Chief Publicity Officer was responsible to the Director-General and through him the Editor was given responsibility for internal publicity, photographs, publications, Overseas Lecturing Unit and the Overseas Servicing Bureau. This last had its origins in the establishment of an Australian News and Information Bureau in New York in 1940, followed in January 1944 by another in London. During 1944 and 1945, Officers of the Department of Information were appointed to act as Press Attaches to Australian Diplomatic Representatives in Ottawa, Delhi, San Francisco, Rio de Janiero and Paris.
The main work of the editorial section of the Department was to service those representatives with publicity material designed to make Australia more widely and more favourably known abroad. (13)
The Short Wave Division operated within the Department until 21 January 1942, when it was transferred to the Australian Broadcasting Commission. (14) It subsequently returned to the Department in April 1944 and carried out the functions of:
 News bulletins to troops;
 Political warfare;
 Listening post;
 National short wave publicity: (15)
An Inter-Allied Relations Division, (known as the American Division) controlled Allied Relations Committees for promotion of fraternisation between allied troops in Australia. In order to promote better liaison with other government departments in Australia the Department was represented on a series of Inter-Departmental Committees and had offices attached to agencies such as the Advertising Division of Treasury, which first existed as the Advertising Section of the Department of Information, later became a Division, and was transferred to Treasury in January 1942.
A Film and Still Photographic Production Division carried out the following functions:
(a) Film production
   (i) Production of film records of activities of Australian
       Forces for Australian newsreel coverage and other
       overseas film publicity and war history;
  (ii) Production of documentary films dealing with
       Australia's part in the war;
 (iii) Production of war loan pictures;
  (iv) Production of campaign and morale films
   (v) Processing and printing of training and other films
       for Australian and Allied Services.
(b) Still photographic production of operational and home
    front photographs. (16)
In April 1945 the Australian National Film Board (CA 160) was established by the Government to promote, assist and co-ordinate throughout the Commonwealth, the production, distribution and importation of films for the purposes of school and adult education, rehabilitation, social development, promotion of international understanding, extension of trade and tourist traffic and encouragement of immigration. The Board had Commonwealth and State representatives. For administrative purposes the Board was attached to the Department, which was responsible for the production of films recommended by the Board. (17)
The Department was established with the stated intention of serving only the wartime information needs of Australia; but by 1944 the Minister, Mr Calwell was setting out peacetime functions for it. His principal object was the encouragement of migration to Australia (18), but in a speech in Parliament on 18 September 1945 he spoke of the need for overseas publicity in the fields of foreign relations, defence, commerce, finance, tourist trade and immigration. (19)
The statement of the Department's functions in the Administrative Arrangements Order of 1 April 1947 gives a picture of the Department's post-war activities:
 National publicity through:
  An editorial, and pictorial production organisation in
  Australia, servicing overseas publicity officers.
  The publication of essential facts and figures relating to
  the Australian economy and administration.
  The organisation of Australian exhibitions for use abroad
  (in association with the Department of Commerce and
  Agriculture in the case of trade exhibits).
 Conduct and administration of shortwave broadcasting, transmitting:
  National publicity to overseas countries
  Foreign Policy broadcasts to allied and former enemy
  countries, in association with the Department of External
  Affairs.
 Administration of the National Film Board.
 Immigration publicity in association with the Department of 
 Immigration.
 Establishment and servicing of Australian News and
 Information Bureaux abroad; appointment and servicing of
 Press Attaches to Australian Diplomatic Missions and of
 Information Officers attached to Australian Trade
 Commissioners. (20)
On 16 March 1950, the Department of Information was abolished (21) and replaced by Australian News and Information Bureau (CA 219), ministerial control of which passed to the Department of the Interior [II] (CA 31). (22)
The Central Office of the Department was originally situated in Melbourne but on 2 February 1942 a Canberra Secretariat was established with the intention of eventually centralizing most departmental activities. (23)  This did not occur until 5 April 1943 because of shortage of office accommodation in Canberra (24) and the fact that most of the Department's business dealings were conducted in the states. Even then, some Central functions continued to remain in Melbourne.
As regards the records of the Department, Hasluck says "It is difficult to be confident about the documents affecting the Department of Information. It was by far the untidiest and administratively the most incompetent Department in the Public Service if the state of its files can be taken as evidence. It fell far below the usual standard both in recording what it did and in the custody of its records. This part of research had to rest at some points as an examination of an assortment of papers in manila folders with nothing to reveal whether or not papers were missing". (25)
 
Ministers to the Department were:
 
12 Sep 1939 - 14 Mar 1940: Hon Sir Henry Somer Gullett
14 Mar 1940 - 13 Dec 1940: Hon Sir Robert Gordon Menzies (CP 54)
13 Dec 1940 -  7 Oct 1941: Sen the Hon Hattil Spencer Foll
 7 Oct 1941 - 21 Sep 1943: Sen the Hon  William Patrick Ashley
21 Sep 1943 - 19 Dec 1949: Hon Arthur Augustus Calwell
19 Dec 1949 - 16 Mar 1950: Hon Sir Oswald Howard Beale (CP 257)
Secretaries to the Department were:
 
 7 Dec 1939 - 25 Sep 1940: J C Treloar
11 Feb 1941 - 19 Nov 1941: B P Jenkins
20 Nov 1941 - 26 Jan 1942: C H Holmes
27 Jan 1942 - 12 Oct 1943: R E Hawes
13 Oct 1943 - 14 Jan 1948: E G Bonney
14 Jan 1948 - 16 Mar 1950: K G Murphy
Directors-General of Information:
 
 8 Jun 1940 -    Dec 1940: Sir K Murdoch
[subsequent appointees called Director of Information]
by 1943 the position lapsed until:
 5 Apr 1943 -            : E G Bonney
was appointed Director, being re-titled Director-General some weeks later.
References:
 
Commonwealth of Australia Gazette No 73, 12 September 1939, p 1905.
Committee of Review - Civil Staffing of Wartime
   Activities.  Report on the Department of Information, 24
   September 1945, p 1.
 3. Paul Hasluck, The Government and the People, 1939-1941.
    Australian War Memorial, Canberra, 1952, p 202.
 4. Ibid, p 201.
 5. See submission by Director to Minister for Information, 2
    January 1940 in Accession SP195, Set 1, Bundle 1, item
    3/1/15.
 6. Paul Hasluck, The Government and the People, 1939-1941.
    Australian War Memorial, Canberra, 1952, pp 201-203.
 7. See submission by Director to Minister for Information, 2
    January 1940 in Accession SP195, Set 1, Bundle 1, item
    3/1/15.
 7a. Parliamentary Paper 1940-1943, Vol IV, p 1378, Auditor
     -Generals' Report, 1939-1940.
 8. Paul Hasluck, The Government and the People, 1939-1941.
    Australian War Memorial, Canberra, 1952, p 203.
 9. Ibid, p 181.
10. Ibid, p 184.
11. Paul Hasluck, The Government and the People, 1942-1945.
    Australian War Memorial, Canberra, 1970, pp 397-399.
12. Committee of Review - Civil Staffing of Wartime
    Activities, 24 September 1945, p 1.
13. Ibid, p 2 & p 9 (organisation chart).
14. Ibid, p 3.
15. Ibid, p 9 (organisation chart).
16. Ibid, p 2 & p 9 (organisation chart).
17. Ibid, p 2.
18. Department of Information. Future Activities - Post War,
    18 September 1945 in Commonwealth Digest of Decisions and
    Announcements, No 96, 26-27 October 1944, p 48.
19. Department of Information, Future Activities - Minister's
    Statement, 18 September 1945 in Commonwealth Digest of
    Decisions and Announcements No 107, 18-19 September 1945,
    p 61.
20. Commonwealth of Australia Gazette No 68, 8 April 1947, 
    p 1097. 
21. Commonwealth of Australia Gazette No 15, 17 March 1950, 
    p 665. 
22. Executive Council Minute No 12 of 8 March 1950.
23. Department of Information, Central Office at Canberra in  
    Commonwealth Digest of Decisions and Announcements No 17,
    29 January-4 February 1942.
24. Paul Hasluck. The Government and the People 1942-1945,
    Australian War Memorial, Canberra, p 399.
25. Ibid, p 403.
 
Additional Sources
 
Federal Guide 1943 p 71.
C. Hughes and B. Graham, Australian Government and Politics 1890-1964, ANU, Canberra 1968.
Public Service Board Annual Report, 1973

Historical
agency address

1939-1942: Melbourne
1942-1950: Hotel Acton, Balmain Crescent, Canberra

Legislation
administered

Creation: Executive Council Meeting No. 48 (Prime Minister's
          Department No. 123) of 12 Sept. 1939
Abolition: Executive Council Meeting No. 11 Minute 16 Mar. 1950