In different circumstances and at different times, the appropriate form of port administration varies. So it was at Fremantle. In chapter 2 we discussed the formation of the Fremantle Harbour Trust and the establishment of an institutional framework which survived relatively intact for over ninety years. The Fremantle Port Authority, which was created in 1964, exercised substantially the same powers and functions as its predecessor. However, as we saw in the previous chapter, in the late 1980s, as part of the wider process of waterfront reform, ports were required to improve their efficiency and operate more commercially. At Fremantle and many other Australian ports the 1990s were marked by the introduction of major institutional reforms that led to the development of a new commercially-orientated port culture.

It is commonplace to historians that changes in social and economic conditions alter the viability of institutions; but it is also true that the quality of the staff counts as much as the institutional framework in which they have to operate. Thus, it is also necessary to give due attention to the organisation and performance of the staff. Before discussing port staffing and changes in port administration, it is proposed to use some yardsticks developed in the 1920s by a British engineer, Sir George Buchanan, to evaluate port administration at Fremantle.

The Efficiency of the Administrative Framework

Buchanan's yardsticks, which have often been cited with approval by world experts on ports, are listed below: