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press outside, to the fresh air.
It was now up to the Premier to allocate the portfolios: to distribute responsibility for the various departments, commissions and statutary authorities among the nineteen ministers. The next day, Wran would call each minister in turn, to give them their jobs.
The more able ministers would be given the "big" departments, while the less experienced would get a lighter load, and those whom Wran distrusted would be put where he thought they could do least harm.
Jack Ferguson retained the powerful Department of Public Works. Landa, Walker and Cox kept their important responsibilities. As a newcomer, Hallam was made Minister for Decentralization and Minister Assisting the Premier, neither of which was considered very demanding. Bill Haigh was given prisons, the least popular job.
Then they all went down to Government House, to be presented to the Governor, who duly swore them in as ministers of the Crown in Her Majesty's Government of the sovereign state of New South Wales.
They were photographed on the verandah. Dressed in their best suits, grouped around the towering figure of Sir Roden Cutler, the local representative of Elizabeth the Second, Queen of Australia and diverse other lands. Among them there was Neville Kenneth Wran, the agnostic