States and territories of Australia

The Commonwealth of Australia is a union of six states and various territories. The Australian mainland is made up of five states and three territories, with the sixth state of Tasmania being made up of islands. In addition there are six island territories, known as external territories, and a claim to a territory in Antarctica. All states and two of the three internal territories have their own parliaments and administer themselves; the remaining territories are administered by the Federal Government.

Map showing the creation of the colonies/states and mainland territories.

States and territories

Reference map for States and Territories of Australia

Western Australia Northern Territory South Australia Queensland New South Wales Australian Capital Territory Victoria Tasmania Indian Ocean Timor Sea Gulf of Carpentaria Arafura Sea Great Australian Bight Tasman Sea Bass Strait Coral Sea ● ● ● ● ● ● South Pacific Ocean Southern Ocean ● ● Great Barrier Reef

States and Territories of Australia

Flag	State/Territory name	ISO	Postal	Type	Capital (or largest settlement)	Population	Area (km²)
	Ashmore and Cartier Islands			External	(West Islet)	0	199
	Australian Antarctic Territory			External	(Mawson Station)	1,000	5,896,500
	Australian Capital Territory	AU-ACT	ACT	Territory	Canberra	358,894	2,358
	Christmas Island	CX		External	Flying Fish Cove	1,493	135
	Cocos (Keeling) Islands	CC		External	West Island	628	14
	Coral Sea Islands			External	(Willis Island)	4	10
	Heard Island and McDonald Islands	HM		External	(Atlas Cove)	0	372
	Jervis Bay Territory		JBT	Territory	(Jervis Bay Village)	611	70
	New South Wales	AU-NSW	NSW	State	Sydney	7,238,819	800,642
	Norfolk Island	NF		External	Kingston	2,114	35
	Northern Territory	AU-NT	NT	Territory	Darwin	229,675	1,349,129
	Queensland	AU-QLD	QLD	State	Brisbane	4,516,361	1,730,648
	South Australia	AU-SA	SA	State	Adelaide	1,644,642	983,482
	Tasmania	AU-TAS	TAS	State	Hobart	507,626	68,401
	Victoria	AU-VIC	VIC	State	Melbourne	5,547,527	227,416
	Western Australia	AU-WA	WA	State	Perth	2,296,411	2,529,875

See also: List of State Codes

Australia has had three now-defunct territories in its history:

• From 1926 to 1931, the Northern Territory was divided into Central Australia and North Australia, with the border at the 20th parallel of latitude. Both territories were reincorporated as the Northern Territory at the end of this period.
• From 1949 to 1975, the Territory of Papua and New Guinea was part of Australia, remaining so until the independence of the country of Papua New Guinea.

Background and overview

The states originated as separate British colonies prior to Federation (in 1901). Their powers are protected by the Australian constitution, and Commonwealth legislation only applies to the states where permitted by the constitution. The territories, by contrast, are from a constitutional perspective directly subject to the Commonwealth government. The Australian Parliament has powers to legislate in the territories that it does not possess in the states.

Most of the territories are directly administered by the Commonwealth government, while three (the Northern Territory, the Australian Capital Territory and Norfolk Island) administer themselves. In the self-governing territories the Australian Parliament retains the full power to legislate, and can override laws made by the territorial institutions, which it has done on rare occasions. For the purposes of Australian (and joint Australia-New Zealand) intergovernmental bodies, the Northern Territory and the Australian Capital Territory are treated as states.

Furthermore, the distribution of powers between the Commonwealth and the territories is different from that between the Commonwealth and the states. In the Northern Territory, the Commonwealth retains the power to directly administer uranium mining and Aboriginal lands – powers which it does not possess with respect to the states.

Each state has a Governor, appointed by the Queen, which by convention she does on the advice of the state Premier. The Administrators of the Northern Territory and Norfolk Island are, by contrast, appointed by the Governor-General. The Australian Capital Territory has neither a Governor nor an Administrator, but the Governor-General exercises some powers that in other jurisdictions are exercised by the Governor of a state or Administrator of a territory, such as the power to dissolve the Legislative Assembly.

Jervis Bay Territory is unique in being the only non-self-governing territory that is not an external territory. Until 1989 it was a part of the ACT, but was separated when the ACT achieved self-government. Residents of the Jervis Bay Territory are not represented in the ACT Legislative Assembly. However, laws made by that assembly generally apply to them. They are represented in the Australian parliament as part of the Electoral Division of Fraser in the ACT and by the ACT's two Senators. In other respects, the territory is administered directly by the Federal Government through the Territories portfolio.

Each state has a bicameral Parliament except Queensland, which abolished its upper house in 1922. The lower house is called the Legislative Assembly, except in South Australia and Tasmania, where it is called the House of Assembly. Tasmania is the only state to use proportional representation for elections to its lower house; all others elect members from single member constituencies, using instant-runoff voting(preferential voting). The upper house is called the Legislative Council, and is generally elected from multi-member constituencies using proportional representation. The three self-governing territories, the ACT, the Northern Territory and Norfolk Island, have unicameral Legislative Assemblies.

The head of government of each state is called the Premier, appointed by the state's Governor. In normal circumstances the Governor will appoint as Premier whoever leads the party or coalition which exercises control of the lower house (in the case of Queensland, the only house) of the state Parliament. However, in times of constitutional crisis, the Governor can appoint someone else as Premier. The head of government of the self-governing internal territories is called the Chief Minister. The Northern Territory's Chief Minister, in normal circumstances whoever controls the Legislative Assembly, is appointed by the Administrator.

Comparative terminology

Entity	State/Territory type	Tie to the Queen?	Domestic administrator	Head of Government	Upper House of Parliament	Lower House of Parliament	Member of Parliament*
Australia	Federal Government	Direct	Governor-General	Prime Minister	Senate	House of Representatives	Senator	MP
South Australia	Federated state	Direct (established by Australia Act)	Governor	Premier	Legislative Council	House of Assembly	MLC	MHA
Tasmania
New South Wales						Legislative Assembly		MLA
Victoria
Western Australia
Queensland					None (abolished 1922)		None	MP
Australian Capital Territory	Self-governing territory	None	Assembly and Chief Minister	Chief Minister	None	Legislative Assembly	None	MLA
Northern Territory		Indirect (through Governor-General)	Administrator		Administrator
Norfolk Island	External territory
Christmas Island				Mayor/Shire President		Shire Council		Councillor
Cocos (Keeling) Islands
*Note: The abbreviation MP is an acceptable, and indeed more common, term for members of each lower house.

Statistics

State/territory	Land area (km²)	Rank	Population (2006)	Rank	Population density (/km²)	Rank	% of population in capital	Rank
Australian Capital Territory	2,358	8th	344,200	7th	137.53	1st	99.6%	1st
New South Wales	800,642	5th	6,967,200	1st	8.44	3rd	63%	5th
Victoria	227,416	6th	5,297,600	2nd	22	2nd	71%	4th
Queensland	1,730,648	2nd	4,279,400	3rd	2.26	5th	46%	7th
South Australia	983,482	4th	1,601,800	5th	1.56	6th	73.5%	2nd
Western Australia	2,529,875	1st	2,163,200	4th	0.79	7th	73.4%	3rd
Tasmania	68,401	7th	498,200	6th	7.08	4th	41%	8th
Northern Territory	1,349,129	3rd	219,900	8th	0.15	8th	54%	6th

Distance table

Distance Table Australia

Adelaide
2673	Albany
1533	3588	Alice Springs
1578	3633	443	Uluru
2045	4349	3038	3254	Brisbane
2483	1943	2483	1223	3317	Broome
3352	5656	2457	2900	1716	2496	Cairns
1196	3846	3706	2751	1261	3275	2568	Canberra
3022	4614	1489	1932	3463	1803	2882	4195	Darwin
1001	3674	2534	2579	1944	3636	3251	918	4023	Hobart
3219	3787	1686	2129	3660	1045	3079	4392	827	4220	Kununurra
2783	5087	2505	2948	976	2840	740	1999	2930	2682	3127	Mackay
731	3404	2264	2309	1674	3124	2981	648	3753	609	3950	2412	Melbourne
2742	5106	1209	1652	1829	1834	1248	2561	1634	3075	1831	1296	2805	Mount Isa
2781	409	3696	3741	4457	2389	5764	3954	4205	3782	3378	5195	3512	4905	Perth
1412	3970	3830	2875	1001	3373	2495	286	4034	1142	4516	1926	872	2400	4078	Sydney

Distance in kilometres from the corresponding city on the X-Y axis.

State and territory codes

State/Territory	Call signs			Postal		Telephone area codes	Time zone
	AM/FM	TV	Amateur	Abbrev.	Postcode		Std	Summer
Australian Capital Territory	1xx(x)†	xx(x)Cn†	VK1xx†	ACT	02nn*, 26nn, 29nn	02	+10	+11
New South Wales	2xx(x)	xx(x)Nn	VK2xx	NSW	1nnn*, 2nnn	02	+10(+10½)	+11
Victoria	3xx(x)	xx(x)Vn	VK3xx	VIC	3nnn, 8nnn*	03	+10	+11
Queensland	4xx(x)	xx(x)Qn	VK4xx	QLD	4nnn, 9nnn*	07	+10
South Australia	5xx(x)	xx(x)Sn	VK5xx	SA	5nnn	08	+9½	+10½
Western Australia	6xx(x)	xx(x)Wn	VK6xx	WA	6nnn	08	+8
Tasmania	7xx(x)	xx(x)Tn	VK7xx	TAS	7nnn	03	+10	+11
Northern Territory	8xx(x)	xx(x)Dn	VK8xx	NT	08nn	08	+9½
External Territories
Norfolk Island	2xx(x)		VK9xx	(NSW)		+672 3	+11½
Christmas Island				(WA)		(WA)	+7
Cocos Island							+6½
Australian Antarctic Territory	none		VK0xx	(Tas)		+672 1	+6 to +8
Macquarie Island	none						+10	+11
* used for some PO box and Large Users only. † a number of broadcast stations in the ACT have call signs allocated as if it was part of New South Wales.

See also

• ISO 3166-2:AU, the ISO codes for the states and territories of Australia.

• List of regions in Australia

External links

• Maps of Australia
• CityMayors article
• Legal Information