>our "artificial" capital Canberra to sit on "neutral" ground).
>Might you explain the quotes for the uninformed?

Sorry for the obscurity, Jazzo. I wondered at the time if I should have explained it, but I've been trying to keep my posts shorter. Now I get to bump my stats up with another post.

In 1901 the states were federated to form the Commonwealth of Australia, and it was deemed necessary to have a national capital city. The two most populous cities Sydney and Melbourne were intense rivals for the prestigious title. However, in order to settle the argument without alienating a large part of the fledgling country's population, the powers that be decided to build a brand new city called Canberra in the middle of nowhere (between Sydney and Melbourne, inland). As I said in my previous post, an area of land surrounding the new city was cut from the middle of New South Wales to form the "Australian Capital Territory". A Chicago architect called Walter Burley Griffin won an international competition for the rare opportunity of creating a design for a major city on what was essentially a "greenfield" site.

Further details at:
http://www.tomw.net.au/cnbst1.html
and in particular at
http://www.tomw.net.au/cnbst3.html