Muswellbrook Shire is a

local government area A local government area (LGA) is an administrative division of a country that a local government is responsible for. The size of an LGA varies by country but it is generally a subdivision of a federated state, state, province, division (politica ...

in the Upper Hunter region of

New South Wales New South Wales (commonly abbreviated as NSW) is a States and territories of Australia, state on the Eastern states of Australia, east coast of :Australia. It borders Queensland to the north, Victoria (state), Victoria to the south, and South ...

Australia Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country comprising mainland Australia, the mainland of the Australia (continent), Australian continent, the island of Tasmania and list of islands of Australia, numerous smaller isl ...

. The Shire is situated adjacent to the

New England Highway New England Highway is an long highway in Australia running from Yarraman, Queensland, Yarraman, north of Toowoomba, Queensland, at its northern end to Hexham, New South Wales, Hexham at Newcastle, New South Wales, Newcastle, New South Wales, ...

and the Hunter railway line. Muswellbrook Shire was established on 1 July 1979 from the amalgamation of the Municipality of Muswellbrook with the adjacent Denman Shire, which had been called Muswellbrook Shire between 1907 and 1968. The

mayor In many countries, a mayor is the highest-ranking official in a Municipal corporation, municipal government such as that of a city or a town. Worldwide, there is a wide variance in local laws and customs regarding the powers and responsibilitie ...

of the Muswellbrook Shire Council is Cr. Jeffrey Drayton.

Main towns and villages

The Shire includes

Muswellbrook Muswellbrook ( ) is a town in the Upper Hunter Region of New South Wales, Australia, about north of Sydney and north-west of Newcastle, New South Wales, Newcastle. Geologically, Muswellbrook is situated in the northern parts of the Sydney bas ...

, Denman, Baerami, McCullys Gap, Martindale, Muscle Creek, Sandy Hollow, Widden and Wybong.

Coal mining

Muswellbrook started as

coal mining Coal mining is the process of resource extraction, extracting coal from the ground or from a mine. Coal is valued for its Energy value of coal, energy content and since the 1880s has been widely used to Electricity generation, generate electr ...

town in late 1800s and began open cut mining in 1944. The oldest coal was opened in 1906.

Heritage listings

The Muswellbrook Shire has a number of heritage-listed sites, including: * Denman, 4883 Jerrys Plains Road: Merton * Muswellbrook, Denman Road: Rous Lench * Muswellbrook, 132 Bridge Street: Weidmann Cottage * Muswellbrook, 142-144 Bridge Street: Loxton House * Muswellbrook, 178, 180-188 Bridge Street: Eatons Group * Muswellbrook, 710 Denman Road: Edinglassie * Muswellbrook, Hunter Terrace: St Alban's Anglican Church * Muswellbrook, Main Northern railway: Muswellbrook railway station

Demographics

At the 2011 census, there were people in the Muswellbrook Shire local government area, of these 51.7 per cent were male and 48.3 per cent were female. Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people made up 5.4 per cent of the population, which was significantly higher than the national and state averages of 2.5 per cent. The

median The median of a set of numbers is the value separating the higher half from the lower half of a Sample (statistics), data sample, a statistical population, population, or a probability distribution. For a data set, it may be thought of as the “ ...

age of people in the Muswellbrook Shire was 34 years, which was lower than the national median of 37 years. Children aged 0 – 14 years made up 22.8 per cent of the population and people aged 65 years and over made up 10.6 per cent of the population. Of people in the area aged 15 years and over, 47.0 per cent were married and 11.8 per cent were either divorced or separated. Population growth in the Muswellbrook Shire between the 2001 census and the 2006 census was 3.25 per cent; and in the subsequent five years to the 2011 census, population growth was 3.64 per cent. When compared with total population growth of Australia for the same periods, being 5.78 per cent and 8.32 per cent respectively, population growth in the Muswellbrook Shire local government area was approximately half the national average. The median weekly income for residents within the Muswellbrook Shire was marginally higher than the national average. At the 2011 census, the proportion of residents in the Muswellbrook Shire local government area who stated their

ancestry An ancestor, also known as a forefather, fore-elder, or a forebear, is a parent or ( recursively) the parent of an antecedent (i.e., a grandparent, great-grandparent, great-great-grandparent and so forth). ''Ancestor'' is "any person from ...

Australian Australian(s) may refer to: Australia * Australia, a country * Australians, citizens of the Commonwealth of Australia ** European Australians ** Anglo-Celtic Australians, Australians descended principally from British colonists ** Aboriginal Aus ...

Anglo-Saxon The Anglo-Saxons, in some contexts simply called Saxons or the English, were a Cultural identity, cultural group who spoke Old English and inhabited much of what is now England and south-eastern Scotland in the Early Middle Ages. They traced t ...

exceeded 81 per cent of all residents (national average was 65.2 per cent). In excess of 68% of all residents in the Muswellbrook Shire nominated a

religious Religion is a range of social- cultural systems, including designated behaviors and practices, morals, beliefs, worldviews, texts, sanctified places, prophecies, ethics, or organizations, that generally relate humanity to supernatural ...

affiliation with

Christianity Christianity is an Abrahamic monotheistic religion, which states that Jesus in Christianity, Jesus is the Son of God (Christianity), Son of God and Resurrection of Jesus, rose from the dead after his Crucifixion of Jesus, crucifixion, whose ...

at the 2011 census, which was considerably higher than the national average of 50.2 per cent. Meanwhile, as at the census date, compared to the national average, households in the Muswellbrook Shire local government area had a significantly lower than average proportion (4.3 per cent) where two or more languages are spoken (national average was 20.4 per cent); and a significantly higher proportion (89.7 per cent) where English only was spoken at home (national average was 76.8 per cent).

Council

Current composition and election method

Muswellbrook Shire Council is composed of twelve

councillor A councillor, alternatively councilman, councilwoman, councilperson, or council member, is someone who sits on, votes in, or is a member of, a council. This is typically an elected representative of an electoral district in a municipal or re ...

s elected proportionally as a single ward. All councillors are elected for a fixed four-year term of office. The mayor is elected by the councillors at the first meeting of the council. The most recent election was held on 11 January 2022 and the makeup of the council is as follows: The current Council, elected in 2024, in order of election, is:

Mayors

The following is a list of mayors since the Shire of Denman amalgamated with the Municipality of Muswellbrook to form Muswellbrook Shire Council on 1 July 1979.

References

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