Joseph Docker

[1] Docker held a number of cabinet positions and other senior executive roles during his 26 years in the New South Wales upper house.

Docker emigrated to the Colony of New South Wales (Australia) in 1835 and established himself as a grazier, with 10,000 acres in the Upper Hunter Valley, at "Thornthwaite", near Scone.

He was married in April 1839 to Matilda, daughter of Major Thomas Brougham of the East India Company (Presidency armies), from Penrith, Cumberland.

As Representative (leader) of the government in the upper house on the first occasion, he introduced and carried through Henry Parkes's Public School Bill in 1866, which required teachers to have training and created a funding mechanism.

Together with Francis Murphy (Victoria) and Ronald Campbell Gunn (Tasmania), he traveled to New Zealand to inspect various possible locations, and the commissioners recommended for the capital to move from Auckland to Wellington.