Lord Bathurst’s instructions to John Thomas Bigge, following his appointment to conduct a Royal Commission into the state of the colony of New South Wales, included the following statement:

[Y]ou will … constantly bear in mind that Transportation to New South Wales is intended as a severe Punishment applied to various Crimes, and as such must be rendered an Object of real Terror to all classes of the community … If … by ill considered Compassion for Convicts, or from what might under other circumstances be considered a laudable desire to lessen their sufferings, their Situation in New South Wales be divested of all Salutary Terror, Transportation cannot operate as an effectual example on the Community at large, and as a proper punishment for those Crimes against the Commission of which His Majesty’s Subjects have a right to claim protection, not as an adequate Commutation for the utmost Rigour of the Law.

Bigge, who as the chief justice of the colony of Trinidad from 1813 to 1818, had instituted legal and administrative reforms, was given the power to revoke supposedly wasteful projects in New South Wales. The costs to government of transporting and maintaining convicts to the settlement had doubled during Macquarie’s governorship. In his defence, the period saw a 10–fold increase in the number of convicts transported, and Macquarie had actually reduced the cost per convict. As the Tory government sought to divert criticism at home about the rising crime rate, Macquarie became a victim of political expediency. The effect of the Royal Commission was to stop, delay or reverse many of Macquarie’s projects and policies. Building projects were stopped, convict punishments became more severe and the encouragements offered to emancipists declined.

Macquarie spent the last years of his life, after his return to England, trying to salvage his reputation and secure his promised pension after the Bigge report was tabled in Parliament. He died unexpectedly in 1824, and his wife, Elizabeth, continued to advocate for her husband’s reputation.