The Australian-English phrase the Hungry Mile designates a section of Sussex Street, on the Sydney waterfront, along which, in the 1920s and 1930s, unemployed wharf-labourers trudged, waiting to be handpicked for the few jobs that were available.

The following explanations are from Change on the docks, by Peter Stephens, published in The Age (Melbourne, Victoria, Australia) of Monday 24^th April 1989:

In the 1920s, a foreman would choose the fittest and strongest looking men from the laborers clamoring for work. Having secured the “bulls” as they were known, it was not uncommon for him to toss the remaining work tickets in the air and watch the others fight over them.
This process, known as the pickup, went on daily and often twice a day. It was humiliating and helps explain why job continuity and security were burning issues with wharfies long before the rest of the workforce became interested.
At that time, wharfies in Sydney would walk along the docks, from Walsh Bay, past Darling Harbor to Pyrmont Bridge, searching for work. This area became known as “the hungry mile” and wharf laborers still speak of it with reverence.

The earliest occurrences of the Australian-English phrase the Hungry Mile that I have found are as follows, in chronological order:

1-: From a letter to the Editor, published in the Labor Daily ¹ (Sydney, New South Wales, Australia) of Monday 5^th October 1925—in the title given to this letter, wharfes is a misprint of wharfies:

PICKING UP
WHARFES’ PURGATORY
(To the Editor.)

Sir,—It is time something was done to improve the method of obtaining waterfront employment under the so-called “picking-up.”
The Government should see that we have a proper picking-up shed. As it is, the men are walking about in droves along the “hungry mile” that extends from Circular Quay to Pyrmont Bridge. A stevedore going to pick up labor is seen, and there is a mad rush for him, and the anxiety to get a job portrayed on the faces of the men is awful to see—a picture no artist could paint. There are sufficient around the stevedore to handle ten ships, and he wants only men for one solitary ship.
He picks up a few men for an 8 o’clock start, and tells the other unfortunates to wait about until 10, when he might want some more Iabor. There they have to hang about outside the gate on the chance of getting run over, and to be the laughing stock of passengers off the ships.
Why cannot those poor devils be given a proper picking-up shed instead of being made to tramp from one end of the street to the other, and perhaps miss a job because they are at the wrong end of the hungry mile? This picking-up is a disgrace to the city of Sydney. It is bad in Sussex Street, and as bad at Pyrmont and Woolloomooloo, too—Yours, etc.,
“A WORKER”
Pyrmont

¹ The Labor Daily was the official organ of the Australian Labor Party.

2-: From the following poem ², published in the Labor Daily (Sydney, New South Wales, Australia) of Wednesday 4^th January 1928:

THE HUNGRY MILE

They tramp there in their legions on the mornings dark and cold,
To beg the right to slave for bread from Sydney’s lords of gold;
They toil and sweat in slavery, ’twould make the Devil smile,
To see the Sydney wharfies tramping down the hungry mile.

On ships from all the seas they toil, that others of their kind,
May never know the pinch of want nor feel the misery blind;
That makes the lives of men a hell in those conditions vile;
That are the hopeless lot of those who tramp the hungry mile.

The slaves of men who know no thought of anything but gain,
Who wring their brutal profits from the blood and sweat and pain;
Of all the disinherited that slave and starve the while
Upon the ships beside the wharves, along the hungry mile.

But every stroke of that grim lash, that sears the souls of men,
With interest due from years gone by, shall be paid back again;
To those who drive these wretched slaves to build the golden pile,
And blood shall blot the memory out—of Sydney’s hungry mile.

The day will come, aye, come it must, when these same slaves shall rise,
And through the revolution’s smoke, ascending to the skies,
The master’s face shall show the fear he hides behind his smile,
Of these, his slaves, who on that day shall storm the hungry mile.

And when world grows wiser and all men at last are free,
When none shall feel the hunger nor tramp in misery,
To beg the right to slave for bread, the children then may smile,
At those strange tales they tell of what was once the hungry mile.

NO. 2701 W. W. F. of A.
Paddington.

² The author, Ernest Antony (1894-1970), later republished this poem in The Hungry Mile and Other Poems (Sydney: Wright and Baker, 1930). S. A. Rosa reviewed this collection of poems as follows in Literary Jottings, published in the Labor Daily (Sydney, New South Wales, Australia) of Saturday 11^th October 1930:

POETRY OF TOIL.
“The Hungry Mile, and Other Poems” is a booklet of 39 pages, by E. Antony. Some of these poems have appeared in the Labor Daily.”
[…]
There is good stuff in “The Hungry Mile,” which makes the booklet well worth the shilling asked for It by the author.

3-: From the Labor Daily (Sydney, New South Wales, Australia) of Tuesday 16^th July 1935:

‘HUNGRY MILE’ OF SUSSEX ST.
Picking Up Places For Work

Seeking improved conditions and, in some cases, increased rates of pay for employees covered by the Federated Ship Painters and Dockers’ Union, Mr. R. Mahoney in the Federal Arbitration Court yesterday, when asking for the fixing of a specified place for picking up casual workers, said evidence would be given to show that a portion of Sussex Street where men looked for work was known as “The Hungry Mile.”
The union’s aim, went on Mr. Mahoney, was to avoid the necessity for men to traverse the whole waterfront seeking work. It often happened that at a wharf where men were wanted, only a few gathered, whereas a surplus congregated at another wharf.

4-: From the following by G. B. Mullins, Secretary of the Waterside Workers’ Federation of Australia, published in The Maritime Worker ³ (Melbourne, Victoria, Australia) of May 1938:

SYDNEY
The Deadly Mile

For many years members of the Federation have called that stretch from Erskine Street to Dawes Point the “hungry mile.”
Modern conditions of transport have necessitated it being renamed, and as is proper in such circumstances, it has quite appropriately been named “The Deadly Mile.”
During the lengthy period of my official connection with the Federation, there have been many serious accidents on this the Deadly Mile—three of which were fatal.
Now, these accidents did not occur in the period of time when men were working, but when they were presenting themselves for employment.
Less than two weeks ago a member was seriously injured while facing a job at Huddart Parker’s. Speeding motors are responsible for these occurrences.
The danger of the pick-up system is well established; of this there can be no two opinions.

³ The Maritime Worker was the official organ of the Waterside Workers’ Federation of Australia.

5-: From Readers’ Views, published in the Daily News (Sydney, New South Wales, Australia) of Thursday 9^th February 1939:

Storemen, like the wharfies, have their “Hungry Mile” too.
Casuals, who a few years ago could pick up a day’s work handling petrol and kerosene tins, have since lost that avenue of employment, as it now comes out in tankers in bulk.—STOREMAN.