The stakes are high for the Australian War Memorial, known for its centrality to our collective values, understanding of ourselves and our national identity. How does the council navigate the memorial’s complex functions, diverse stakeholders and mission to safeguard the future of history?
Among the many roles he’s held, Kim Beazley AC says the deep national reflection required as chair of the council of the Australian War Memorial has been unlike any other. “The memorial is Australia’s iconic institution, maybe even our greatest national institution,” says Beazley, a prominent figure in Australia’s leadership ranks during more than four decades, including as deputy prime minister, leader of the Australian Labor Party and ambassador to the US.
“This is a role that requires much deeper reflection about who we are as a country and people, and that’s really because of what the memorial means in the hearts of the average Australian,” he says. “You must make sure that anything done in its name reflects its honourable purposes, and that we live up to the promise made back at the time of the First World War to all veterans and their families, that we’d never forget them. I am immensely conscious of that promise.”
More than a monument
The Australian War Memorial officially opened, after some Great Depression-related setbacks, on Armistice Day in 1941. It was initially conceived by acclaimed Australian historian and war correspondent Charles Bean as a place to commemorate the sacrifice of those Australians killed in WWI and, subsequently, every conflict and peacekeeping mission since. Last year, it drew around one million visitors.
Its location — at the northern end of the grand Anzac Parade in Canberra — is no accident. Bean’s vision was for the memorial to be in direct line of sight of Parliament House, so when politicians were making decisions about sending Australians to war, they could open their doors and be reminded of the consequences and cost.
“Our location is deliberate, it is powerful and continues to serve its purpose,” says memorial director Matt Anderson PSM.
Despite its name, the institution serves three distinct functions — as a shrine, a museum and an archive — making it unlike any other place in the world, explains Anderson, formerly deputy high commissioner to the UK, ambassador to Afghanistan and high commissioner to Samoa and the Solomon Islands, among other postings.
“The way in which those three strands intertwine means that of all the world’s memorials, this place is about commemoration through understanding,” he says. “We tell meaningful stories about what young Australian men and women are prepared to fight and to die for, and that’s what makes us different.”
Traversing complexity, sensitively
With its dominant stature in the nation’s cultural landscape, the memorial’s governing council — which lists an esteemed field of members over the decades, from highly decorated military personnel to former prime ministers — is called on to navigate quite distinctive governance issues.
Council member Dr Susan Neuhaus AM CSC FAICD, an experienced director across the defence, health, private commercial, government and NFP sectors, says some of those issues stem from the political context that swirls around Commonwealth entities operating under the Public Governance, Performance and Accountability Act 2013.
“It’s like no other... but more so [due to] the complexity of the memorial’s functions and its absolute centrality to national identity, our nation’s understanding of ourselves and our values,” says the respected surgeon, who served in the Australian Defence Force and led clinical teams in Cambodia, Bougainville (PNG) and Afghanistan.
What this means, she says, is that as time marches on, new historic milestones reveal themselves and national values, perspectives and opinions evolve — triggering a need for the council to help shape how those changes are understood, reflected and commemorated by the memorial.
Among the most sensitive of these issues in recent years have been how the memorial acknowledges the rising rates of suicide among veterans, the Frontier Wars, and the findings of the Brereton Report into war crimes by ADF Special Forces personnel during the war in Afghanistan.
“The council has a really interesting dynamic in which to be dealing with these types of issues that need to be approached with respect and deep consideration,” says Neuhaus. “We all bring quite different perspectives to the table in terms of our own lived experience and our diverse views. It’s not easy, but it is done with enormous diligence and respect.”
To stay abreast of what matters across the community, council member Glenn Keys AO MAICD adds he is impressed by the AWM’s deep, continuous engagement through advisory committees, surveys and open lines of communication with advocacy groups. “It’s a critical part of what we do,” says Keys, founder and executive chair of global healthcare provider Aspen Medical, who brings experience from a distinguished career in the ADF, as a board director, philanthropist and disability inclusion advocate. “What we’re not interested in is some whitewashed view that every Australian Digger was perfect in every way. Many did incredible things, but they’re people — some failed, some were afraid, some said, ‘We shouldn’t be going to war’. We need to evolve and represent all those aspects of the Australian story.”
Modern era rebuild
A critical project underpinning the memorial’s evolution, the one Beazley says will be the council’s greatest legacy, but is most likely to keep him up at night due to its scale and need to “get it right”, is the $550m building redevelopment currently underway. Due for completion in stages out to 2028, its main aim is to provide more gallery space to tell the stories of the more than 100,000 Australians who have served in the past three decades, predominantly in Middle East operations and the many peacekeeping missions underway every single day since 1947. When finished, the memorial floorspace will increase by more than 50 per cent, and the iconic facade of the original sandstone building, along with the Pool of Reflection and Hall of Memory, will be complemented with a new southern entrance, Anzac Hall, additional galleries and an expanded Parade Ground.
“This is fundamentally about creating space to tell the stories of contemporary generations of veterans, of which I’m one, with the same respect, honour and depth as previous generations,” says Neuhaus, who joined the council in 2018 and chairs the memorial’s development committee.
Of the tough building project decisions taken by the council, Neuhaus believes perhaps the most courageous was the choice to construct the largest closed-loop geothermal technology system in the Southern Hemisphere. A 128km network of pipes is being installed underneath the memorial to use geothermal energy to heat and cool the buildings.
“It is absolutely perfect for a museum and memorial, because it will maintain an ambient temperature, and it is nation-leading in terms of our commitment to sustainability,” she says, explaining the geothermal system, together with other renewable energy installations, should let the memorial disconnect completely from the energy grid by 2030.
The redevelopment is tracking well to its overall timeline, but Neuhaus says, like all major building projects, it hasn’t come without hiccups and critics. “The original building was a Depression- era build and although it is magnificent, we’ve discovered it has a horrendous number of legacy issues we’ve needed to deal with,” she says. “There’s asbestos, mould, lead pipes with leaks, walls with no footings, so much that has had to be rebuilt, re-engineered, propped up or addressed. Adding to that, the project has been managed through COVID and record construction inflation prices. Most importantly, we’re doing the rebuild while keeping the memorial open 364 days a year.”
Beazley says the team has done a “magnificent job” in handling unexpected snags, while keeping cost overruns “well within the norm”. Indeed, in April, after a period of intense public scrutiny and some expressed concerns, the Australian National Audit Office gave the project a tick, finding the memorial had established “largely effective” frameworks for project management, procurement and contract management.
Although conceding that funding for the ongoing project will “remain a point of discussion” with the government, Beazley, chair since December 2022, after Dr Brendan Nelson AO’s term finished, emphasises that the redevelopment is critical for the memorial’s honourable purpose and promise to the nation. “It is so necessary to have every element of Australia’s engagements properly reflected in the way in which they are interpreted and portrayed in the war memorial.”
Shifting perspectives
Since his appointment as memorial director in 2020, Anderson says he has valued the national perspective, experience and thoughtfulness brought by council members, particularly in grappling with weighty issues. “There’s an expectation that the memorial remains relevant and part of national debates, but it should have considered deliberation, rather than be reactionary. That’s a role the council takes very, very seriously.”
On the memorial’s position on the scandalous findings and ongoing investigations arising from the Brereton Report, Anderson is forthright. “Whatever the truth is, whenever it’s known, we’ll tell it,” he says. “In some quarters, it’s controversial that we would acknowledge it, but how could we not? We’re going to tell people about our country’s 20 years in Afghanistan, our longest war, and there is so much more to our service in Afghanistan than just that. So if there is any glaring omission, why would people trust the rest of the story we’re telling? The Brereton Report also acknowledges that, overwhelmingly, they served with courage and distinction, and we will tell the story proportionately and honestly.”
Similarly, on another longer-standing question, the council has decided to expand the memorial’s treatment of Australia’s earliest conflicts — between First Nations people and the military of European colonisers — known as the Frontier Wars. “The council has determined to do it and, certainly under Kim Beazley’s leadership, we will,” says Anderson. “But we are not starting from scratch. Frontier violence has been depicted in our galleries since 1986 and the galleries are not the only way we tell stories.”
Such responses will add to the many other perspective shifts made by the memorial in line with the community, such as introducing the commemoration of people who have taken their own lives as a result of their service. In addition to the inclusion of their names on the Roll of Honour since WWI, this year the memorial installed a sculpture, For Every Drop Shed in Anguish.
Honouring the fallen
Keys, who joined the council in February 2021, says an issue he hadn’t anticipated relates to the memorial’s revered Roll of Honour, the bronze panels on which are engraved the names of ADF members who lost their lives.
“One of the things I hadn’t understood to be a responsibility of the council, but is one of its most important, is that we review every request for additional names to go on the Roll of Honour,” he says. “There are names still coming to us from as early as WWI — people who may have served, were medically discharged, came home and died from their injuries, but were not tracked because they had left military service. Others may have died because of mental health issues related to their time in service. Some of them are clear-cut, but others can be really challenging and lead to robust debates around the council table. But to be there with the families when we unveil the new names on the wall and lay a wreath, it’s just so incredibly moving and powerful.”
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