TRANSCRIPT - SPEECH - CANBERRA REGION TOURISM ADVISORY FORUM - THURSDAY, 1 FEBRUARY 2024

E&OE TRANSCRIPT

SPEECH

CANBERRA REGION TOURISM ADVISORY FORUM

THURSDAY, 1 FEBRUARY 2024

SUBJECTS: Australia’s collecting institutions.

TONY BURKE MP, MINISTER FOR EMPLOYMENT AND WORKPLACE RELATIONS, MINISTER FOR THE ARTS: Thanks so much, David, for the warm welcome. Thank you to all of you. It’s been a real pleasure and privilege to be joining you here on the traditional lands that make up the Canberra area, and I acknowledge the traditional owners and elders past and present.

One of the things that has changed I think in a really exciting way over the last few years is in television. Our screen producers have finally worked out what an incredible set Canberra is. I remember this being written about for the first time when Secret City was broadcast. Now with Total Control, we’re seeing again something that US television had always – and movies had always understood – the capacity for drama in a national capital. Australia largely hadn’t. We’d had the True Believers, but not much more than that.

There’s an ongoing understanding now through our big story tellers that so many stories live here. At the part of Australia where we divide the nation into roughly 150 different bits, send someone from each part and bring them into a room to argue with each other, there’s a natural creative tension in Canberra. There’s a natural centre of all of Australian stories that lives here.

That concept of going to a capital is when people travel the world, it’s something that they want to do. You naturally when you’re doing a visit to anywhere around the world, you always consider the capital because you know by its very definition the capital of a nation is a gathering place for the stories of a nation.

That’s what the collecting institutions are there to do. All of the collecting institutions except for two live here in the ACT. There’s a good reason why the other two don’t – Bundanon obviously has a very specific history. It couldn’t be relocated anywhere else since it exists, ever since Paul Keating’s cultural policy, Creative Nation, as part of the national collection, but its place is immovable. Similarly, for a National Maritime Museum it is difficult to sail to Canberra. So, therefore, the location was always going to be somewhere different. But for everything else the collections live here, they belong here, and when people come to Canberra they want to see our national collecting institutions.

I’ll run through the names – because I use the term knowing what they are, but just for those who don’t have a list at hand – this is the order in which someone else wrote it, so every word is my own, but not the order. The Museum of Australian Democracy at Old Parliament House, the National Archives, the National Film and Sound Archives, the National Gallery, the National Library, the National Museum and the National Portrait Gallery.

Of course, people also go to Parliament House, and if I can give you a quick story of Parliament House that I think explains what I think is best about all the collecting institutions. When someone travels to Parliament House they travel to, thinking that they’ll see the House of Representatives, the Senate and the Great Hall. They’re sort of, the big things that they know they’ll be there to see. You can decide whether it’s lucky or unlucky to get there on a sitting day or at a particular time, but the objective, the exhibit, I guess, that makes us a nation in the first place is us. It’s the Parliament, its members. That’s the thing that draws people to want to go to Parliament House.

But when a destination is really well curated, the most exciting thing that people go away talking about afterwards sometimes has nothing to do with what they thought they were going to most value before they arrived. I only know this because I read You Daughters of Freedom, because for some very silly reason in the last 20 years I’ve never taken aside the half hour to get one of the guides to give me a tour of the building. But in one of the corners of the public area, which is so easy to miss – you need to sort of go through a door to find it – is a women’s suffrage banner, a banner that was part of the marches for women’s suffrage in London in 1911. If anyone’s read Clare Wright’s You Daughters of Freedom, you’d have a sense of the incredible leadership role that Australian women played in the suffrage movement in the time United Kingdom.

This banner says something that goes to the heart of the development of the Australian constitution story. I remember being taught in history that the big moment of Australia finally recognising that we were not going to be captive of the UK telling us what to do anymore, was Versailles when Prime Minister Hughes made clear that Australia had to be independently represented. But this was 1911, and the sign on the banner as a daughter talks to her mother – the daughter being Australia and the mother being Great Britain – is “Trust the women, Mother, as I have done.”

The message that Australia was a country that had advice to give. That had a story to tel. A nation that had a story to teach. That independently was no longer dependent is something that is all through that banner. It is not simply a story – and it would be enough if it was simply a story of franchise – but it is a story of the growing independence and confidence of Australia.

No one I suspect 10 years ago – there might be some now – but 10 years ago almost no-one would have gone to Australian Parliament House with the intention that there was their destination. That’s what we need for the cultural institutions to all be able to do. To have the destination that makes you want to get there, the bit you know about, but you go away after talking about the discoveries that you never expected to make when you first walked out the door but you’re going to tell your friends about after you’ve left.

Old Parliament House, which is part of a collecting institution, has a slightly different role to any of the other collecting institutions. Most of the others are in a repurposed building or in a building that has been built for that exact purpose. Old Parliament House as the Museum of Australian Democracy has that wonderful concept where the storytelling is not simply in the exhibits; the storytelling is in the walls. There’s – some of you would know – I read a poem each day. There’s a wonderful line in TS Elliott’s ‘Burnt Norton’, as they’re going through the ruins of an old church, which is “Other echoes inhabit the garden,” as they’re hearing the choir and they’re hearing everything that used to live in the ruins. Old Parliament House, you go there and you stand in King’s Hall and you hear the echoes, I feel, of the years of parliamentary divisions, bustling past the public on the way into the chamber. You walk up the steps where Gough Whitlam delivered his speech following – on the day of the dismissal. You walk into a chamber and you get that sense of how small and physical the room was.

Former Senator Margaret Reid – now that Barry Cassidy has taken the role of Chair, someone who worked in the building, he’s been starting to organise events held on the floor of the chamber. I was there for one recently for cartoonists where everybody was sitting on the floor of the chamber and former senators Margaret Reid and Sue Knowles had both turned up and were sitting in the seats that they used to sit in next to each other there on the floor of the chamber.

There is something in that building that nothing else can match. But that physicality, as people move through, the things they don’t expect, is how cramped not just the chamber was but the offices were. Members of parliament sharing offices, the press gallery being such a small, tight, cramped place. Those stories as well as the exhibits that are run from time to time leave people with a conversation about Australian democracy that is only possible because they came to Canberra and they went there.

But to be able to have all of our collecting institutions with the strength to be able to tell these stories, not just to do the fundamental bits, but to also be able to make sure that you leave having made discoveries you’d never expected you’d make, they needed to be funded.

The state of disrepair for the national collecting institutions was a national embarrassment. There is always a case for government to see each time where they can build efficiencies, where they can make sure they’re not spending more public money than they should be spending. But to get to the point where buildings themselves were in a state of disrepair, where works of art at the National Gallery worth half a billion dollars were within sight of buckets for roofs that were leaking was not acceptable and was being allowed to get worse and worse and worse.

I couldn’t think of a better time to have a senator for the ACT as Australia’s Finance Minister, because going and asking for money on those things is not easy. Particularly when something’s been so underfunded, to be able to say spend all of this and all we’ll be doing in the first instance is just getting back up to scratch is not an exciting announcement. But the alternative was unthinkable. The alternative was unthinkable. Because I want the boards that I appoint to be full of people who can come up with new ideas and say what’s next. What’s the exhibition that we’ll be able to run that people will want to come here to see, and once they’re here, what are the discoveries they’ll make that they had no idea they were going to make.

One of the great things of the National Gallery, for example, the beautiful exhibition – I want to give it its correct name – it’s simply called the Aboriginal Memorial Poles. But you know the poles that used to be down at the bottom of the escalator, and they’ve been moved upstairs. The problem with them down the bottom of the escalator, near the escalator, was everybody would look at them but almost no-one would walk through the middle of them. Every tour now pretty much begins at that exhibition where people walk through the poles, and it is a completely different experience.

That exhibition at the National Gallery, the river that takes you through to the Arafura Sea that the work is for, the river is through the middle of those poles. The ochre of the poles changes from one side of the river to the other based on the geology of the different dirt on each side of that river. As you move towards the Arafura Sea, the ochre continues to change to both your right and left because that’s what happens on country.

You could never appreciate that when you were going up in the escalator looking back and just saying, “There’s some nice poles.” So, I’m really proud of the way that the visitor experience is being thought about by these institutions.

The next part of it, though, is a very strange way of advertising Canberra, but I think it’s going to be phenomenal. Part of our cultural policy Revive was to have a principle that there’s a place for every story and a story for every place. While you have centres like the Australian Capital Territory, which are a centre for the housing of stories and bringing them together, we also want them to be heard all around the nation as well.

Sharing the collection is allowing some major works, so, for example, Margaret Olley, her home has been rebuilt and is in the Northern Rivers. There were some Margaret Olley works that we had and a Monet which we had which were in storage. Roughly 98, 99 per cent of our collection is in storage at any point in time. We’re now sharing the national collection with different parts of the country. But in doing that what people are getting is they are getting a glimpse of, this is just part of what’s in the national collection, and if you want to see the rest, come to Canberra.

In doing that, we’re creating a destination for these works where they were previously in storage, and that helps the regional and suburban galleries. But we’re also letting people know the breadth and quality of the national collection that is held in Australia, which allows people to ask that question: if this is the work that was held in storage, I’d better get to the ACT to see what they’re keeping on display. That sharing the collection, far from in any way diminishing the central role of the Australian Capital Territory I believe is going to play a very serious role in enhancing it.

There is a great role that philanthropists play with respect to our national collection and our national collecting institutions, but there is a rule for philanthropists. Philanthropists want to be part of great work. You’ll get some who’ll just want to provide some money and whatever you spend it on, fine. But it is pretty hard to get philanthropy going in Australia if they have a view that the government of Australia isn’t even looking after the basic infrastructure, and that has been a real challenge.

I remember one of the heads of one of the institutions saying to me when I was in Opposition, saying, “Can you not” – and I was careful with it – “to not spend too much time arguing about the problems with the physical challenges that they’re facing,” because he said, “Every time we get a story on that, we lose donors.” People want to know that they’re donating to something that is otherwise being looked after so they can see the value add.

So what we’ve added in terms of government revenue doesn’t just make a difference in government revenue; it changes the conversation for philanthropists in Australia to believe that these institutions are worth investing in.

If you go to the National Museum, there’s a wonderful part of it, and it’s donated – it’s a combination of government money and a very generous amount that was provided by Tim and Gina Fairfax. What it does is takes the story of the circumnavigation of Australia by Matthew Flinders, Bungaree and a cat called Trim. But it’s a children’s play area. So as children play, they are being immersed in stories.

They will carry that from then on. They haven’t just been to a playground, they’ve been hearing a story which affects their relationship both with our history – well, with three things: with our history, with our national capital and with the concept of visiting a museum. Because the memory is always early and always fun. It wasn’t work.

These principles make sure not only that people have a good experience when they’re here but make sure the collecting institutions are something that people feel is something that is open to them. For many people, going to various institutions, whether it’s a theatre performance or whether it’s a gallery or collecting institution, a lot of people have a reaction that that’s not for them. They might not feel welcome in that sort of instance.

So making sure that we have things there that are good experiences for children, a schools program which is a good experience for students, not something that they walk away having felt resentful about. And finally making sure that we are constantly opening those doors guarantees that people in terms of their experience and benefitting from government-funded institutions never view it as something for elites; always view it as a door that is open to them. In terms of what does that mean for those involved in tourism? It means people stay extra days. It adds to the list of things that they want to see and want to be part of when they’re here.

To make sure that we’re getting this right, I have been changing the composition of the boards. We had a National Museum with no historian. The historian that I’ve put on there is actually Clare Wright, the person who wrote You Daughters of Freedom, who’s the reason I found out about the banner I’d been a hundred metres away from for nearly 20 years. The art gallery now has more artists on it. We’re gradually making sure these institutions in terms of who’s there it’s a closer connection to the work and mission of the institution and the nature of the boards also looks a little bit more like modern Australia than what the boards looked like when I first arrived.

All of that is aimed at, I guess, the simplicity of this. We have a cultural policy as a government because we believe Australian stories are worth telling and we want the understanding of Australian stories to be part of what it is to live in Australia. A huge part of the collection of our stories and the home for new works rests within our collecting institutions. We need to make sure those collecting institutions are properly funded. We need to make sure that the governance of those collecting institutions is both professional and genuinely connected with their purpose in modern Australia. And finally, we need to make sure that we end this stupid debate that somehow our stories and loving our stories is an elitist thing.

If we don’t have government support, it can easily become an elitist thing. But we should never be a nation where access to our stories and love of our stories is something that is limited to people based on how much money they have. You with your role in the ACT are essential custodians of that relationship.

As I referred before and I gave a couple of examples of the surprises that people have when they see aspects of the collection when they leave of things they weren’t expecting. I’ll tell you the thing that came through when we checked with every institution in the preparation for this speech, which shouldn’t have surprised me, but it wasn’t what I was expecting it to be, because I wanted – I thought we’d give a different “What’s the unexpected thing you’re getting in feedback when people have visited your institution?”

Without exception every institution said the main piece of feedback we get was people were excited about the guides they met, about the people they met, about the friendliness of direct human contact and hearing stories in an institution from a storyteller. I think that also tells us the asset that we have which is possibly one of the most intrinsic strengths of the collecting institutions here in Canberra – the people of Canberra.

HOST: [Indistinct] so we’re going to forgive you from answering any questions because your Chief of Staff is glaring at me.

BURKE: I can do 5 minutes.

HOST: Okay. Very, very quickly then. A couple of things.

BURKE: You know, as long as they’re tough and horrible.

HOST: So you confirmed you’ll continue to maintain funding for the institutions. And what about capital works as well on top of that?

BURKE: So the announcement that we made, there’s capital funding, there’s essential resourcing funding and that money – often governments make the announcement and only put it in the forward estimates. That funding is all continuing. We also have a process for – so it would have to be an active government cut for that money to disappear, and certainly that’s not where this government is coming from.

There is further to that a process that the institutions can now go to where there are major capital works that they need funding for. Like completely fixing the work that needs to be done at the National Gallery will take some years. But there is an additional process. So, there’s three lines. There was announced funding for capital, the announced funding for ongoing work and a process to be followed for additional capital work which some institutions are already following.

HOST: Okay. A quick final question: how important is it that school children are able to come to Canberra and, as they do now, 80,000? How important is that, do you think, to the institutions, and to those kids?

BURKE: Look, it’s not only important; it’s very personal to me. I remember turning up on my school excursion and going to the gallery and just by luck, Malcolm Fraser was making a speech when I was there, and Bob Hawke was calling out, "bull," at whatever, and they were all laughing and there was all this energy in the building. And then I ended up coming back as a student and sitting in the Senate chamber on the final night. But I always felt welcome in the building. It was never foreign to me because it had always been something that I’d been to.

So having that is really important. Obviously how we try to provide that experience for students who live further away – you know, places like Western Australia, Tasmania – the program doesn’t work the same way. That is an ongoing challenge and a weakness. So it’s something that I want to be able to maximise.

In terms of, to expand it, though at the moment I’ve had to get really significant additional funding to just be able to get the institutions back from the brink. I don’t want to give an expectation that I’m about to be able to expand because the big ask that I had to make is what we announced last year.

HOST: We’re very grateful for what you do for the institutions. Could you please thank the Honourable Tony Burke.

ENDS