29th June 2011
This post was published when the author was in a previous role
I was invited to watch a holiday weekend footy match, another Australian tradition. I had decided that I needed to choose an Aussie Rules team to support, so I opted for the Geelong Cats (on the personal advice of the State Premier of Victoria, where the game is mostly played). Geelong President Colin Carter filled […]
Read more on Go Cats: Watching Aussie Rules Football | Reply
27th June 2011
This post was published when the author was in a previous role
I represented Britain at the Trooping of the Colours on 11 June. In Australia, the Queen’s Birthday weekend is a public holiday. It was a crisp sunny day but cold, and the backdrop of Lake Burley Griffin, around which Canberra is sited, looked spectacular. Australia’s Royal Military College, Duntroon, is celebrating its centenary this year, […]
Read more on Trooping of the Colours in Canberra | Reply
24th June 2011
This post was published when the author was in a previous role
With a group of colleagues from the High Commission I attended the Canberra opening of a new film “Oranges and Sunshine”. It’s about the 7,000 child migrants who were sent to Australia between 1945 and 1967, and the heroic role of Nottingham social worker, Margaret Humphreys (tautly played by Emily Watson) in helping many of […]
Read more on Oranges and Sunshine – a deeply moving film | Reply
16th June 2011
This post was published when the author was in a previous role
I visited Darwin, capital of the Northern Territory this week. Although NT covers a vast land area, as seen in the Nicole Kidman film “Australia”, it represents only about 1% of Australia’s population and GDP. Once a sleepy backwater, Darwin is poised to become a major oil and gas hub for the vast offshore reserves […]
Read more on Oil and Gas boom in the ‘Top End’: Visit to Darwin | Reply
27th May 2011
This post was published when the author was in a previous role
London was looking beautiful in the sunshine when I travelled there for the annual conference of all our ambassadors earlier this month. The Prime Minister, Foreign Secretary and Chancellor all came to tell us what they expected from our network of embassies around the world. William Hague announced a significant strengthening of our footprint in […]
Read more on London calling | Reply
28th April 2011
This post was published when the author was in a previous role
On 25 April I got up at 4.00am to attend the ANZAC Day Dawn Service at Canberra’s magnificent Australian War Memorial. It was a very moving experience. I was deeply impressed to see a crowd of some 20,000 people so still and silent that you could hear the cockatoos screeching in the trees – a […]
Read more on ANZAC Day – Part of Australia’s National Identity | Reply
21st April 2011
This post was published when the author was in a previous role
Hobart, capital of Tasmania, is only a four hour flight from Australia’s Antarctic research stations. Whilst there I had a fascinating visit to the Antarctic Division, the equivalent of our own British Antarctic Survey in Cambridge. Scientists there talked about some of the fascinating research they are doing on the impacts of climate change, which […]
Read more on Visiting Tasmania – Antarctic research on Climate Change | Reply
15th April 2011
This post was published when the author was in a previous role
Foreign Minister Kevin Rudd invited the diplomatic corps to visit his home state of Queensland to see how well it is recovering from the terrible January floods. I went with some 70 High Commissioners, Ambassadors and other diplomats. Having been up in Brisbane with William Hague shortly after the floods, it was good to return […]
Read more on Seeing Queensland “open for business” again, with Kevin Rudd | Reply
14th April 2011
This post was published when the author was in a previous role
كلمة "الكرامة" كلمة نسمعها كثيرا في العالم العربي في الوقت الراهن. سمعناها في تونس في شهر كانون الاول وفي ميدان التحرير في القاهرة في شهر كانون الثاني كما أننا نسمعها في ليبيا وسوريا الآن. الكرامة جزء أساسي من الثقافة العربية. و الكلمة في طبيعة الحال تحمل معنى مختلف لكل شخص، ولكنها كانت في قلب الأحداث […]
Read more on أهمية الكرامة | Reply
13th April 2011
This post was published when the author was in a previous role
A word we hear a lot in the Arab world at the moment is “dignity”. We heard it in Tunisia in December and in Tahrir Square in Cairo in January. And we are hearing it in Libya and Syria now. Dignity is a fundamental foundation of Arab culture. The word of course means different things […]
Read more on The Importance of Dignity | Reply (1)
