27th July 2011
This post was published when the author was in a previous role
A busy few days, with a trip to Perth to recce for the Commonwealth Heads of Government (CHOGM) meeting which will take place in October. Hosting a meeting for 54 heads of government and HM The Queen is quite a tall order, but we were impressed with the professionalism of Australian plans. It is shaping […]
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19th July 2011
This post was published when the author was in a previous role
It was an unusually “legal” week for me in Sydney last week, with Lord McNally, Minister of State for Justice attending the Commonwealth Law Ministers Meeting, and later in the week the Rt Hon Dominic Grieve MP, Attorney General, participating in a separate Quint meeting with his opposite numbers from Australia, the US, Canada and […]
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1st July 2011
This post was published when the author was in a previous role
Adelaide with its graceful buildings and abundant parkland is sometimes described as the most British, even English, of Australian cities. I certainly found many connections there. The Premier, Mike Rann, is English-born. The Governor, Admiral Kevin Scarce, served in Portsmouth as a young naval officer. And Lord Mayor Stephen Yarwood had just returned from a […]
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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 […]
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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, […]
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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 […]
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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 […]
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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 […]
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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 […]
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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 […]
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