8th August 2017 Canberra, Australia
As a Yorkshire lass who has lived in Australia for 5 years, I was thrilled 10 months ago to get a job at the British High Commission in Canberra assisting my fellow Brits in need – and the range of ways we can help has really surprised me! A consular officer’s primary focus is to […]
21st July 2017 Canberra, Australia
Last night I was honoured to host a private screening of the critically-acclaimed new blockbuster Dunkirk. The film proved to be a stunning depiction of an iconic moment in British military history. Personally, Christopher Nolan’s gripping account resonated for two powerful reasons. If you can indulge me I’d like to take you back to 1976. […]
21st June 2017 Canberra, Australia
It’s been a difficult three months. The UK has been through a series of terrorist attacks, which have punched through the daily news cycle with repeated horror and intensity. We will remember them all – Westminster (22 March), Manchester (22 May), London Bridge (3 June), Finsbury Park (19 June) – and hope there are […]
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15th May 2017 Canberra, Australia
It all started in a cafe in Montmarte, Paris. My husband and I were enjoying a drink when I noticed a father sitting with his daughters. He’d ordered two glasses of wine and set the girls up with iPads. Then, clearly straight from the office, arrived a woman to greet her family. I didn’t know […]
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24th April 2017 Canberra, Australia
A year after the end of the First World War, a beautiful baby girl, Vera Constance Parker, was born in the tiny town of Stapleford in Northern England. But even as her father Walter celebrated her birth, he was already succumbing to the devastating wounds that would eventually kill him. Walter had been mortally wounded […]
26th March 2017 Canberra, Australia
I have two, what I jokingly call, spiritual homes in the UK. One is Wales, land of my fathers (actually my mother) and home now to all of my immediate family. The other is London. I was born in Hillingdon to the north-west of the capital, and raised in Ruislip, near the end of the […]
15th March 2017 Canberra, Australia
I watched you perform at the ANZ stadium in Sydney on Saturday night, with my 16 year old daughter and 94,998 other people. This was just one night in your multi-city Australia tour – your first time in this beautiful country, you said. Altogether, I reckon around 600,000 people will have seen you perform in Australia – […]
29th December 2016 Canberra, Australia
2016 was lots of things. Forgettable wasn’t one of them. It will give students of politics plenty of stuff to write about decades from now. And it will live on in our own memories for years to come. So how to describe the year that was… what? And what does that mean for us in […]
22nd December 2016 Canberra, Australia
At the beginning of this month, I was honoured to accept, on behalf of the British High Commission, the Public Affairs Asia Gold Standard Award for Diplomatic Engagement for our work supporting scholarships for Indigenous Australian students. We have been supporting the Charlie Perkins Scholarship Trust since 2010 through the FCO’s Chevening programme, and recently extended […]
15th December 2016 Canberra, Australia
My time here is up. For over four years I have been proud to bear the title of the United Kingdom’s Deputy High Commissioner to Australia. It’s the best job I’ve ever had, working with some of the best people I’ve ever met. Large parts of me don’t want to go, but four years is […]