Kate Lundy (ACT, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

As I near the end of my time in this place I recognise more than ever before just how lucky I have been to be nearly 19 years a senator for the Australian Capital Territory—lucky because I have never had to be at work too far away from my family and friends, and I empathise deeply with my colleagues who find themselves travelling vast distances to be here every sitting week. But I am also lucky because I am privileged to live in such a beautiful city. You only need to look out of the outer-corridor windows in this building to see the most beautiful surroundings and take in that breathtaking view across the lake and towards the mountains. In fact, wherever you look here in Canberra you cannot help but soak in the splendour of what it is to live in the 'bush capital'. Again, I have had many opportunities to interact with those of our community who are passionate about our natural environment, be it flora or fauna, over many years now, and I certainly feel it, live it and breath it as I continue to choose to live my life here in this beautiful city.

Any Canberran who takes the opportunity to explore the hills around this city is greeted every time by a unique and special view. From Mount Ainslie, for example—which happens to be my favourite summit—what is laid out before you is the wonder of the Griffins' visionary plan of a century ago. You only need to turn your eyes south to see, right there in front of you, Marion Mahony Griffin's extraordinary satellite snapshot of what Australia's national capital might become, based on her husband, Walter's, ideas. These ideas were magically formed—and I say 'magically' because they did it without actually coming to Australia, in a very grey and chilly Chicago suburb in the winter of 1911 and 1912.

The Griffins, of course, should not get all the credit for what we see here in 2015 in our national capital. In fact, it was Prime Minister Robert Menzies who made a crucial intervention in our capital city's grand narrative through the 1950s when he provided the necessary funding and patronage. Decades earlier, John Christian Watson, Labor's first Prime Minister, also made a significant contribution to Canberra. And like so many of the stories of early Canberra, Watson's is nearly lost, but has been reinvigorated through the course of the National Capital Centenary. And I would like to just reflect on it a little. It was a tricky and contested time, when the nation's capital might have been marooned forever in Melbourne or relegated to some other less elegant location in New South Wales. But it was Chris Watson who visited the Monaro region in 1906. He stood, it seems, right on    top of Mount Ainslie and allowed himself to dream an identifiably Australian dream. He spoke about it later:

There is a plain in the centre, and foothills all round, varying the general appearance of the country; and beyond that, after further rolling foothills, we have, on the south-west and south, the Murrumbidgee mountains, towering as a background and proving a most effective foil to the other scenery ... In the vicinity there are mountain gorges, which afford every diversity of scenery … full of beauty and within a short distance of the suggested [capital] site. I do not say that picturesqueness alone should decide the question; but, other things being equal, I think that the beautiful ought to turn the scale.

Watson, like so many to follow him, was in an elevated mood—so too the Griffins, without even seeing the place.

As I mentioned, Walter Burley Griffin had his own dream: a democratic dream for a country that he had grown to admire for what he called its 'most democratic tendencies'. Griffin wanted to give Australians a capital to suit their egalitarian character. I have quoted his memorable words in this place previously, and I would like to again:

I have planned a city that is not like any other in the world. I have planned it not in a way that I expected any government authorities in the world would accept. I have planned an ideal city—a city that meets my ideal of the city of the future.

I think that this is the stuff of inspiration, and there is no doubt that many since have found similar sustenance when applying themselves to the Canberra project. When Aldo Giurgola, one of this city's most treasured citizens, began to design this Parliament House—surely destined to be World Heritage listed in the coming years—he said that he constantly felt the illuminating presence of the Griffins on his shoulder as he sketched preliminary plans in his New York office in the late 1970s.

It is troubling that many of our representatives and leaders have somehow—and I do not know how—formed a somewhat negative view of this city. There were recent comments about the location of Australia Day celebrations by the Northern Territory Chief Minister, Mr Adam Giles, where he referred to Canberra as a city of 'just beige buildings'—a very naive view of someone who has obviously not spent any time to take in the natural beauty of the nation's capital or to appreciate the substance of its plan and surrounds.

I am well known for criticising previous Prime Minister John Howard for refusing to make the capital his home. I believed at the time that it showed a great disdain for the status of the national capital. Former Prime Ministers Mr Malcolm Fraser and Mr Paul Keating have also, in a more recent public appearance, expressed a mutual dislike of Canberra, suggesting that the capital should have been in Melbourne or Sydney. I love both Melbourne and Sydney; it is true. I was born in Sydney, and I have grown to love Melbourne very much. So it is pitiful that people find it necessary to reflect on the national capital in a negative way, somehow comparing it to two extremely large and very successful state capitals who form integrated parts of our economy and are, of course, esteemed capitals of their respective states. A like for a city does not diminish the role or status of the national capital in any way; in fact, in many ways it underscores the uniqueness and importance of this place.

I would argue that these narrow views not only ignore the genuine beauty of the capital but show an ignorance concerning our national capital's foundation story—in point of fact, a story rich with a set of international connections embracing the best of what humankind was thinking one hundred years ago. Many of the people who inspired the then fledgling Labor Party in the Federation era were the very same people who inspired Canberra to be conceived as an ideal capital.

I chaired a joint standing committee inquiry into the role of Australia's national capital in 2008, entitled The way forward. I wrote in that foreword:

The challenge for all Australians is to ensure that Canberra as our national capital continues to be planned with the high ideals first articulated by the Griffins.

In the seven years that have passed since then, I believe it is fair to say that this challenge has become even more pressing and ever more urgent. We have had two more inquiries since then: one chaired by Senator Louise Pratt, entitled Etched in stone?Inquiry into the administration of the National MemorialsOrdinance 1928; and the other, overseen by Dr Allan Hawke, entitled Canberra a capital place:Report of the independent review of the National Capital Authority. All three of these enquiries produced a raft of sensible and well-researched recommendations for Canberra during the 21st century, and yet few of these bipartisan recommendations have been implemented, partly because of the leadership volatility that has engulfed parties in recent years, but also because of the prevalent belief that nothing is worth spending taxpayer dollars on that is not cost neutral or moneymaking. I think that, if you value the role of the national capital in the context of the part that it plays in our collective Australian story, it is important to make the investment in the national capital to ensure that all Australians have the opportunity to feel that they are part of it.

Canberra is in essence a public asset. It demands our careful attention. Our national capital is too precious to be marginalised and subject to a hundred lazy and ill-informed cuts. It is not good enough to have only the national cultural institutions, along with the National Capital Authority, doing the hard yards developing the cultural fabric of our capital city. They find themselves often friendless, cash-strapped and forgotten. The load must be shared, and proudly showcased by the Australian people through the vehicle of the appropriate federal government department and with financial support.

There are many things about Canberra that I love. One of the most important is that it is our national capital. I am here on behalf of the people of the ACT, and Canberra is here on behalf of all Australians.