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The National Museum of Australia - the history of a concept
Dr John Gardiner-Garden
Social Policy Group
Major Issues Summary
Introduction
The 1970s-the original concept
The 1980s-an enactment without enactment?
1993-a forward step?
1994 and 1995-a different vision?
Early 1996-a new commitment?
December 1996-the right decision?
Endnotes
The idea of a National Museum of Australia has been around since Federation,
but despite repeated promises from the major political parties to proceed
with permanent National Museum facilities, a vast collection remains unexhibited.
Financial constraints, pressure to consider other sites, varying personal
and bureaucratic visions, and lack of political will have meant Australia
remains one of the few countries in the world without an easily identifiable
National Museum. Issues of site capacity, urban design, economics and
environmental impact have all been debated. Despite a recent Federal Government
decision, debate over what and where the National Museum should be continues.
Key developments have included the following:
In 1975 the Committee of Inquiry set up by the Whitlam Government developed
the concept of a low profile museum with three themes/galleries (Aboriginal
Australia, Social History and the Environment) and recommended it be sited
at Yarramundi Reach in Canberra. The Act to establish a National Museum
was passed in 1980. An invaluable collection was developed, links were
forged with Aboriginal, Torres Strait Islander and other communities,
and travelling tours, open days, public exhibitions were organised. The
construction of permanent facilities, however, was deferred by successive
governments.
In 1993 the Keating Government committed $3m for preliminary design
work on a National Museum at Yarramundi Reach and pledged $26m towards
its construction, conditional on the private sector providing the remainder
of the anticipated $60m. Within 18 months, however, the Commonwealth was
advancing a new concept. The October 1994 Creative Nation document
described a Museum without any permanent exhibition galleries at Yarramundi
Reach. The Museum would organise travelling or electronic exhibition and
produce educational programs, information databases and multi-media resources.
A permanent Gallery of Aboriginal Australia, not necessarily part of the
National Museum, would be built at Acton Peninsula. In 1995 the Federal
Arts Minister and the ACT Government arranged to swap the Commonwealth's
land at the Kingston foreshore for the ACT's land on Acton Peninsula.
In the March 1996 Federal election the Coalition promised to go ahead
with a full three gallery Museum-stating that its preferred site was Yarramundi
Reach. In December, the Coalition Government committed $750,000 for design
work to commence on a three-theme Museum, but it was to be located on
the site recommended by the Advisory Committee which they had set up,
Acton Peninsula.
The idea of a National Museum of Australia has been around since Federation
in 1901. The concept of a tripartite museum sited at Yarramundi Reach
in Canberra has been around more than 20 years and the Act to establish
such an institution was passed nearly 17 years ago. Over the last ten
years an invaluable collection of over 170 000 items has been developed.
Links have been forged with Aboriginal, Torres Strait Islander and other
communities. Travelling tours, open days, public programs and Old Parliament
House exhibitions have been organised. Promises to proceed with permanent
National Museum facilities have been repeatedly made by all the major
parties, but financial constraints, pressure to consider other sites,
varying personal and bureaucratic visions, and lack of political will
have meant Australia remains one of the few countries in the world without
such facilities. For many years, while most of the Museum's vast collection
has remained in a warehouse, a debate has raged over what and where the
National Museum should be. A recent Federal Government decision, intended
to end the uncertainty, has given rise to further debate.
In April 1974 the Whitlam Government announced the establishment of
a Committee of Inquiry on Museums and National Collections to recommend,
among other things:
... measures which should be taken in the immediate future to ... institute
new developments and institutions, with particular attention to the establishment
of a national museum of history in Canberra.
The Committee of Inquiry, chaired by P H Pigott, presented its Museums
in Australia Report in 1975 and among its recommendations was an area
of more than 90 hectares be reserved for a National Museum:
In putting forward this recommendation, we may well be criticised on the
grounds of extravagance and over-ambition. Our defence against such charges
is that we have taken a long-term view of the museum's development. Too
many museum planners in other lands have encumbered their capital city
with a museum site and building which now prevent innovative planning.
The proposed museum must not be viewed as just another building which
could equally be designed for a library or an art museum. We believe that,
with the right approach, Australia could lead in museum planning.(1)
Site-related specifications endorsed were:
- it should be reasonably close to the centre of Canberra
- it should serve the particular need of the museum
- it should have reasonable road access from a number of directions
- it should allow the museum building to be an identifiable landmark
- it should be reasonably distant from residential areas and other major
institutional buildings.
The Committee found that a site west of Black Mountain 'meets all the
specifications outlined above' and recommended that 'an appropriate area
of land on the site identified above be reserved for the proposed Museum
of Australia'.
This same general area was endorsed by the Planning Committee on the
Gallery of Aboriginal Australia, chaired by Dr D J Mulvaney:
The attention of the Planning Committee was drawn to several possible
sites. Only one met the Committee's desiderata but it did so superbly.
A close inspection was made of the open tract surrounding 'The Cork Plantation'
adjacent to the intersection of Caswell Drive and Lady Denman Drive south-west
of Black Mountain. The particular part of the tract which appealed to
the committee as in every way suitable was the higher ground towards and
including the main ridge. The slopes fall on one side towards Lake Burley
Griffin and on the other towards open bush, with a distant view of the
Brindabellas. The members of the Committee were unanimous that they could
recommend without qualification the site as suitable for the construction
of the kind of Gallery they have in mind.
The place recommended is within five kilometres of Civic Centre, which
is sufficiently near to attract visitors and tourists, yet far enough
away to be undisturbed by urban noise and commotion. It can readily
be reached from a main traffic artery, but a road and parking space
can be concealed so as not to obtrude upon the gallery's special areas.
The topography of the site is such that service buildings, perhaps even
the main building or buildings, can be constructed and/or placed so
as not to dominate the natural landscape. It should be possible by landscaping
and 'dioramas without walls' to create for visitors a mounting impression
of entry into 'blackfellow country' and the Committee hopes that by
architectural ingenuity, ways will be found of using the magnificent
views of the lake and of the Brindabellas so as to become natural backdrops
for dioramas within the main buildings. Here, if anywhere in Canberra,
it would seem practicable to create a convincing representation of the
physical settings in which Aboriginal societies humanised the continent
from ocean to ocean.(2)
This planning committee went on to stress that a gallery which:
opened on to crowded streets or was foreclosed by urban conglomerations
or had no vista of the bush, could only reinforce the distorted outlook
that has been so common in the past, when Aboriginal social forms and
cultural achievements were either not understood at all or were 'understood'
only as they appeared through European spectacles.
Both the planning committee on the Gallery of Aboriginal Australia and
the Committee of Inquiry on Museums and National Collections recommended
the co-location of the Gallery of Aboriginal Australia with the galleries
devoted to environmental, historical and other cultural matters. As the
Planning Committee noted:
If they were all set contiguously on a single broad-acres site, it permits
their symbolic juxtaposition, and possibly even an architectural complementarity.
It could also allow for the future possibility of integrated cross planning
of certain major display themes between all three institutions.(3)
Both committees also supported a complex of indoor and outdoor exhibition
areas, rather than grand buildings. As the Committee of Inquiry noted:
We have come down firmly against an inordinately expensive monumental,
multi-storey building, with all the granite or marble facings of a prestige
institution.(4)
In 1977, in line with the recommendations of the Pigott and Mulvaney
Reports, an 88-hectare site was reserved at Yarramundi, on the western
side of Lake Burley Griffin.
In 1980 the Museum of Australia Act was passed with bipartisan
support. A new inquiry into the best site for the Museum was soon under
way, with the Museum's interim Council joining with the National Capital
Development Commission (NCDC) to investigate the suitability of 12 sites
submitted by the NCDC. In 1982 the interim Museum Council presented the
Government with a vision for the museum in a report entitled The Plan
for the Development of the Museum of Australia and in March 1984 the
NCDC published the site inquiry's conclusions and reasonings as Technical
Paper 39. After a thorough examination of overseas experiences and possible
Canberra sites, the Museum Council had concluded that a National Museum
in the form of a series of low-key pavilions at Yarramundi would be outstanding
by world standards.
In the debate on the 1980 bill, Mr Barry Cohen was recorded as claiming
that the Labor opposition wanted an assurance that passage of the bill
would not simply create a fanfare of publicity 'followed, after the election
of 1983, by the project being quietly shelved.'(5) This is exactly what
happened but, somewhat ironically, it was the Labor party which, after
the election, oversaw the building of a temporary Visitor Centre and headquarters
at Yarramundi reach, and then 'quietly shelved' the project.
In 1988, following a review of the Commonwealth's involvement in the
museum sector, the Government agreed to defer the construction of the
Museum for five years.
In September of that same year the Coalition parties declared their
commitment to the Museum. Their Arts Policy noted that:
The Coalition Parties are committed to the Museum of Australia and wish
to see it built and grow to a pre-eminent national collecting institution
and significant tourist attraction for the A.C.T. We will give a clear
financial commitment to the Museum for the next five year period, redefine
its future building programme and require it to stress its particular
role in relation to the preservation of our Aboriginal cultural heritage.
During the 1993 election campaign the Government's Distinctly Australian
Statement declared:
Labor will proceed with the development of the National Museum of Australia,
with a Commonwealth contribution of $26 million over four years. Its completion
will be a co-operative exercise between the Commonwealth, the Government
of the Australian Capital Territory and the corporate sector … Concurrently,
over the next four years, there will be a staged development of the Museum's
site at Yarramundi including exhibition, education and conservation facilities.
In its August 1993 Budget the Labor Government committed $3.3m for 'preliminary
design and documentation work associated with the proposed construction
of the National Museum of Australia in Canberra, and for the pursuit of
private sector support towards the estimated $60m total cost.'(6) The
Commonwealth's budget papers that year also restated the Government's
'in-principle agreement to contribute $26m towards the project provided
the additional funding sources can be secured'. The process of choosing
an architectural firm to design the National Museum complex for the Yarramundi
site was begun, with the support of the then ACT Chief Minister Rosemary
Follet. In November 1993, however, the process of choosing a design firm
was put on hold pending a resolution of renewed uncertainty over the site.
The National Capital Planning Authority rejected the Museum's proposal
for a private-sector housing development on part of the museum's Yarramundi
Reach site (intended to help raise the private-sector funding upon which
the rest of the Commonwealth funding was contingent) but seemed to support
a mixed-use concept for Acton Peninsula. This was the old Royal Canberra
Hospital site, and had not been available when the Hospital was open in
the 1980s.(7)
In January 1994 the president of the Friends of the National Museum
of Australia, Jack Thompson, urged the Prime Minister to give his official
imprimatur to the museum as without it raising $26 million from private
sources would be impossible.(8) Supporters of the National Museum were
disappointed that not only had the Prime Minister withheld his official
imprimatur, he had continued to express his doubts about the desirability
of the museum. For example, at the opening of the new National Portrait
Gallery in the Old Parliament House in March 1994 the Prime Minister said:
It can always be said, and often with irresistible logic and passion,
that we need one more gallery or museum. One more place to put our heritage
on show. It may have reached the ears of some of you that I have sometimes
resisted this logic and this passion. It is true. I have not always been
persuaded that another huge and hugely expensive building on the banks
of Burley Griffin ranked high among the things we need for a better national
life.(9)
The Prime Minister suggested that one of the main reasons he supported
the concept of a National Portrait Gallery was:
... because it is not going to be left sitting in Canberra locked up in
yet another massive mausoleum. The works on display here are all on loan
from both public and private collections... Even better, these exhibitions
will not be confined to Canberra... It seems to me that in a country of
our size and demography, all our collecting institutions - all our cultural
institutions - should be exploiting modern transport and technology to
take our heritage out to the people.(10)
The remark surprised many commentators, as the vision for the National
Museum had never been a vision for 'yet another mausoleum'.
In August 1994, the Centenary of Federation Advisory Committee, chaired
by Joan Kirner, called on the Council of Australian Governments to consider,
among other national infrastructure projects with a possible 2001 completion
date, the 'National Museum proposed by the Government of the ACT and many
community organisations'.(11)
In the beginning of October, the week before the Government's Creative
Nation cultural statement, Arts Minister Michael Lee proposed to the
Federal Cabinet's Expenditure Review Committee that the museum be abandoned
and its Aboriginal collection transferred to the South Australian Museum.(12)
The proposal, which brought an outcry from many quarters (including Aboriginal
groups, Institutes and individuals who had donated objects, and friends
of the National Museum), was rejected.(13)
In October 1994 the Labor Government and the Coalition opposition both
released cultural policy statements, the former's entitled Creative
Nation and the latter's The Cultural Frontier. Considering
that the Bill for a National Museum was passed by a Coalition government
in 1980, it was perhaps surprising that the Coalition made no mention
of the Museum in its statement. Similarly, considering that the Museum's
construction was a central, if conditional, promise of the Labor Government's
1993 arts election policy, it was also perhaps surprising that the Government
only obliquely indicated that the original vision was to be abandoned.
The Government's statement made much of the National Museum's role in
organising 'a range of static and travelling exhibitions and educational
programs and its potential as an Internet provider, a CD-ROM producer
and a developer of 'interactive multi-media resources, electronic exhibitions
and pilot information databases'. Of the three permanent gallery complexes
which had been originally envisaged, however, only the Gallery of Aboriginal
Australia was mentioned. It was to be co-located with a new Australian
Institute of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Studies (AIATSIS) building
on the Acton Peninsula and its relationship with the National Museum was
left open:
The Government believes that the Gallery of Aboriginal Australia should
form part of the network of the National Museum, but considers it most
appropriate that Aboriginal people themselves determine the precise nature
of the relationship between those two institutions they wish to pursue.(14)
The decision to separate out the Aboriginal collection from the rest
of the National Museum's collection attracted wide criticism in the press.
It was suggested that the decision was made in haste, noting that only
a week before the statement the Minister had attempted to gain approval
for depositing the Aboriginal collection with the South Australian Museum
and that at one point the statement put the new Gallery on the East Basin
peninsula (a place that doesn't exist). It was noted that the decision
was made without public consultation and that there was no reference to
the work of any of the committees who gave birth to and sustained the
vision of a National Museum of Australia at Yarramundi. It was said that
an opportunity to place Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal Australian history
in a joint context would be lost. Professor John Mulvaney, the prominent
prehistorian who had been a member of the Pigott Inquiry on Museums and
served on the Interim Council of the National Museum, suggested, 'The
cultural diversity of modern Australia merited better than a version of
cultural apartheid'.(15)
Six months after the Creative Nation statement, on 11 April 1995,
Federal Arts Minister Michael Lee and ACT Chief Minister Kate Carnell
announced that they had agreed to swap the ACT's Acton Peninsula for the
Commonwealth's Kingston foreshore. According to the Federal Minister:
... the ACT Government would provide the whole of the Acton Peninsula
site to the border of the Australian National University, excluding the
hospice and the cottage. The ACT Government will clear the site of existing
buildings and provide up to $3 million for infrastructure work for the
Gallery of Aboriginal Australia. In return the Commonwealth will make
available to the ACT Government land on the Kingston foreshore of Lake
Burley Griffin.(16)
The ACT Chief Minister noted that:
While the ACT Government's preferred location for the National Museum
project was Yarramundi Reach, it became clear the Commonwealth would never
accept that site. This decision means the National Museum will now become
a reality in Canberra rather than a long-held dream.(17)
The Chief Minister made it clear that she had proposed the ACT Aboriginal
and Torres Strait Islander Cultural Centre be co-located on the Peninsula
with the Gallery, and this proposal appears to have been accepted by the
Commonwealth.
The Territory's Labor opposition condemned the proposed land swap as
disastrous deal for the territory which would be left with the multi-million
dollar cost of both demolishing the hospital buildings at Acton and cleaning
up the industrial site at Kingston. The ACT Assembly Standing Committee
on Planning and the Environment started to hold hearings into the land
swap.
In July 1995 the National Capital Planning Authority published advertisements
calling for expressions of interest in designing the Gallery of Aboriginal
Australia, AIATSIS and the ACT Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Cultural
Centre.
Twelve months after the Creative Nation statement, public debate
was reignited by the confirmation in the National Museum's Corporate plan
for 1995-96 that the single site tripartite museum concept would be abandoned.
The Friends of the National Museum of Australia, a body with 1,000 members,
renewed their call for the construction of all the museum at Yarramundi.(18)
The president of the Australian Academy of the Humanities, Professor John
Mulvaney, and the president of Museums Australia, Dr Des Griffin, were
both reported as criticising the separating out of the Aboriginal Gallery,
the basing of the Social History Gallery in Old Parliament House and the
apparent abandonment of the Environmental Gallery.(19) Emeritus Professor
J. Zubrzycki, member of the Interim Council of the National Museum of
Australia form 1980-82, joined the debate, reminding the Minister that
Australia belongs to the tiny minority of countries that do not have the
political will, pride and resources to fund an National Museum.(20) Jack
Kershaw, President of the Canberra Community Action on Acton Inc., suggested:
Yarramundi Reach is a site with a fine natural setting, largely free of
established European elements, a destination in itself and not hidden
away, but above all, free of the characteristic inherent in the configuration
of Acton Peninsula in the Central National Area which automatically stratifies
the importance of building placed there-something which is surely undesirable
in an Australian nation museum complex.(21)
The Director of the Museum, Margaret Coaldrake, was at pains to remind
the press that a National Museum did exist-with 400,000 people having
come and seen the Museum's exhibits at various places around the country.
The central showcase, she believed, would still come, but only as the
support for the national network of services and national showcase became
fully apparent. Moreover, she speculated that had the Acton site been
available in the mid-70s it might well have been chosen as 'It's the better
site in many ways'.(22)
At the beginning of 1996, with a Federal election on the horizon, both
the Labor Government and the Coalition Opposition sought to clarify their
position on the contentious issue of the National Museum.
In a statement on 25 January 1996 Prime Minister Keating elaborated
upon his Government's vision for the National Museum.(23) The Gallery
of Aboriginal Australia would be co-located with a new facility for the
Australian Institute of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Studies
on Acton Peninsula. The Government would provide $12m over 3 years to
allow the Museum to develop exhibitions at the Old Parliament House which,
together with extensions of the National Portrait Gallery and the Australian
Archive, would celebrate Australia's social history. There would be a
national competition to design a facility for Yarramundi Reach which would
focus on environmental history and issues and would 'be developed so as
to provide links with the National Botanical Gardens and to develop public
programs in conjunction with bodies such as the CSIRO, the Australian
Heritage Commission and Greening Australia'. $6m would be allocated to
the Museum over the next three years 'to facilitate the funding of a number
of specific partnership projects with State and regional museums, to increase
the rate of their digitising program, to enable more Australians to get
in touch with their cultural heritage and to extend the range of travelling
exhibitions developed and toured by the Museum.'
On 9 February 1997 Senator Bob McMullan was reported as saying the Labor
Government had promised more than $40 million for the National Museum
($25m for the Gallery of Aboriginal Australia, $12m to Old Parliament
House and $6m to a regional access program).(24) The soundness of the
estimate was soon being debated.(25) The Prime Minister had not put a
figure to the Aboriginal Gallery promised in his speech on 25 January
and the relationship of this gallery to the National Museum had not been
finalised. $11.3m of the $12m which the Senator, and before him the Prime
Minister, would seem to be counting as going to Old Parliament House to
establish National Museum exhibition space, had already been counted in
the 1995-96 Budget Statement as going to Old Parliament House over the
following 4 years for 'refurbishment to address deterioration and safety
standards'. The Museum, as a lessee of only part of the Old Parliament
House, would only benefit from a small portion of this. The remainder
of the $12 million may be double counting of the $0.8m recorded in the
Budget statement as going to Old Parliament House over 4 years for the
'National Film and Sound Archive exhibition program'. Similarly, the $6
million for partnership projects with state and regional museums to increase
the rate of digitising the collection and to extend the travelling collections
was not all going to the National Museum.
The Arts Policy released by the Federal Coalition in February 1996,
just prior to the March 1996 election, declared:
The Coalition will honour Labor's broken promise and establish a National
Museum of Australia. In the first year $1.5 million will be allocated
to determine the best possible site, employ architects and establish an
appropriate tendering process. In each of years two and three $7 million
will be provided with additional funding being sought from corporations
and individuals. Funding beyond this period will be considered at the
appropriate time.
The National Museum will reflect Australia's society and history,
our interaction with the environment and our Aboriginal and Torres Strait
Islander culture and heritage.
The Gallery of Aboriginal Australia will not only be a significant
part of the National Museum but will be located at the same site, thereby
symbolising an important step in the reconciliation process. The Australian
Institute of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Studies will also
be co-located with the National Museum.
It is the Coalition's preference that the National Museum be located
at the Yarramundi Reach site which has been earmarked for this purpose
for well over a decade.
The Coalition will consult extensively with all the major stakeholders,
including the ACT Government, the Friends of the National Museum and
representatives of the indigenous community, to ensure the most appropriate
location and structure for the National Museum.
Identical wording is to be found in the Federal Coalition's 1996 policy
on the Australian Capital Territory. The Coalition's arts spokesperson,
Senator Richard Alston, was reported on 16 February 1996 as 'rejecting
suggestions that the Coalition would renege on its undertaking to develop
the museum on the Yarramundi site', and as claiming 'that the Coalition
had always regarded the Yarramundi site as "overwhelmingly the preferred
site"'.(26) In a press release Senator Alston declared:
Yarramundi had been identified more than a decade ago as the most obvious
and suitable location for a National Museum complex incorporating a Gallery
of Aboriginal Australia.
and criticised Minister Lee for attempting 'to demean the National Museum
board by refusing to fill vacancies as they occurred.'(27) Similarly,
it was widely reported that Canberra Senator Margaret Reid supported proceeding
with a three-theme Museum at Yarramundi.(28)
The Coalition's package, did not fare much better than the Government
one, in the local Canberra press. Robert Macklin suggested:
For $15.5 million these days you get a bit of site clearing, a couple
of well-appointed out-houses and maybe a barbecue... and the first year's
funding, $1.5 million, is for "site investigation". Now if any
site in Australia has been thoroughly investigated its Yarramundi Reach.(29)
Within months of the election some sought to question the new Coalition
Government's commitment to the concept of a National Museum. The new ACT
Labor Senator Kate Lundy suggested that the money the Government had committed
could only build a 'glorified barn' (a realistic cost would be $150 million)
and, curiously, put the outgoing Labor Government's commitment at $58
million.(30) Others noted delays in filling several senior vacancies at
the National Museum (the same reason given by many commentators to question
the previous Arts Minister's commitment to the Museum). These vacancies
included the positions on the Council and the position of Director. Dr
William Jonas, the principal of the Australian Institute of Aboriginal
and Torres Strait Islander Studies, who the outgoing Arts Minister, Mr
Michael Lee, had appointed to succeed Margaret Coaldrake as Director,
had been unable to take up his appointment for health reasons.
In early August 1996 the appointment of Jim Service, prominent businessman
and arts patron, as head of the Museum Council and the reappointment of
Dr Jonas, who had recovered from his illness, as the museum's new director
was seen by some commentators as representing 'the first positive moves
for the development of the museum in almost half a decade' and as signalling
that 'the Howard Government is serious about its election commitment to
the project'.(31) These appointments were followed in late September 1996
with the appointment of the museum professional Andrew Reeves to the Museum
Council.
The Government's intention of returning to the concept of a unified
National Museum on a single site in Canberra would seem to have been confirmed
by the decision-upon recommendation of the National Museum's Council and
despite representations from Sydney's Lord Mayor-not to proceed with establishing
a presence at the Sydney Customs House. No money was allocated for establishing
the presence in the August 1996 Budget. It was still, however, not clear
which site a unified Museum might occupy. In that same budget the Government
committed $1.5m 'for the establishment of, and the provision of research
facilities and administrative support services for, the Advisory Committee
on New Facilities for the National Museum of Australia and the Australian
Institute of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Studies.'(32) Although
this measure was detailed under a heading 'National Museum of Australia-Design
of Facilities', the Minister explained in the Senate Estimates Hearings
on 25 September 1996 that no money was going on architectural design.
The committee is primarily to advise the Minister on the most appropriate
location for the facilities. When Senator Schacht reminded the Minister
of Senator Margaret Reid's February statement, the Minister argued that
the Government's actions were strictly in line with their policy 'that
the coalition will honour Labor's broken promise and establish a National
Museum of Australia and that in the first year $1.5m will be allocated
to determine the best possible site, employ architects and establish an
appropriate tendering process'.
In November 1996 the Senate Environment, Recreation, Communications
and the Arts Legislation Committee published information it had received
from the Minister in response to earlier Senate Estimate Hearings into
expenditure by the Department of Communication and the Arts. The budgeted
$1.5m was broken down into $305,000 for administration, $995,000 for site
studies and associated consultancies and $200,000 for communication strategies.
The Senate Committee heard that although the Coalition at the time of
the election had said it preferred the Yarramundi site, the Advisory Committee
would also consider Acton Peninsula, Kings Park and the Parliamentary
Zone foreshore sites, and the development of a fully fledged National
Museum would be planned for in the 1997-98 Budget.
In early December 1996 the Advisory Committee on New Facilities for
the National Museum of Australia and the Australian Institute of Aboriginal
and Torres Strait Islander Studies handed its completed report to the
Federal Minister for Communications and the Arts, Senator Richard Alston.
The Committee had been chaired by the current Chair of the NMA Council,
James Service, and other committee members were Dr Robert Edward's, former
NMA Chairman, former Museum of Victoria Director and head of Art Exhibitions
Australia; William Henderson, Government Relations and International Trade
Adviser; Winnifred Rosser, President of the Friends of the National Museum;
Aye Sculthorpe, Museum of Victoria Head of Indigenous Studies and member
of the AIATSIS Council; and Hon. Robert Webster, Executive Director, International
Banks and Securities Association.
On 13 December 1996, following the presentation of the Advisory Committee's
report, the Prime Minister Mr Howard announced that the Federal Government
would provide $750,000 immediately so that design work could begin for
the Museum of Australia on Acton Peninsula.
On 16 January 1997 the Advisory Committee's report to the Government
was finally released publicly. The Committee considered the advantages
and disadvantages of several sites with respect to site capacity, urban
design, economics and environmental impact. Use of the Kings Park site
was not recommended primarily because the required amendment to the National
Capital Plan could place a Museum opening by 2001 in doubt. The need to
preserve the vista between the Australian War Memorial and Parliament
House was identified as the major difficulty in building the Museum in
the Parliamentary Zone Foreshore, the committee's third preference. The
Committee's second Preference was the Yarramundi site:
Yarramundi is considered to be a highly desirable site on which to build
the NMA. It is ranked a close second by the committee who noted the nostalgic
attachment of many Canberrans for the site-the majority of public submissions
support the development of the NMA and the AIATSIS facilities at Yarramundi.
While the committee found Yarramundi the most suitable to accommodate
additional buildings for future expansion, it noted that the dearth
of physical infrastructure to the site meant this was by far the most
expensive option.
In relation to accessibility and viability, Yarramundi is not considered
to be as attractive to potential sponsors as Acton. It is the site furthermost
from the CBD and other national cultural institutions and therefor will
not easily attract visitors other than those who are specifically interested
in visiting the NMA.(33)
The Committee's first preference was the Acton Peninsula:
Acton Peninsula is widely regarded as a site of national significance.
It is highly visible, centrally placed within the ACT and consequently
its ability to attract sponsorship should be significant. The site is
also easily accessible for visitors and reasonably close to other national
cultural institutions.
The other important determining factor for the committee in selecting
Acton Peninsula as the preferred site was cost. The cost of developing
the NMA and the AIATSIS facilities on Acton Peninsula is substantially
less than at Yarramundi. The ACT Government will proceed with demolition
of the buildings if the Commonwealth Government confirms it will establish
the NMA on Acton Peninsula. It will also contribute $3 million towards
the cost.(34)
The Committee estimated the cost of providing services to and on the
Yarramundi site as $23.61m, $10 million more than to providing the same
services to and on the Acton site ($13m more expensive if the ACT Government
contribution towards infrastructure at Acton is taken into consideration).(35)
It also noted that the Yarramudi Reach site contained several significant
animal habitats which could constrain development on part of the site.
Reaction to the Government's announcement and to the Advisory Committee's
report was mixed.
The ACT Labor Senator Kate Lundy welcomed the go-ahead for the museum
but criticised the choice of site:
The Choice of Acton conveniently gets Kate Carnell and the ACT Government
off the hook in relation to the Kingston land swap.
Winnifred Rosser, a member of the Advisory Committee and the President
of the Friends of the National Museum and a body which had supported Yarramundi
as the preferred site, was quoted as saying:
The decision to build the Museum on Acton, whilst disappointing, is an
economically rational decision given the importance of having the National
Museum ready in time to celebrate the Centenary of Federation.(36)
Professor David Ride, who was a member of the interim council and, later,
the Council of the National Museum, found it 'difficult to imagine how
that [original] concept, requiring broad acres, native vegetation and
open vistas, can be accommodated in a contained site (that could be as
small as 11ha), limited by heritage-listed buildings and plantings.'(37)
Professor John Mulvaney, who was a member of the Pigott Inquiry on Museums
and served on the Interim Council of the National Museum, regretted that
the 1996 committee had been 'subjected to political and commercial pressures',
suggested that the Acton site did not fit the criteria put forward by
the Interim Council in 1982 and raised several questions concerning the
nature of development at both Acton and Yarramundi.(38) He also regretted
the lack of weight given in the report to the need to have a site with
room to accomodate research facilities (not just for the Aboriginal collection)
and new acquisitions-suggesting environmental factors would not hem in
a sensitively designed 'museum without walls' at Yarramundi in the same
way geological features, flood areas and utility easements will hem in
a museum at Acton.(39) Looking to the future again, he suggested 'to claim
that Yarramundi is too distant, or to cite a bus company which questions
service viability … is to fossilise cultural expectations and transport
systems.'(40)
The strength of the report's economic argument in favour of Acton Peninsula
over Yarramundi Reach was called into question by the president of the
Canberra Community Action on Acton group, Jack Kershaw, who suggested
that the cost of building at Acton should include the $15m given by the
former Labor Federal Government to the ACT for clearing the Acton site
('Add that to Acton and it becomes at least as expensive as Yarramundi
Reach').(41)
It is expected that the Government will announce further funding for
the National Museum in the May 1997 Budget and that the first stage of
the museum will be completed by 2001 to help mark the centenary of Federation.(42)
How much funding will be allocated in May and how much of the Museum will
be completed by 2001 remains, however, unclear.
- Museums in Australia 1975, Report of the Committee of Inquiry
on Museums and National Collections including the Report of the Planning
Committee on the Gallery of Aboriginal Australia, Canberra, 1975: 79.
- ibid: 8.
- ibid: 12.
- ibid: 79.
- Geoffrey Maslen, 'Hidden Treasures', The Bulletin, 12 December
1995: 28.
- Budget Paper No1, 1993-1994: 3.143. See also the Budget
Paper Press Release.
- Canberra Times, 25 October 1993 and 6 November 1993.
- Canberra Times, 27 January 1994.
- Speech by the Prime Minister, the Hon P.J. Keating, MP, Opening the
National Portrait Gallery and Inaugural exhibition "About Face:
Aspects of Australian Portraiture", Old Parliament House 30 March
1994: 2.
- ibid: 5.
- 2001. A report from Australia, A report to the Council of Australian
Governments by the Centenary of Federation Advisory Committee, August
1994: 80.
- Canberra Times, 12 October 1994; Canberra Times, 13 October
1994.
- Ibid.
- Creative Nation, Commonwealth cultural policy, October 1994:
76.
- Canberra Times, 19 October 1994.
- Minister for Communications and the Arts, Minister for Tourism, the
Hon. Michael Lee MP, News Release, 11 April 1995.
- Kate Carnell, ACT Chief Minister, Treasurer and Minister for Health
and Community Services, Media Release, 11 April.
- Marion Frith, 'Museum plan dogged by controversy', Age, 9
October 1995.
- Australian, 9 November 1995.
- Canberra Times, 27 September 1995.
- Canberra Times, 27 September 1995.
- Frith, op.cit.
- Statement by the Prime Minister, the Hon P J Keating, MP, National
Museum of Australia, 25 January 1996.
- Canberra Times, 9 February 1996.
- Canberra Times, 1 March 1996; Canberra Times, 2 April
1996.
- Canberra Times, 16 February 1996.
- Senator Richard Alston, Shadow Minister for Communications and the
Arts, Press Release, 26 January 1996.
- For example, Canberra Times, 15 June 1996.
- Canberra Times, 1 March 1996.
- Canberra Times, 27 May 1996.
- Canberra Times, 18 August 1996.
- Portfolio Budget Statement 1996-97, Communications and the Arts
Portfolio, Budget Related Paper No.1.2: 23.
- Report by the Advisory Committee on new facilities for the National
Museum of Australia and ustralian Institute of Aboriginal and Torres
Strait Islander Studies, December 1996: 8.
- ibid.
- ibid: 35.
- Canberra Times, 4 January 1997.
- David Ride, 'Economic reasoning is difficult to understand', Canberra
Times, 4 January 1997.
- John Mulvaney, 'A diminished vision of the National Museum', Canberra
Times, 21 December .
- John Mulvaney, 'Museum needs to look centuries on', Canberra Times,
21 January 1997.
- ibid.
- Canberra Times, 17 January 1997.
- Canberra Times, 14 December 1996.
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