Inside Story has a forensic examination on the campaign for vast memorials to the 20th century’s world wars on Rond Terrace.
Despite the status of the Australian War Memorial, some retired military officers decided, in around 2003, that Canberra lacked memorials to the two world wars. To remedy this deficiency, they established the Memorials Development Committee, or MDC.
Eight years later, there is considerable alarm among people concerned about Canberra’s national symbolic architecture that the memorials project has advanced through the system without proper scrutiny. The need for new memorials to the world wars has not been proven. The statutory decision-maker has let down the Australian parliament and the people it is supposed to be serving. The planning authority, in its eagerness to deliver for the MDC, has cut corners, avoided issues and manipulated the decision-maker. The authority’s current representatives have obfuscated and stonewalled.
Definitely worth a read.