Museum of Australian Democracy at Old Parliament House

I’m giving this thread a ‘bump’ hoping to see some MoAD feedback. Full disclosure: my company is the guilty party responsible for the Australian Democracy gallery, the revamping/relocation of the Prime Ministers’ Exhibit, and the Living Democracy gallery. I’d be very interested in hearing comments from other locals who have visited, especially any constructive criticism relating to the three galleries mentioned.

Note: I am not a MoAD employee. My comments don’t represent those of the museum.

“It is a new museum – and a new approach to being a museum – in an old building, and possibly Canberra’s, if not Australia’s, most loved building at that.”

Sounds like something from a tourist brochure to me?

It’s not actually a new museum anyway.

G’day I-filed,

Just curious what other Canberra people think of the place.

Hi nanzan – why do you ask? Are you conducting in-house research, or are you contracted? Or just curious?

Igglepiggle,

It’s $2 per adult, $1 per concession, $5 per family. And there are baby change rooms too!

Is there an entry cost? With a 3 year old and a newborn, we are always at the potential to leave 3 minutes after arriving, which is a pain if you’ve paid entry!

Rule of law and limits to executive power are a necessary precursor to stable democracy, that’s what magna carta represents.

Obviously the museum didn’t do a good job explaining that though.

Err, modern Australian democracy is built on the Magna Carta.

If you look here you’ll even see that the Magna Carta sits proudly among all the other current ACT Legislation, sandwiched between the Magistrates Court Act 1930 and the Major Events Security Act 2000.

Some of the new exhibits are a little contrived, I fail to see the link between modern Australian democracy and Magna Carta, bit tenuous don’t you think?

Otherwise OPH is a great museum.