"The Sydney Harbour Federation Trust (SHFT) is the custodian of a number of former Army and Navy sites of historical significance around Sydney Harbour.  One of the most important is the North Head site of the former School of Artillery, including the North Fort precinct.   SHFT is consequently an important stakeholder in the RAAHC because the North Fort precinct includes Australia's Memorial Walk (AMW), which we are still developing and maintaining; the Defence of Sydney Museum, including equipment on loan from the Company; the Sir Roden Cutler VC Research Centre and Library and the North Head Visitors Centre, which h includes the Whitelaw Room named by SHFT in honour of that distinguished RAA family. The Parliamentary Secretary for the Environment, Mr Bob Baldwin MP, formally opened the latter three sites on 21 May 2015.  As further evidence of the strong RAAHC/SHFT relationship our Chairman, Major General Tim Ford, AO (Retired), was invited to address formally the 21 May gathering.

The key role that I have as a member of the RAAHC Board is to facilitate the active interaction between SHFT and the Company on a regular basis.  The Liaison role is one that I have undertaken since joining the RAAHC Board in 2010.  Some of the outcomes of this active facilitation include the Dedication of the AMW in December 2012, the signing of a Memorandum of Understanding between SHFT and the RAAHC, which provides the RAAHC with rent-free facilities at North Fort, including the new Library building.  It was also in these rent-free facilities where the impressive restoration of the ANZAC Centennial Gun occurred. 

The relationship is certainly a mutually beneficial one and it means that the RAAHC participation is wider than North Fort and includes all SHFT's former artillery sites around the Harbour.  In addition to my liaison role I therefore also sit on SHFT's Community Advisory Committee and a historical sub-committee, which they have established.  More latterly Tim Ford and I also assisted SHFT with an advertising campaign which sort to find tenants to occupy the newly refurbished 1 and 3 St Barbara's Avenue homes Tim occupied when his father was Commanding Officer/Chief Instructor (CO/CI) in the mid1950s and which my family and I lived in when I was CO/CI in 1991/92.

I have taken a particularly active interest in RAA historical matters since retiring in 2007 and settling on the Northern Beaches of Sydney. That should be no surprise because I spent eight years of my military service at North Head, not including courses.  This involved three years as an Instructor in Gunnery (IG) after attending 16 Gunnery Staff Course in the UK; two years as the Senior Instructor Gunnery in Gunnery Wing, after Staff College; a year as the SO1 (Artillery) at the newly relocated Directorate of Artillery; and two years as the CO/CI.  This appointment also included the additional role as the Deputy Chairman of the RAA Historical Society.  The dedication of those early volunteers, determined to protect and maintain the heritage of the RAA, impressed me greatly and I was delighted to become a Life Governor of the Society.  The Regiment and I then parted company for a number of years but I never lost interest in RAA affairs and in 2001 I was privileged to become Head of Regiment, shortly after taking command of the Land Warfare Development Centre, in Puckapunyal.  This was a role I then maintained for just under two years, except for a seven-month break in 2002 when I was fortunate to command the Sector West brigade on operations in East Timor.  When I returned to Australia in 2007, following a three-year tour as Head of the Australian Defence Staff and Defence Adviser to the UK, NATO and the EU, I retired from the Army.  However, I was determined to give something back to the Regiment, which had done so much for me over 33 years of commissioned service.  I consequently accepted an invitation from Tim Ford, as the then Representative Colonel Commandant, to become the Regimental Committee's representative on the RAA Museum's Advisory Committee.  When the museum vacated North Fort it then became only a small step to join the RAAHC Board in 2010 and the rest is history."