The Minister Assisting the Prime Minister on the Centenary of Anzac, Warren Snowdon, today announced $1.3 million initial funding towards the design and development of the Anzac Interpretive Centre in Albany, Western Australia, the first major project for the Centenary of Anzac.

Addressing the RSL State Congress in Perth, Mr Snowdon announced the Australian Government would provide funding towards the development of the Centre to honour the important role Albany played in the story of Anzac.

“The Anzac Interpretive Centre will go a long way in providing both a physical and virtual educational resource for all Australians and it will showcase the moving story of Albany, which provided for many Anzacs their last glimpse of home,” he said.

“Earlier this year I announced $250,000 towards a scoping study which will examine a range of options for the development of the Centre.” 

“Today’s initial funding ensure that when the scoping study is complete, detailed design and foundation work for the Centre can begin without delay,” Mr Snowdon said.

“This is a project of national significance that needs to be built, fitted out and operational by the start of the Centenary period in 2014, to properly commemorate the embarkation itself.”

The establishment of the Centre was a key recommendation of the National Commission on the Commemoration of the Anzac Centenary.

Mr Snowdon said Albany is a very appropriate site for the Interpretive Centre because the convoys carrying the Anzacs gathered and departed there in October-December 1914.

“Albany was the last the troops saw of their homeland before they started training in Egypt and the landings at Gallipoli in April 1915, and many would not ever return home.” 

The Interpretive Centre will overlook King George Sound where the convoys of ships gathered. It will house innovative, interactive technology which provides commemorative and educational material.

Mr Snowdon said the Centre will be supported by an Internet-based virtual Interpretive Centre, which will allow Australians and people from across the globe to access information on the convoys and the troops, sailors and nurses they carried.

“We hope this Centre will shed light on the vital, but little known, role that Albany played in the campaigns of the First World War.” 

The Government’s commitment was a further step forward in national preparations for the Anzac Centenary.

The funding announcement for the first project of the Anzac Centenary, follows the recent appointment of the Anzac Centenary Advisory Board which will provide high-level, strategic and independent advice to the Government on the planning and development of events and initiatives. 

The Advisory Board met for the first time in October and will reconvene next month.

For more information on plans to mark the Anzac Centenary visit www.anzaccentenary.gov.au

For design concepts and an artists impression of the Anzac Interpretive Centre, visit www.dva.gov.au/media