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Report by
National Chair
The Hon. Margaret White AO
It is with a sense of impending loss that I write this, my final
Annual Report. I shall retire as National Chair and from the Board
of the Trust at the Annual General Meeting on 14 June 2017. It
has been a significant honour to lead the Board of an institution
which has had an effect on almost every aspect of Australian life
from its inception in 1965.
Over those ensuing fifty-one years much of our world and the
way in which we live has changed almost beyond recognition.
Nonetheless, constantly, year after year, there has been a group
of outstanding Australians, determined to achieve excellence
in their many fields of endeavour and to deliver benefit to their
country – Churchill Fellows.
Another, rather surprising, constant has seen Winston
Churchill remain firmly fixed in the Anglo-American-Australian
consciousness. As I write, the film “Churchill” directed by
Australian Jonathan Teplitzky, is currently in our cinemas with
another, “Darkest Hour” directed by Joe Wright, on the way. They
bookend the Second World War. The first covers D-Day. The
second the perilous weeks before the declaration of war.
In both films Churchill is the central figure. Yet, from time to
time, there has been a concern that the Trust may struggle to
make relevant, let alone “perpetuate and honour”, the memory
of Winston Churchill, the first object of the Trust, to Australians
today. As the people of the Western democracies struggle to
identify strong, principled leaders it is not at all surprising that
Churchill continues to be a figure of considerable interest.
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Bob was, above all, a problem solver and a doer. The Trust is
greatly honoured that, having been a Fellow himself, he identified
in the Trust the appropriate vehicle for finding the doers and
problem solvers he would support. He closely scrutinised the
Trust’s processes for selection. He was satisfied that the selection
was made by skilled volunteers and that the administration, while
not as lean as his own life’s spending, nonetheless was suitably
frugal with donated money. There have to date been some 36
recipients of Fellowships funded by him and his late wife, June.
There will be more since he bequeathed his estate to the Trust.
It is with a sense of impending loss
that I write this, my final Annual
Report. It has been a significant
honour to lead the Board of an
institution which has had an effect on
almost every aspect of Australian
life from its inception in 1965.”
As the years pass since the first Fellows travelled in 1966 fewer
are able to attend the Churchill Fellows’ Association (CFA) dinners
around the country and gradually the older early travellers are
passing.
Recalling early Fellows, I was delighted to receive during the year
a copy of “Bringing Knowledge Home” an initiative of the CFA
of Tasmania. It describes every Tasmanian Fellow from 1965 to
2015 devoting a page of text and a page of photographs to each.
Robert (Bob) Prickett is one. He was a 1967 Churchill Fellow,
an engineer and one of the Trust’s most generous and loyal
benefactors. He died peacefully in far North Queensland on 3
January 2017. His project was “to study public health aspects of
water supply, sewerage treatment and re-use in tropical and arid
regions” in the USA. On his passing he was described by the peak
international body for water excellence as “a character…almost
with legend status”.
The Honourable William Cox AC, who was National Chairman
when I joined the Board as a Director in 2003 just prior to his
appointment as Governor of Tasmania, has written the forward.
He exemplifies the devotion which involvement with the Trust
inspires. He was part of a group of door-knockers in 1965
collecting to establish a memorial to Churchill and subsequently
served on the Tasmanian Selection Committee and on the Board
as Director and finally as National Chair.