Well, look, it is a real thrill to be here at the Australian War Memorial on the eve of Anzac week.
And it’s great to be with the Governor-General Sir Peter Cosgrove; it’s good to be here with the Director of the War Memorial Dr Brendan Nelson, who has done so much over the last couple of years to keep alive the Anzac story, to keep the flame burning in our hearts.
This will be a very significant time for our country.
It will be a time to reflect on the great men and women whose sacrifice has helped to keep us free and whose spirit still breathes over our country 100 years on.
I will be in Gallipoli on 24 and 25 April. On the 24th, I will attend the international service – the British service. On the 25th, I will attend the joint Australia and New Zealand dawn service, then the Australian service at Lone Pine and the New Zealand service at Chunuk Bair.
As well, as part of this trip, I will be talking to the Turkish government and then subsequently the French government about the interests we have in common, because from the time of ANZAC to this day, there are threats to our freedom, there are threats to our national and international security and it's important that good and decent countries should stand together and work together to keep their own people and all people as safe as we humanly can be.
While the focus this week is inevitably and naturally on the events at Gallipoli 100 years ago, our war did not end at Gallipoli. The men of the first AIF subsequently went to France, Sinai and Palestine.
So, we don't just remember the men of Gallipoli; we remember the Western Front.
We remember not just the magnificent failure at Gallipoli; we look forward to the terrible success on the Western Front.
We think of the campaign in Sinai and Palestine and the Australians who helped deliver at Jerusalem and Damascus, as well as the Australians and the New Zealanders who first stormed ashore on 25 April 1915.
So, a significant and solemn time in our national life.
I have one message, if you like, today, and that is to those millions of Australians who have not yet been to an Anzac Day event: please don't let this anniversary pass without attending one.
Best thing you can do this Anzac Day, to celebrate our country, to honour our values, to support the men and women of our armed forces is to attend an Anzac Day service and I hope every single Australian, one way or another, will attend an Anzac Day service at some point over the next few days.
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