On 11 November the ANI held its Annual General Meeting conducted over Zoom. This allowed interstate members to attend. In the President’s Report, Vice Admiral Jones reported that:
- Despite COVID-19 the financial position of the ANI remains solid. As it did in 2020, the Council has tried to keep apace with the COVID-19 restrictions. The ANI fortunate that the lull in COVID allowed us to have our Annual Dinner. This year the highlights have been:
- The continued growth in membership which now stands at 330 plus about 30 non-financial members which Sue Hart is chasing down. This is a significant growth over recent years. To give you a sense of our improvement we had 261 members in 2018. The increase has largely been built on our events and in particular our webinar program.
- The ANI has also increased our corporate sponsors from 12 to 14. That gives us greater funding stability. I would like to acknowledge the strong support of our sponsors who have been very understanding as we have tried to deliver our activities despite COVID-19.
- In terms of these activities:
- The ANI had a very successful annual dinner with General Sir Peter Cosgrove delivering the Vernon Parker Oration.
- At the same event, Mr Ted Huber, the founder of Acacia Systems, became the 6threcipient of the McNeil Prize.
- In regard to other prizes we continue to give prizes to New Entry Officer graduates at the Naval College. The ANI now gives a complementary one-year membership to the winner of the new Rupert Long Prize for Maritime Intelligence Officers.
- The ANI has created the Commodore Sam Bateman Book Prize with the winner to be announced next month.
- As a result of COVID-19 the Goldrick Seminar on Future Maritime Operations was transitioned to eight Goldrick Webinars. This has been very successful with nearly 1,000 total views.
- The Australian Naval Review continues to grow in stature and will have two editions this year. Thanks to the editor Ben Page and his advisory panel.
- The ANI website and newsletter continues to grow in subscribers, hits and articles that we originate. The ANI has further tweaked the website this year. Some figures are:
- The website has had 106,000 visits for the year.
- In the past year, 630 articles were published. The average 2014-2020 was 420.
- The website attracts overseas attention, with 15% of hits coming from the US; 6% each coming from UK and India; and about 3% each from Canada and NZ.
- The revamped website is easier to search and navigate. Since the AUKUS announcement some ANI content has been quoted by some media organizations as they search for information. The ANI Council thanks Crispin Hull for his work on our behalf on the e-newsletter.
- This year we introduced a Themed Dinner into our activities. The first one was attended by the Chief of Navy, the High Commissioner for New Zealand and senior representatives from Navy, industry and academia to discuss maritime trade. This small event format was very successful in progressing the understanding of this issue and we will possibly hold two a year.
- ANI has now become an Accredited Defence Organisation and this will be important in the future as the educational worth of the ANI’s events are recognised for professional development.
- The objectives of the 2020-2023 ANI Strategy for membership and attendance at events have been essentially met. As a result, we are bringing forward strategy development by one year and we will launch a new strategy in early 2022.
- The planned activities in 2022 are:
- Following the success of the Goldrick webinar series over the last two years, the ANI will introduce a separate regular webinar series.
- The 2022 Goldrick event will be a two-day international Conference which marks the centenary of the death of naval strategist Sir Julian Corbett. There will be similar events held by King’s College, London and the US Naval War College. Our event will focus on Maritime Strategy in the Indo-Pacific and will be held 21-22 September 2022. This will be the biggest event the ANI has held for some decades and involve international and Australian speakers.
- One of the issues touched on by members in previous AGMs is the very healthy state of our bank balance and that in recent years we have had an operating surplus. The Council is investigating the creation of an ANI Scholarship to progress the study and understanding of Australian naval affairs. It would be funded by setting aside a portion of our savings in prudent investments and use the interest accrued to assist the study of an ANI Scholar. The United Services Institute in Canberra has a similar scheme in operation and they have shared with us their administrative rules. The Council thinking is to keep the equivalent of two years of operating funds in liquid reserves. The ANI would therefore anticipate placing $90,000 to $100,000 to be invested to fund the ANI Scholar. The Council will further develop the proposal in the first half of 2022 and that includes providing opportunities in that time for members to provide input. The aim would be for the first ANI Scholar to be in 2025 to coincide with the ANI’s 50th Anniversary.
- The Council will form a team to consider 50thAnniversary initiatives and will seek participation by members.
- For the second time running the ANI will administer, on CN’s behalf, his Essay Competition. Once again, the ANI will be sourcing judges from our members.
- The ANI will institute an ANI Prize to the Petty Officer’s Leadership Course. This is an initiative to reach out to our sailors.
- Finally, External Engagement. Commander Mike Collinson, the NZ Naval Advisor has been doing a lot of work on the Council in putting our engagement with kindred organizations both in Australia and overseas on a firmer footing. This work will bear much more tangible fruit in 2022.
The President thanked all the members of the ANI Council for their contribution to the ANI’s output. He also thanked the outgoing members for their support to me and the ANI. Richard Hobbs left the Council so some of the younger generation can join and the President particularly thanked him for his long service on the Council.
The new Council is listed at: https://navalinstitute.com.au/about-ani/ani-council/
The ANI’s activities are underpinned in large measure by support from our sponsors and the President thanked them for their generous support. Finally, he acknowledged the work of Sue Hart and Richard Hart at Commerce Management Services in ensuring the crucial administration and organisation is undertaken in a most professional way.
