Parliament House, Canberra

The Australian Capital Territory (ACT), known as the Federal Capital Territory (FCT) until 1938, is a federal territory of Australia. Canberra, the capital city of Australia, is located in this territory. It is located in southeastern Australian mainland as an enclave completely within the state of New South Wales. Founded after Federation as the seat of government for the new nation, the territory hosts the headquarters of all important institutions of the Australian Government. On 1 January 1901, federation of the colonies of Australia was achieved. Section 125 of the new Australian Constitution provided that land, situated in New South Wales and at least 100 mi (160 km) from Sydney, would be ceded to the new federal government. Following discussion and exploration of various areas within New South Wales, the Seat of Government Act 1908 was passed in 1908 which specified a capital in the Yass-Canberra region. The territory was transferred to the federal government by New South Wales in 1911, two years prior to the capital city being founded and formally named as Canberra in 1913. While the overwhelming majority of the population reside in the city of Canberra in the ACT's north-east, the territory also includes some towns such as Williamsdale, Oaks Estate, Uriarra, Tharwa and Hall. The ACT also includes the Namadgi National Park which comprises the majority of land area of the territory. Despite a common misconception, the Jervis Bay Territory is not part of the ACT although the laws of the Australian Capital Territory apply as if Jervis Bay did form part of the ACT. The territory has a relatively dry, continental climate experiencing warm to hot summers and cool to cold winters. The Australian Capital Territory is home to many important institutions of the federal government, national monuments and museums. This includes the Parliament of Australia, the High Court of Australia, the Australian Defence Force Academy and the Australian War Memorial. It also hosts the majority of foreign embassies in Australia as well as regional headquarters of many international organisations, not-for-profit groups, lobbying groups and professional associations. Several major universities also have campuses in the ACT including the Australian National University, the University of Canberra, the University of New South Wales, Charles Sturt University and the Australian Catholic University. A locally elected legislative assembly has governed the territory since 1988. However, the Commonwealth maintains authority over the territory and may overturn local laws. It still maintains control over the area known as the Parliamentary Triangle through the National Capital Authority. Residents of the territory elect three members of the House of Representatives and two senators. With 453,324 residents, the Australian Capital Territory is the second smallest mainland state or territory by population. At the 2016 census, the median weekly income for people in the territory aged over 15 was $998, significantly higher than the national average of $662. The average level of degree qualification in the ACT is also higher than the national average. Within the ACT, 37.1% of the population hold a bachelor's degree level or above education compared to the national figure of 20%.In September 2022, it was announced the border between NSW and the ACT would change for the first time since it was created in 1911. ACT chief minister Andrew Barr said NSW premier Dominic Perrottet had agreed to a proposed border change of 330 ha (1.3 sq mi) in the Ginninderra watershed.

Enlighten Canberra is an outdoor annual art and cultural festival held in Canberra, Australia featuring illuminating light installations and projections, performances from local and interstate musicians, a short film festival and the Canberra Balloon Spectacular. The festival is an Australian Capital Territory (ACT) Government initiative held annually in early March, encouraging people to "See Canberra in a whole new light." The centrepiece of Enlighten Canberra is the illuminating of Canberra's cultural institutions after dark, including Old Parliament House, Parliament House and the National Gallery of Australia (since the 2011 event) as well as the National Portrait Gallery and Questacon (since the 2012 event). There is also live music, film screenings and after-hours tours. Since its inception, Enlighten has become increasingly popular, attracting 115,000 visitors in 2013 and 131,500 in 2014. Attendance rose again in 2015, to 287,874 visitors.

Capital Hill (postcode: 2600) is the location of Parliament House, Canberra, at the south apex of the land axis of the Parliamentary Triangle. The site was selected as the location of the Capitol in Walter Burley Griffin's Canberra design in 1912, which he envisaged to be "either a general administration structure for popular receptions and ceremony or for housing archives and commemorating Australian Achievements". The proposed building is commemorated in the name of the Capitol Theatre, Manuka. However, Griffin's name for the hill was subsequently changed to Capital Hill. The Parliament buildings were to be located a little further down the hill towards Lake Burley Griffin at Camp Hill, between Capital Hill and the Provisional Parliament House. Griffin opposed the plan to build a Provisional Parliament House on the lower slopes of Camp Hill, because he considered that it would make it difficult to build the permanent Parliament House on Camp Hill, as the provisional building would have to be demolished.In fact, in the 1958 and 1964 Holford plans for the Parliamentary Triangle, the site for the New Parliament House was moved to the lake shore, partly for this reason. Holford also reportedly said that a lakeside site would discourage politicians from seeing themselves as superior to ordinary people. However, in 1974 Parliament voted to move the Parliament to its permanent location on Capital Hill, which it saw as befitting the eminence of the institution. Construction of the new parliament buildings commenced in 1981 and the new building was officially opened by Queen Elizabeth II in 1988, when the Parliament relocated from the old building. Capital Hill was previously named Kurrajong Hill and is around 2.5 km2, surrounded by a circular road (Capital Circle). Until the construction of the current Parliament House, the hill was covered with scrubby native bushland. The construction of the current parliament building required removing much of the top half of the hill, and after construction, much of the earth was replaced on top of the building. The surrounding hill is landscaped with native plants, while the soil on top of Parliament House is planted with lawn. However, on the western side of the Hill, a small area of the original native bushland has been preserved. The streets that go out from Capital Hill are named after Australian capitals, and some of their direction roughly corresponds to the direction of that capital city, Melbourne Avenue, Adelaide Avenue, Perth Avenue, Hobart Avenue and Darwin Avenue with Brisbane Avenue, Sydney Avenue not even being close. The streets which surround the hill in concentric circles are named after increasing spheres of influence with the inner-most circle called Parliament drive and then spanning out to Capital Circle, State Circle, National Circuit, Dominion Circuit and Empire Circuit. When Griffin drew up his plans in 1912, there was still some optimism that New Zealand might join the Federation of Australia. Griffin's plans included eight avenues radiating out from Capital Hill named after the capitals of the six states, the capital of the Northern Territory and the capital of New Zealand. Before the name Wellington Avenue was gazetted, it was realised that New Zealand was not going to become part of a Confederation of Australasia and the name was replaced by Canberra Avenue. Griffin planned that the state capital city avenues were terminated with a park named after the generic botanical name for a native plant from that particular site; for example, Telopea Park is named after the waratah, the floral emblem of New South Wales, and is at the end of Sydney Avenue, named after the capital of New South Wales. The name of the precinct of Manuka is a remnant of Griffin's naming scheme. Another remnant of Griffin's nomenclature was the Wellington Hotel, formerly on the corner of Canberra Avenue and National Circuit, which was demolished and replaced by the hotel known as of 2007 as Rydges Capital Hill Canberra.

Australia Day Live is a concert which is hosted each year on Australia Day, on 26 January at the forecourt of the Sydney Opera House and Sydney Harbour. The concert features music from Australian artists and musicians.

The Senate is the upper house of the bicameral Parliament of Australia, the lower house being the House of Representatives. The composition and powers of the Senate are established in Chapter I of the Constitution of Australia. There are a total of 76 senators: 12 are elected from each of the six Australian states regardless of population and 2 from each of the two autonomous internal Australian territories (the Australian Capital Territory and the Northern Territory). Senators are popularly elected under the single transferable vote system of proportional representation. The Australian Senate is vested with significant powers (unlike upper houses in other Westminster-style parliamentary systems) including the capacity to reject all bills, including budget and appropriation bills, initiated by the government in the House of Representatives. This makes it a distinctive hybrid of British Westminster bicameralism and American-style bicameralism. As a result of proportional representation, the chamber features a multitude of parties vying for power. Since 1981, the governing party or parties (which needs to maintain the confidence of the lower house) has only had a majority in the Senate from 2005–2007; otherwise, negotiations with other parties and independents have generally been necessary to pass legislation.

The House of Representatives is the lower house of the bicameral Parliament of Australia, the upper house being the Senate. Its composition and powers are established in Chapter I of the Constitution of Australia. The term of members of the House of Representatives is a maximum of three years from the date of the first sitting of the House, but on only one occasion since Federation has the maximum term been reached. The House is almost always dissolved earlier, usually alone but sometimes in a double dissolution of both Houses. Elections for members of the House of Representatives are often held in conjunction with those for the Senate. A member of the House may be referred to as a "Member of Parliament" ("MP" or "Member"), while a member of the Senate is usually referred to as a "Senator". The government of the day and by extension the Prime Minister must achieve and maintain the confidence of this House in order to gain and remain in power. The House of Representatives currently consists of 151 members, elected by and representing single member districts known as electoral divisions (commonly referred to as "electorates" or "seats"). The number of members is not fixed but can vary with boundary changes resulting from electoral redistributions, which are required on a regular basis. The most recent overall increase in the size of the House, which came into effect at the 1984 election, increased the number of members from 125 to 148. It reduced to 147 at the 1993 election, returned to 148 at the 1996 election, increased to 150 at the 2001 election, and stands at 151 as of the 2022 Australian federal election.The House of Representatives chamber is designed to seat up to 172 Members, with provision for an ultimate total of 240 to be accommodated.Each division elects one member using full-preferential instant-runoff voting. This was put in place after the 1918 Swan by-election, which Labor unexpectedly won with the largest primary vote and the help of vote splitting in the conservative parties. The Nationalist government of the time changed the lower house voting system from first-past-the-post to full-preferential voting, effective from the 1919 general election.

The 2009 Australian dust storm, also known as the Eastern Australian dust storm, was a dust storm that swept across the Australian states of New South Wales and Queensland from 22 to 24 September 2009. The capital, Canberra, experienced the dust storm on 22 September, and on 23 September the storm reached Sydney and Brisbane. Some of the thousands of tons of dirt and soil lifted in the dust storm were dumped in Sydney Harbour and the Tasman Sea. On 23 September, the dust plume measured more than 500 kilometres (310 mi) in width and 1,000 kilometres (620 mi) in length and covered dozens of towns and cities in two states. By 24 September, analysis using MODIS at NASA measured the distance from the northern edge at Cape York to the southern edge of the plume to be 3,450 km. While the cloud was visible from space, on the ground the intense red-orange colour and drop in temperature drew comparisons with nuclear winter, Armageddon, and the planet Mars.The dust storm was described by the Bureau of Meteorology as a "pretty incredible event" that was the worst in the state of New South Wales in nearly 70 years. The phenomenon was reported around the world. The Weather Channel's Richard Whitaker said: "This is unprecedented. We are seeing earth, wind and fire together". It was later referred to as "The mother of all dust storms."

The Parliament of Australia (officially the Federal Parliament, also called the Commonwealth Parliament) is the legislative branch of the government of Australia. It consists of three elements: the monarch (represented by the governor-general), the Senate and the House of Representatives. The combination of two elected chambers, in which the members of the Senate represent the states and territories while the members of the House represent electoral divisions according to population, is modelled on the United States Congress. Through both chambers, however, there is a fused executive, drawn from the Westminster system.The upper house, the Senate, consists of 76 members: twelve for each state, and two each for the territories, Northern Territory (including Christmas Island and the Cocos (Keeling) Islands) and the Australian Capital Territory (including Norfolk Island and the Jervis Bay Territory). Senators are elected using the single transferable vote proportional representation system and as a result, the chamber features a multitude of parties vying for power. The governing party or coalition has not held a majority in the Senate since 1981 (except between 2005 and 2007) and usually needs to negotiate with other parties and Independents to get legislation passed.The lower house, the House of Representatives, currently consists of 151 members, each elected using full-preference instant-runoff voting from single-member constituencies known as electoral divisions (and commonly referred to as "electorates" or "seats"). This tends to lead to the chamber being dominated by two major political groups, the centre-right Coalition (consisting of the Liberal and National Parties) and the centre-left Labor Party. The government of the day must achieve the confidence of this House in order to gain and remain in power. The House of Representatives has a maximum term of three years, although it can be dissolved early. The Senate has fixed terms, with 36 Senators' terms expiring every three years (the terms of the four territory senators are linked to House elections). As a result, House and Senate elections almost always coincide. A deadlock-breaking mechanism known as a double dissolution can be used to dissolve the full Senate as well as the House if the Senate refuses to pass a piece of legislation passed by the House.The two Houses meet in separate chambers of Parliament House (except in a rare joint sitting) on Capital Hill in Canberra, Australian Capital Territory.

South Canberra, or the Inner South, is a subdivision of Canberra Central in the Australian Capital Territory in Australia. South Canberra is only separated from North Canberra only by Lake Burley Griffin. The two subdivisions combined form the district of Canberra Central and share Civic as their central commercial area. It is one of the oldest parts of Canberra and is built in part in accordance to Walter Burley Griffin's designs. According to the 2021 census, South Canberra's population was 31,592.

The Commission for the Conservation of Southern Bluefin Tuna (CCSBT) is a Regional fisheries management organisation and international organization with the purpose of managing the stocks of the critically endangered Southern bluefin tuna.The secretariat is housed in Canberra, Australia. CCSBT was established by International treaty signed in Canberra on 10 May 1993 by Australia, Japan, and New Zealand, with the commission commencing a year later. Over the years additional nations have joined.

The High Commission of Canada in Australia is the diplomatic mission of Canada to Australia. It is located on Commonwealth Avenue, near State Circle, in the Australian capital city of Canberra. In addition to responsibility for bilateral relations between Canada and Australia, it is also responsible for relations with several Pacific Island nations, including the Marshall Islands, the Federated States of Micronesia, Nauru, Palau, Papua New Guinea, the Solomon Islands and Vanuatu.

The Canberra 400 was a V8 Supercars event on the Canberra Street Circuit in Canberra, Australian Capital Territory, Australia. The race only had a short life, running from 2000 to 2002 over the Queen's Birthday holiday weekend in June.