Each ANZAC Day, we gather together just as the darkness is about to give way to the light of a new dawn. The symbolism is as poignant as it is powerful.

When this war memorial was erected — one of the first in Australia — that dawn must have seemed so very far off. It was unveiled on April 23, 1916, just shy of a year after the first ANZACs landed at Gallipoli.

As World War I raged on, the people of the Balmain peninsula began the solemn task of recording the names of their fallen.

Maybe you stop once in a while to read those names.

Maybe, in the busy hum of daily life, those names have receded into the background as you walk past them.

But they are held here in place for us. Names that belonged to young men who once walked these very streets.

Young men who went to war and never came home.

Take just the first four names on one of the panels, each of them among Gallipoli’s dead.

Private John Percy Ratcliffe. Killed in action on 19 May, 1915.

Private Alexander Ramsey Rae. Killed in action 11 days later on 30 May.

Private Sydney Anthony South. Killed in action on 6 August that same year.

And Private Cecil Robert Winch, who arrived at Gallipoli on 25 April, 1915, that date that is so indelibly stamped upon the Australia identity.

Whatever naive sense of adventure that war still held for many ended that day. Private Winch’s first day at Gallipoli was also his last.  

It continued across the killing fields of the Western Front. And, when the war to end all wars turned out to be anything but, it just kept continuing.

Time and time again, Australians have stood against the forces of darkness on land and sea and air. Indeed, this year is the centenary of the Royal Australian Airforce.

The RAAF’s history is truly a proud one. We give thanks to all who have served, and those who serve still.

I want to make a special mention of Beryl Barton, who was born just a few kilometres away in Camperdown.

It was her 100th birthday on Tuesday. I wish her many happy returns.

In May 1942, she joined the Women’s Auxiliary Air Force as a driver. Shortly after Beryl signed up, the war arrived in Sydney Harbour when Japanese mini-subs launched an attack.

She stepped up when she was needed. Like so many Australians. We have stood against the darkness unbowed.

But darkness is not vanquished from the world. Freedom is not something we can take for granted. Nor is freedom free.

We gather here to remember those who have paid its price — and those who are still paying its price. For so many, the war does not end when they leave the battlefield.

It comes as some relief that, after a long campaign by relatives who’ve lost love ones, there will finally be a Royal Commission into Veteran Suicide.

This year alone, we have already lost 18 to suicide – and it is only April. 3 To them, and all those who have gone before, and those who are at any risk now, we owe them this much at the very least.

Some have been fortunate enough to turn the weight of war into something else.

I can only imagine what burden that proud son of Balmain, Tom Uren, carried in his heart. In the dreadful depths of World War II, my mentor and dear friend saw the very worst of humanity.

But in peace, he was forever after driven to seek out its best. He held up the past to us and, in doing so, he held out the hope of a better future. 

That is the spirit that brings us together here. To remember — because there are some things we cannot afford to repeat. We turn back to this memorial and the names upon it.

They join together, holding up that light that has glowed through the night.

It reminds that even when darkness surrounds us, there have always been Australians who instinctively rise to push it back until the sun shines upon us all again.

They unite us in sorrow, in pride, in gratitude, and most importantly, in hope.

We hold on to their names, and we give our thanks.

We can never let them fade.

Lest we forget.