Meet the 2026 Board:
Linda Roberts – President
Linda Roberts joined the National Trust ACT board in 2008, stepping into the role of president in November 2025. With a background in education and tourism, she was sought by ACT Heritage to develop heritage trails. Linda oversaw the establishment of the Canberra Tracks network with over 230 interpretive signs and supporting media. Linda was also the coordinator of 14 local heritage festivals and brings a vast corporate knowledge of heritage in the ACT and those who share this enthusiasm to her new role.
Her passion is to showcase our local history through tours and storytelling. She is very active in helping to design and deliver a program of National Trust tours and events. As president, Linda endeavours to make the Trust the organisation that agencies, industry and community groups look to for advocacy and promotion of the conservation of our irreplaceable heritage.
Prof. Tracy Ireland – Vice President
Tracy Ireland is Emeritus Professor of Cultural Heritage at the University of Canberra. An archaeologist and heritage practitioner, she is known for her cultural sector leadership and research on community heritage values which has influenced practice and public policy in Australia and abroad. Tracy is the immediate past President of Australia ICOMOS, Editor of Historic Environment, Adjunct Professor in Humanities at the University of Western Australia, Honorary Fellow in the Department of Archaeology at the University of York, UK, and a Fellow of the Society of Antiquaries, London.
Scott McAlister – Treasurer
Scott is a lifelong Canberra resident and has resided in a heritage-listed home in Reid for nearly 30 years. He and his wife Helen are avid gardeners and have had their Reid home and garden feature as part of the Australian Open Gardens scheme. It has also been an inaugural ‘house’ for the very popular joint National Trust/Reid Residents’ Association annual open house walk in Reid. At one of these openings Scott was approached to be Treasurer for the National Trust and he has fulfilled that role ever since!
Scott has enjoyed a career in banking and finance, during which time he completed a Bachelor of Commerce degree part time, and is a qualified Certified Practicing Accountant which sees him well suited for his role within the Trust. He is also a keen runner and cyclist with the latter activity giving him the impetus to develop and run the annual National Trust Heritage Polaris cycling event; a very popular and successful event for the Trust for the last 10 years.
Linda Keyser – Secretary and Executive Director
Linda brings extensive management and consulting experience to her role as Executive Director, having worked in government at the federal and state levels, and in not-for-profit and private enterprise organisations. With a degree in education her career was built in the Employment & Training sector and later, as a strategic business consultant, in Emergency Services, working in a multitude of diverse settings including with First Nations communities in remote WA.
Her work has evidenced time and time again the benefits a sense of identity, place and belonging brings to individuals and communities, hence her commitment to heritage conservation. Linda also has an obsession for restoration and has renovated several homes including a Federation worker’s cottage, an Edwardian, a Californian Bungalow and a former Cobb & Co. staging station.
Eric Martin AM, Board Director
Eric Martin is an architect who has practiced since 1973, mainly in Canberra. His experience in Building Conservation and Access is recognised nationally and his work extends to all states and territories. He was a member of the International ISO Committee on Access to Heritage Places.
Eric was founding Chair of the ACT Heritage Council in 1992, President of the National Trust (ACT) for 9 years, and a long serving member of the Heritage Committee. He was a member of the Australian Council of National Trusts Board for 11 years. Eric is also a life fellow of the Australian Institute of Architects. He is currently a member of the Institute’s National Heritage Committee and a past Chair.
In 2005 Eric was granted the award of Member of the Order of Australia in recognition of his contribution to heritage, conservation and disability access matters in Australia.
Mary Johnston, Board Director
Born in Adelaide, Mary completed school and university in Sydney. She worked in research at the University of Sydney then at the Australian National University (ANU), after moving to Canberra in 1978. Mary joined the public service in the 1980s and worked across a number of portfolios, retiring as an SES officer from the Education Department in 2008.
Mary has a long-standing interest in history (having studied it at university), heritage (she and her husband owned an 1830s house near Bungendore) and the National Trust. Mary met her husband on a Trust tour of Balmain!
Initially joining the Tours and Events Committee which she now chairs, Mary went on to become a member of the Council of the National Trust (ACT). Her interests now also encompass being a member of the Branch Committee of the Australian Garden History Society.
Gary Kent, Board Director
Gary holds Bachelors of Commerce and Law from the University of Melbourne, a Grad Dip in Public Law from ANU and is a Graduate of the Australian Institute of Company Directors. His long career in the Australian Public Service, included chief of staff roles to several Federal Ministers and Company Secretary of the Defence Housing Authority.
Gary has been a National Trust member for 10 years and a member of the ACT Council since October 2018. He was President from December 2018 until stepping down in November 2025, remaining on Council and now chairing the Corporate Committee.
Gary served 11 years on the Committee of the Friends of the National Library, including 7 years as Chair. He was President of the Liberal Party of Australia (ACT Division) from 2000 to 2007. He is currently Vice-President of the Canberra and District Historical Society and an ACT representative on the Federation of Australian Historical Societies. He is a keen book collector, specialising in books, manuscripts and ephemera published in colonial Victoria and is currently co-authoring a bibliography of Australian private libraries.
Kerry Blackburn, Board Director
Kerry has been a member of Council for since 2021. She is also a volunteer guide at the National Library and Lanyon Homestead and was formerly chair of the Friends of the National Library and editor of its quarterly newsletter. Kerry also contracts as a copy editor for the Defence Air Space and Power Centre’s journal papers and other publications.
Kerry is a long-term resident of Canberra since moving here in the early 1980s for work. She completed a BA (Psychology; Industrial Relations) at the University of Western Australia and worked in the Department of Employment and Industrial Relations. In Canberra, she worked with Social Security before joining Veterans’ Affairs. Kerry retired from DVA as head of the Commemorations Division; among her responsibilities were coordinating Anzac Day commemorations at Gallipoli, education and historical publications, overseas missions with veterans, and working with ministers.
Roslyn Hull, Board Director
Roslyn is an Aboriginal woman and proud of her Maiawali heritage. She acknowledges the Ngunnawal people as the first people of this region and is respectful to all Elders.
Her professional career in Canberra evolved from museum education into curation and management, principally with the National Capital Authority, but also with the Australian War Memorial and the Australian National Botanic Gardens. She is still the resident storyteller at the ANBG.
Roslyn was the NCA’s curator for both the redevelopment of the National Capital Exhibition and Blundells Cottage and has designed and implemented interpretation for most NCA managed sites, including Anzac Parade and Reconciliation Place. After 25 years in the museum sector, Roslyn is enjoying an active retirement but retains her passion for the untold stories of our shared heritage – the stories of First Nations, and of women, children and nameless workers.
Rachelle Miller, Board Director
Rachelle attended Monash University, graduating with a BA (Graphic Design). She commenced her career as a designer with two of Australia’s most awarded branding agencies.
Rachelle then moved into politics, working as an adviser to numerous federal government parliamentarians and ministers, including as a Senior Media Adviser to several cabinet ministers in the Abbott and Turnbull governments.
After leaving politics Rachelle has used her media and communication strategy, strategic writing and creative skills as a management consultant advising senior APS leaders, including as a Senior Manager at a ‘Big 4’ firm in their federal government strategy consulting business in Canberra. She is currently an independent consultant working predominantly on strategic communications and writing within Defence.
