Tens of thousands join Invasion Day rally as Melbourne marks Australia Day

Melburnians marked Australia Day in varied ways, some attending a protest advocating a change to the date and others enjoying the summer weather on a long weekend.

Police were out in force around the CBD as tens of thousands of people marched through the streets at an Invasion Day rally and a few dozen staged a counter-protest in support of the day.

A police officer watches protesters along the Yarra while Melburnians enjoy a barbecue.Credit: Jason South

Victoria Police said it was pleased with overall crowd behaviour and estimated 25,000 attended the Invasion Day protest, which started at Parliament House and finished at Flinders Street. There were no arrests and both protests were peaceful, although there was some shouting back and forth when a few members from each rally bumped into each other by the river.

Indi Clarke, a member of the First Peoples’ Assembly of Victoria, told the Invasion Day rally that January 26 represented the “beginning of dedicated attempts to wipe our people, our cultures, our language, off the face of this planet”.

Indigenous elder and historian Uncle Gary Foley said: “Today’s the day that we remind the Commonwealth that we’re still here. Today is the day that we remind them that we can’t have reconciliation without recognition.”

Speakers urged non-Indigenous Australians to learn about the country’s treatment of First Nations people, criticised media reporting of Indigenous affairs and slammed Opposition Leader Peter Dutton’s comment that he will not to stand in front of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander flags if he becomes prime minister.

The rally was backed by large numbers of pro-Palestine supporters who have marched through central Melbourne every Sunday since October 2023 to protest against the war in Gaza and Israel’s treatment of Palestinian people.

Nasser Mashni, of the Australian Palestine Advocacy Network, said he was there in solidarity with Australia’s Indigenous people.

“My dad used to bring me in the ’70s. They weren’t Invasion Day rallies then; they were commemorations … with perhaps 200 or 500 people. Nothing like this,” Mashni said.

The weekly pro-Palestine marches have been criticised by the government, opposition and business leaders as disruptive and divisive, and Premier Jacinta Allan recently called for an end to the Sunday rallies in light of the ceasefire in Gaza. Former prime minister and current US ambassador Kevin Rudd recently agreed to pass on to Canberra Jewish concerns about the impact of the protests.

An aerial view of Melbourne’s Invasion Day protest.Credit: Nine News

Victorian Chamber of Commerce and Industry acting chief executive Chanelle Pearson said on Sunday that “ongoing disruptions to our CBD traders have gone on far too long”.

“With the world’s eyes on Melbourne this weekend, these protests are not only harming our global reputation, but also dealing a significant blow to trade. Melbourne cannot afford to let this continue.”

Tilly Gunther, a 22-year-old from Bairnsdale, said those who complained about recent protests should look at the issues driving them.

She has attended three or four Invasion Day rallies, along with several pro-Palestine marches in the past year.

Australia Palestine Advocacy Network head Nasser Mashni, at a pro-Palestine rally in October.Credit: Wayne Taylor

“I just think there’s a bigger issue than part of the city being shut for a few hours,” she said.

The pro-Australia Day rally attracted a crowd of about 70, including white supremacist Jacob Hersant, who in October 2023 became the first person in Victoria charged with performing the Nazi salute.

The group marched down Olympic Boulevard to the sounds of Australian music blaring from four large speakers mounted on a trolley. They rallied outside Melbourne Park, though with the tennis yet to kick off for the day they were just about the only people there.

Rally organiser Matt Trihey delivered an anti-government, anti-migration speech.

Pro-Australia Day protesters, including white supremacist Jacob Hersant (outer right), marching towards Melbourne Park.Credit: Jason South

“We are simply a group of people who love this country, do not accept what is happening to this country and want change. That is why we are here,” Trihey said.

Police later broke up a small clash between the pro-Australia Day and Invasion Day groups when they bumped into each other along the Yarra River.

But plenty of people were out and about enjoying the sunshine without a view on the politics of the day. Friends Shaina Mittal, Nalini Harve and Valerie Klingenbeck spent the afternoon enjoying the warm weather by the Yarra River before going to watch the Australian Open men’s final at Melbourne Park.

“We’re just having a really relaxing Sunday with friends out for a picnic, enjoying the sun and just having some delicious snacks,” Mittal said.

Nalini Harve (left), Shaina Mittal (centre) and Valerie Klingenbeck picnic by the Yarra River.Credit: Jason South

Mittal said they weren’t celebrating Australia Day per se but were enjoying the day off.

“We’re more celebrating the long weekend, a long weekend off of work, just prepping for the coming weeks,” she said.

At the Invasion Day rally, Westgarth resident Carolyn Lunt said Australians should “ask blackfellas which day they would like to celebrate. It’s important for them to heal. It’s got to be a date they choose.”

Derek Hilton, a 52-year-old Quandamooka man with connections to Minjerribah (North Stradbroke Island), said the date of Australia Day should be changed, although he didn’t have a specific alternative in mind.

“If you want to celebrate it, it should be a multicultural day,” he said.

Katarina De Napoli, a 25-year-old from Wangaratta, said January 26 was not a day to celebrate. “So we’re here to hopefully make change. Abolish the date. Get rid of it.”

Deputy Opposition Leader Sussan Ley said in an Australia Day speech that it was a day for all Australians to feel proud.

“The problem with those [anti-Australia Day] activists is they are so fixated with projecting themselves as survivors that they leave no room for us to come together as citizens,” she said. “So we have to stand up against what those people are peddling today. We should be proud of being Australian and our Australia Day.”

She also compared the First Fleet to potential settlers on Mars. “All those years ago, those ships did not arrive, as some would have you believe, as invaders. They did not come to destroy or to pillage,” she said.

“In what could be compared to Elon Musk’s SpaceX’s efforts to build a new colony on Mars, men in boats arrived on the edge of the known world to embark on that new experiment. A new experiment and a new society.”

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said Australia had the “unique privilege” of sharing the ancient continent with the world’s oldest continuous culture, but he did not address the controversy that has sprung up around the date. He spoke at a citizenship ceremony in Canberra, welcoming new Australians to their new home.

“Today, in our big cities and country towns, at beaches and backyard barbecues, and in over 280 ceremonies like this one, we celebrate everything that brings Australia together and everything that sets our nation apart from the world,” he said. “We look back on all that we have built together and all that we have learned from each other.”

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