Daniel Andrews slams ‘ridiculous’ call to change Victoria’s name

Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews has slammed a call to change the state’s name over its links to the country’s colonial past, calling the idea “ridiculous”.

Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews has rejected a “ridiculous” suggestion that the state’s name should be changed due to its links to Australia’s colonial past.

The idea was raised this week by Victorian Greens Senate candidate Lidia Thorpe – the state’s first Indigenous female MP – who argued: “We need to be making decisions, changing place names, state names and anything else that causes harm.”

“I think that’s absolutely ridiculous,” Mr Andrews told reporters on Wednesday.

“I’m not interested in symbols and divisive debates, I’m interested in action that sees Aboriginal people have far greater control over their lives and Aboriginal policy and Indigenous affairs and a shared future – one that recognises our past but one that is fundamentally based in justice and a treaty for the future. I don’t think that suggestion is compatible with my outlook, and not just my words, but our action.”

Opposition Leader Michael O’Brien said, “I’d thought I’d heard every stupid idea under the sun, but that takes the cake.”

The global Black Lives Matter protests, riots and looting in response to the killing of George Floyd have reignited debates around statues, monuments and other reminders of controversial historical figures.

Victoria is named after Queen Victoria, who ruled the British Empire from 1837 until 1901. Last week, a statue of Queen Victoria in the northern English city of Leeds was painted with the words “murderer”, “slave owner” and “BLM”.

“Given we’re all talking about the colonial past and how everything’s named as a result of invasion of this country, why wouldn’t we negotiate that?” Ms Thorpe told news.com.au yesterday.

“It may be that it stays the same. But why wouldn’t we put that on the table?”

She said Queensland could do the same. “Maybe that’s something they could negotiate,” she said.

There are also calls to remove references to Melbourne co-founder John Batman – such as Batman Ave – due to his involvement in capturing Indigenous Australians in the 1800s.

“There’s a number of monuments and statues to John Batman in Melbourne, and I think there’s a case to be made around perhaps them being given a less prominent place in our city,” City of Melbourne councillor Nicholas Reece told 3AW.

Speaking to Ms Thorpe yesterday, 3AW host Neil Mitchell said: “You talk about unity, (but) when you talk about changing names of states and things I think you’re potentially creating division.”

He went on: “Because there would be many people who think, ‘Well, why should we?’ You’re saying, if we don’t do it it’s almost an insult.”

Council workers clean graffiti from a statue of Queen Victoria in Leeds on June 10. Picture: Danny Lawson/PA via AP

The graffiti included the letters ‘BLM’ and the words ‘murderer’ and ‘slave owner’. Picture: Danny Lawson/PA via AP

Queen Victoria ruled the British Empire from 1837 until 1901. Picture: Paul Ellis/AFP

Ms Thorpe said she challenged people “to learn about these so-called heroes or explorers a little bit more and learn about the black history, about what’s happened, and then let’s have another conversation”.

On Tuesday night, Gippsland’s Wellington Shire Council voted against the removal of two monuments honouring Scottish explorer Angus McMillan, who was accused of Indigenous massacres.

It comes as Western Australian craft beer brand Colonial Brewing Co said it would consider changing its name following intense campaigning by a Melbourne activist.

Freelance journalist Shaad D’Souza has led calls for Colonial to ditch its name for three years, claiming it “glorifies and glamorises the colonial process that destroyed cultures and countries across the globe”.

The company said in a statement that the name was not chosen to celebration colonisation but rather because “it was one of the first to establish itself in the well-regarded wine region of Margaret River, colonialising the wine region with one of the first craft breweries”.

WA Premier Mark McGowan said on Tuesday he believed the controversy was “taking (things) a bit far”.

“I don’t think it’s necessary but it’s a commercial decision for the company,” Mr McGowan told reporters.

A number of statues have been torn down or defaced in protests across the west in recent weeks, in often chaotic scenes.

Earlier this week, a staffer for NSW Greens MP David Shoebridge was one of two women charged with defacing a statue of Captain Cook in Hyde Park on Sunday, prompting Premier Gladys Berejiklian to warn of tougher penalties for people who vandalise historic monuments.

A protester was shot during a scuffle with a counter-protester in Albuquerque, New Mexico, this week as well, where the crowd was attempting to tear down a statue of 16th century Spanish conquistador Juan de Onate.

Last week, a protester helping tear down a Confederate monument in Portsmouth, Virginia was struck in the head as the statue fell, leaving him in a coma.

A Facebook poll of news.com.au readers yesterday received nearly 9000 votes, with 93 per cent saying they were opposed to changing Victoria’s name.

“We criticise the Germans for denying the Holocaust ever happened and we criticise the Chinese for pretending that Tiananmen Square never happened,” one reader wrote.

“Here is our ‘woke’ generation wanting to do the same. Being an ostrich won’t change our history.”

Another reader quoted George Orwell’s 1984.

“Every record has been destroyed or falsified, every book rewritten, every picture has been repainted, every statue and street building has been renamed, every date has been altered. And the process is continuing day by day and minute by minute. History has stopped. Nothing exists except an endless present in which the Party is always right.”

– with Rohan Smith and Shannon Molloy