Cut the cringe and restore Burke and Wills to their rightful place

In social studies classes, generations of Australian children have been captivated by the courage of Robert O’Hara Burke and William John Wills, who led the first European expedition to cross Australia south to north and reached the Gulf of Carpentaria in 1861. They died on the return journey. But the City of Melbourne’s push to banish their statue, made of bronze and granite in 1865, from the city square where it long stood before being mothballed several years ago to enable construction of part of the Metro Tunnel, reflects appalling disrespect for our history.

As former Victorian premier Jeff Kennett tells John Ferguson, the statue should stand at the heart of the city. Shifting it to a comparatively obscure location, a 20-minute walk from its old spot, is not good enough. It is the oldest piece of public art in Melbourne. The furore has erupted over sensitivities about Australia’s past and the number of colonial statues, particularly those of white men. Opponents of the statue should get a grip. For all the conflicts, privations, intrepid spirits and highs and lows of opening up our vast continent, it’s our history. And it is far better than that of most nations.

One plan, Ferguson writes, is to commission a First Nations sculpture depicting the Yandruwandha people, the Indigenous group who supported Burke and Wills before they died and who saved John King, the only one of the explorers to survive the expedition. The Yandruwandha people were an important part of the story. They deserve to be commemorated as well, so they are better known. But it is “fundamentally wrong”, as Mr Kennett says, to cancel the memory of Burke and Wills. Those colourful characters, Burke a policeman from Galway and Wills a surgeon and surveyor from Devon, are central to Melbourne’s story. Restore them to their rightful place.