‘Bigger priorities than changing Australia Day’
Indigenous figures say changing the day isn’t a priority, citing low Covid vaccinations and a voice to parliament as the immediate hurdles.
Leading Indigenous figures say changing the date of Australia Day is not a priority issue, citing low Covid-19 vaccination rates and the establishment of a voice to parliament as the immediate political hurdles facing Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people.
Yet while Australia Day is not considered the biggest issue facing Aboriginal Australians, most Indigenous leaders have no enthusiasm for the day being celebrated on January 26 and would prefer it eventually be changed.
Marcia Langton, the co-chair of the government’s panel that designed the stalled Indigenous voice, said she would not be celebrating Australia Day on Wednesday. “I can’t really get involved in promoting the day, especially when so much said about Australia Day is based on mythology,” she said.
“The facts of Aboriginal history and Australian history are simply not acknowledged.”
Professor Langton said she did not think the date of the national day would change in her lifetime and there were more pressing issues facing Aboriginal Australians in the near term.
“It doesn’t have a high priority in my political list at the moment,” she said. “There are much more important issues – like Aboriginal communities making it through the pandemic without huge losses of life.
“That is very important to me.”
Dean Parkin, a prominent advocate of the Uluru Statement from the Heart, said the priority in addressing issues facing Indigenous Australians was to hold a referendum on a voice to parliament after the next federal election. “The real question, particularly right now for all of us, is how can we bring Australians together and how can we meaningfully address some of the critical issues facing Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people?” he said.
“I believe the best way we can do that is through a referendum on an Indigenous voice to parliament in the next term of parliament. It addresses the need for symbolism through constitutional recognition and has practical benefits for both Indigenous and non-Indigenous Australians.”
Country Liberal Party Senate candidate Jacinta Nampijinpa Price said the Australia Day debate “pales into comparison” with other issues facing remote communities. “With Covid, foreign threats and local issues such as youth crime and domestic violence as some of our nation’s most important issues, the Australia Day debate pales in comparison,” she said.
“It is as crucial as ever that we make the effort to come together as a nation. That takes making an effort and in many ways acting in selflessness, which is not encouraged so much in this day and age.”
However, the land council overseeing the nation’s biggest Native Title settlement has called for an immediate change of the date of Australia Day.
South West Aboriginal Land and Sea Council chair Brendan Moore, who is overseeing the $1.3bn Noongar land deal, said January 26 was “a celebration of European settlement – a settlement that resulted in over 100 years of violence against Aboriginal people and the ongoing theft of land and heritage
“Some people may feel that this is a symbolic issue that distracts from more material goals, but while the symbolism remains wrong, we cannot truly understand the many significant challenges still ahead of us,” Mr Moore said.
“Sovereignty was never ceded, and no honest reflection on our history can justify this date as one worthy of celebration.”
On Monday, Greens leader Adam Bandt called for January 26 to be retained as a public holiday but as a day of “mourning” rather than for Australia Day.
He accused Scott Morrison of denying the history of “invasion day”. “January 26, should remain as a day of mourning, and recognition. And Australia Day should be shifted to the day that we strike a treaty with our First Nations peoples,” he said.
“That way, it would give the whole country and all of its peoples something to celebrate.”
Mr Bandt’s push came after Immigration Minister Alex Hawke warned councils against refusing to hold Australia Day celebrations on Wednesday’s public holiday, declaring the national day should not be defined by “past mistakes”.
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