Malcolm Turnbull says council ‘out of step with Australian values’ after it votes to stop referring to 26 January as Australia Day

This article is more than 3 years old

This article is more than 3 years old

Yarra city council in Melbourne has been stripped of the power to hold citizenship ceremonies by the federal government because it voted unanimously to stop referring to 26 January as Australia Day and to stop holding a citizenship ceremony on that day.

Yarra Council (@YarraCouncil) #Yarra Council has tonight voted unanimously to change the way it marks January 26, from 2018 onwards: https://t.co/6Hw2nyE9U4

Alex Hawke, the assistant immigration minister, announced the decision on Wednesday afternoon, after the prime minister, Malcolm Turnbull, declared in parliament that the council’s vote was “utterly out of step with Australian values”.

“They are seeking to take a day which unites Australia and turn it into one which divides it,” Turnbull said. “To change the date of Australia Day would be to turn our back on Australian values.”

In a separate statement Turnbull said: “An attack on Australia Day is a repudiation of the values the day celebrates: freedom, a fair go, mateship and diversity.”

Melbourne's Yarra council votes unanimously to move Australia Day citizenship ceremonies Read more

Hawke warned the council it could be stripped of its right to hold citizenship ceremonies before Tuesday’s council meeting but the changes nevertheless received unanimous support.

He said the decision was taken to “safeguard the integrity of citizenship ceremonies” in the City of Yarra, which covers the inner northern suburbs of Richmond, Collingwood and Fitzroy; the heart of the Aboriginal rights movement in Australia.

Hawke said the decision by the council not to hold a citizenship ceremony on 26 January next year, to support the campaign to change Australia Day to a date that is less painful to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people, and to refer to the Australia Day public holiday as “January 26” in all official council documents, was a “political resolution” and therefore a “significant breach” of the Australian Citizenship Ceremonies Code.

“We are committed to ensuring that citizenship is treated in the ‘non-commercial, apolitical, bipartisan and secular manner’ which the code mandates,” he said. “The instrument I have signed today means there will be no more citizenship ceremonies conducted by the City of Yarra on behalf of the government.”

Instead, citizenship ceremonies for residents of the local government area, which has a population of 80,000, will be conducted by neighbouring councils or by the immigration department. The department will hold a ceremony in Yarra council on 26 January.

Yarra council held bimonthly citizenship ceremonies and said before its meeting last night that it would continue to do so, just not on 26 January.

The council consulted Wurundjeri traditional elders, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander organisations and conducted an independent survey of non-Indigenous residents before committing to the change.

It was welcomed and applauded by Indigenous people but roundly criticised by both state and federal politicians, who say it is politicising a day that ought to be universally celebrated.

Tess Ryan (@IndigenousX) Inner Melbourne council moving citizenship ceremonies on Australia Day? Good work.

Tess Ryan (@IndigenousX) Why would u b proud of a day that commemorates genocide, & has been appropriated by drunken yobs with Southern Cross Tatts?

Roxy Moore (@RoxyAmnestyOz) Yarra city council has #ChangeTheDate! Canned Australia Day (Invasion Day) celebrations. Deadly! #IndigenousX @amnestyOz

Richard Weston (@RichJWeston) Go Melbourne. Now join Freo. https://t.co/Olcjpx866a

Colin Hunter, a Wurundjeri man and City of Yarra Aboriginal liaison officer, told Guardian Australia on Tuesday that Indigenous people were happy to join a national celebration “but not on that day”.

He said it was entirely appropriate for local governments, which voted at the national general assembly in Canberra in June to lobby the federal government to change the date of Australia Day, to lead the change.

“People say local government is about bins and rates but it’s also about the civic participation of your local community,” he said. “To me, it makes sense that this change would start with local government.”

Melbourne council plan to move Australia Day citizenship ceremony 'very modest' Read more

The campaign to change the date of Australia Day has gained momentum in recent years. About 40,000 people marched in protest of Australia Day at an Invasion Day rally in Melbourne on 26 January this year and thousands more marched in other capital cities. Youth radio station Triple J recently conducted a survey of listeners to see if it should change the date of its annual Hottest 100 poll from 26 January to another, less contentious day.

Both Turnbull and the opposition leader, Bill Shorten, who recently gave their public support to the Uluru statement on constitutional reform for Indigenous Australians, said they did not support changing the date of Australia Day.

“Our ceremonies and our celebrations on Australia Day begin with an acknowledgement of country, a welcome to country, and conclude with the newest Australians and every one of those Australians, our first Australians and the youngest baby in the newest citizen’s arms are all part of our great multicultural nation,” Turnbull said.

He added: “We recognise that the history of European settlement in Australia has been complex and tragic for Indigenous Australians. We recognise the complexities and the challenges of our histories. But on Australia Day we recognise the greatness of our achievement as Australians.”

Turnbull is wrong - Australia Day and its history aren’t ‘complex’ for Indigenous people | Paul Daley Read more

Shorten said that reconciliation was “more about changing hearts and minds than it is about moving public holidays”.

According to the Australia Day National Council, the tradition of having a national holiday on 26 January to mark Australia Day is a “recent one”, dating back to 1994.

It marks the day that the first fleet arrived in Sydney Cove in 1788 and is often referred to by Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoplesas Invasion Day or Survival Day.

The national day of mourning, and first anti-Australia Day march, was held in 1938.