In this article, Daniel Wild contextualises and disseminates the findings of the IPA’s research on welcome to country.
Some will deride discussion of these matters as culture wars. But economic leadership can only begin from a shared sense of national identity.
It appears that Shaun Turner, a street sweeper from Melbourne, reflects the values of “modern” Australian more than many of our political leaders.
Turner was sacked by Darebin City Council, in inner-city Melbourne, for objecting to the practice of an acknowledgment of country at morning meetings. The Fair Work Commission ruled the sacking was unlawful, and is determining appropriate redress.
Turner is so right when he said in a recent interview that “if you need to be thanking anyone, it’s the people who have worn the uniform and fought for our country to keep us free”.
No one in politics, big business, universities, or other major civic institutions is saying this. In fact, elite society is going in the opposite direction. Plane landings, sports matches, board meetings, and school assemblies have all been turned into divisive performative platforms for welcome or acknowledgment to country practices.
It is hard to think of anything more divisive than being welcomed to your own country multiple times a day, every day, for years on end.
Survey exposes split
But what Shaun Turner said is simply a reflection of the values of modern Australia, which believes in equality and fairness, and opposes racial division.
A survey undertaken by independent marketing research firm Dynata, commissioned by the Institute of Public Affairs, found that 56 per cent of respondents now feel welcome to country ceremonies have become divisive. Only 17 per cent disagreed, and 27 per cent were unsure.
As Howard and Hawke should remind us, culture and economics are not as easily disengaged as some may think.
The survey was a nationally representative sample of 1005 Australians undertaken between May 16 and May 18, with a margin of error of 3.1 per cent. It also revealed that 48 per cent of those aged from 18 to 24 found the practice divisive, more than double those who did not.
Only a minority said welcome to country ceremonies should be performed at significant events such as sporting matches (30 per cent), and Anzac Day ceremonies (34 per cent), with the remaining two-thirds either opposed or unsure.
These results are hardly surprising, given that 60.06 per cent of Australians voted against the Voice to Parliament, including a majority in every jurisdiction other than the ACT.
Despite this, the South Australian government has introduced a Voice to Parliament, the Victorian government appears likely to turn its First People’s Assembly into a permanent body, and NSW remains mired in a consultation process to explore the possibility of a treaty.
Mainstream voice
In the context of an increasing number of Australians believing the country is divided and on the wrong track, many harken back to the reform era of Bob Hawke and John Howard. What cannot be forgotten is that both leaders achieved economic reform, and carried a sceptical electorate with them, because they understood the Australian character and spoke for the mainstream.
At his bicentennial address on Australia Day in 1988, Hawke did not provide an exegesis on the need for tax reform, but said “in Australia there is no hierarchy of descent: there must be no privilege of origin”.
Likewise at his Australia Day address to the National Press Club on January 25, 2006, Howard said: “A sense of shared values is our social cement. Without it we risk becoming a society governed by coercion, rather than consent. That is not an Australia any of us would want to live in.”
Both leaders understood that Australia’s achievement as the world’s most successful multi-ethnic, multi-religious democracy depended on a commitment of all to our shared values.
What the success of Howard and Hawke show is that leadership in the field of economics can only begin from a shared sense of national identity, and against the backdrop of a society that is largely unified as to its broader purpose and direction.
On no measure could today’s Australia said to be unified. It is not just the shocking antisemitism, or the rise of explicitly sectarian political parties. It is also the feeling that we are living in a two-tiered society with different rules for different people. It is the feeling that some go to the front of the queue, get a promotion, or a government or corporate contract if enough identity politics boxes have been ticked.
There are some who predictably deride discussion of these matters as culture wars that sidetrack us from the real issues. But as Howard and Hawke should remind us, culture and economics are not as easily disengaged as some may think.
