Record numbers of Australians want to keep Australia Day on January 26. After a summer marked by anger and division following the Bondi killings, seven out of 10 people reject the call to change the date.
Support for January 26 has climbed steadily in the past three years in exclusive polls for this masthead conducted by Resolve Political Monitor. Only 47 per cent backed the date in January 2023, but 56 per cent supported it in January 2024, shortly after the failed Voice to parliament referendum.
Now, 68 per cent back the current national day, despite the objections of Indigenous Australians to celebrating the nation on the day the first fleet arrived and colonisation began.
The question was, “If we are to have a national day, what is your preference for the date of Australia Day?” The majority of the 18-34 cohort – the generation most open to changing the date – backed January 26, with 55 per cent saying they want to keep the current day and only 24 per cent in favour of change. Support was strongest among the over-54s, with 78 per cent backing the current date.
Support for changing the date has declined rapidly from 39 per cent in January 2023 to 16 per cent of respondents, while the number who are neutral or undecided has remained more or less the same.
The estimated number of people attending the annual Invasion Day marches in major cities has also declined. In 2019, 50,000 people marched in Melbourne and about 40,000 in Sydney, while tens of thousands rallied in other capital cities. Last year, crowds at Melbourne and Sydney’s rallies were estimated at half that size, 25,000.
State authorities have approved plans for Monday’s Invasion Day rallies in Melbourne and Sydney, with NSW Police Commissioner Mal Lanyon agreeing to remove Hyde Park from the no-protest zones introduced after the Bondi killings on December 14 and describing the event as peaceful.
Victoria’s protest restrictions have already been lifted, and on Friday the organisers of Melbourne’s Invasion Day rally successfully challenged the stop-and-search powers recently granted to Victoria Police within the CBD and surrounding suburbs.
Anti-immigration protests organised by March for Australia will also go ahead in major cities on Australia Day. Earlier marches attended by tens of thousands were criticised when the crowds were addressed by members of neo-Nazi groups that have since disbanded in the face of new laws proscribing hate groups.
The majority of respondents polled by Resolve – 66 per cent – said that having a national day such as Australia Day adds to social cohesion, while 74 per cent said they agreed with the idea of having a national day.
Resolve’s director Jim Reed, who has conducted separate polling for the National Australia Day Council, said Australians needed “mechanisms that enable them to come together and express unity given all the division, uncertainty, fragmentation and pressures of the last few years, and that’s reflected in continued strong support for our national day.
“What’s more surprising is the rise in support for keeping Australia Day: the fourth annual increase we’re recording in our polling. That’s driven mainly by younger people, who seem to be more aligned to the long weekend and positive associations with the day than the change campaigns of previous years.”
The poll of 1800 voters was conducted between January 12 and 16. It has a margin of error of 2.3 percentage points.
Prime Minister Anthony Albanese last week promoted the idea of Australia Day as an opportunity for unity, telling ABC Perth on Friday that the national day would be an opportunity to celebrate “the three phases of Australia”.
“We have the oldest continuous culture on earth in Indigenous Australians, but the new, first, of the arrival of the British, but then multicultural Australia and what we’ve seen in this country,” he said, when asked what his Australia Day message was. “And I think we have a task not just nationally, but a time of international turbulence and turmoil that we see. Our task is to be a microcosm for the entire world to show that harmony and diversity, that is our strength.”
The federal Labor Party and the former Coalition back January 26 as the national day, while the Greens want the date to be changed.
Indigenous rights campaigner Thomas Mayo acknowledged the trend of the polls, but still believes Australians will eventually agree to move the celebration to a date less painful to First Nations.
“Like most people that support changing the day, we’re not saying that we don’t have reasons to be celebrating our country and the things that we’ve achieved,” he told this masthead.
“All we’re saying is, you know, like, hey, this is a day of mourning, and it has been since 1938 when the first protest happened, when there was a celebration of 26 January, you know. That it’s a day of mourning for many Australians as well, you know, because it marks the beginning of British colonisation.”
The Reconciliation Council, in a statement, said “objections to celebrating 26 January by First Peoples, and many other Australians, is not about causing guilt or shame but about understanding these historical facts and reflecting on the responsibilities and reciprocities of being Australian. Reconciliation Australia continuously call for the debate and discussions around 26 January to be conducted respectfully and without ridicule.”
Cut through the noise of federal politics with news, views and expert analysis. Subscribers can sign up to our weekly Inside Politics newsletter.
Nick Newling is a federal politics reporter for The Sydney Morning Herald and The Age.Connect via email.