Change the date on this one and it will be a win for those people who hate Australia and all it stands for. 

This whole change the date for Australia Day, which crops up anytime from New Year’s Day onwards, has absolutely nothing to do with Australia Day.  

If it weren’t for the fires, this annual story from the Left would have filled up the pages weeks ago seeing if it could score a win from mainstream Australia. 

But the whole point is missed every time, if you give in and change the date, the following year, there will be something else the Left will get up in arms about. 

Indigenous Australians are just as divided on the whole change the date idea as other Australians as in should we or shouldn’t we. 

In a recent opinion piece, Federal Minister for Indigenous Australians Ken Wyatt says that Australia Day is not a day for hostility, or a day to discard the great achievements of all Australians who have built our nation. 

He says Australia Day is a day to celebrate indigenous, British and multicultural history and look forward in unity with a determination to build a stronger and more rewarding Australia for all. 

Ken Wyatt asks everyone on Australia Day to first and foremost celebrate the good things in life, celebrate with family and friends, with the community and spare some thoughts for those who are struggling by reaching out to your neighbours and be a mate. 

There you have it, that quintessential Australian word of ‘being a mate’ helping others. 

Yet, despite Ken Wyatt being the Federal Minister for Indigenous Australians and being an Indigenous Australian himself, he is conveniently ignored by activists. 

They actually don’t know what to do because an Indigenous Australian saying it is ok to celebrate on Australia Day does not suit their narrative. It’s a bit of a curveball for them. 

In 2016 Mr Wyatt made history as the first Indigenous Minister to sit in Cabinet and the first Indigenous person to hold the actual ministry responsible for Indigenous Affairs. He was elected in 2013. 

He is currently the Minister for Indigenous Health and Minister for Senior Australians and Aged Care. 

No one is denying that January 26 is a difficult date for Indigenous Australians, but July 4 is a difficult day for Native Americans too. Yet, you don’t hear Americans wanting to change the July 4 date. 

The more people go on about changing the date, the more people will dig in because they have had enough of minorities always moaning. 

The continual pick, pick, picking away at the whole date change thing, the more galvanised people become at resisting. 

Those people resisting are not, as Hilary Clinton would call, ‘deplorable’. It does not mean because you don’t want to change January 26 that you do not have some sensitivity for Indigenous Australians.  

The National Apology was accepted and delivered in 2008, for past laws, policies and practices that have impacted on Australia’s First Nations Peoples. 

National Sorry Day is held on May 26, since 1998  — the National Day of Healing for Australians since 2005 — to remember and commemorate the mistreatment of Australia’s Indigenous peoples. 

Away from the inner city trendy café strips, there are millions of people in the outer suburbs across the nation who are Australian or who have come to Australia to realise a dream and that’s what Australia Day means to the majority of people. 

Talk to anyone who’s come from the council estates of London or anywhere within Britain and to them Australia is their chance to break free from the class–based society of Britain. 

In the UK, your path is literally determined from birth. 

I grew up in London, I know. 

The dead giveaway, the English accent. 

Destined to consign them to a way of life forever and being able to move up a social class, near impossible in Britain. 

There is no Brexit from your class in Britain, ever.  

Meet a Pom, say ‘G’day mate’, a handshake, a nod, a smile and when you say where you are from and where you live now and the secret code is unlocked.  

You both smile because you automatically both think, ‘good on you mate, you have grabbed the chance to live in this incredible country, reinvent themselves and achieve far more in your career and lifestyle then you would have ever dreamed possible’.  

In Perth, Western Australia, in the northern coastal suburbs, we have the highest number of overseas immigrants from the United Kingdom.  

Perth’s Australia Day Skyworks fireworks have been going for decades on the Swan River and are the equivalent of Sydney’s New Year’s Eve fireworks from the Harbour Bridge.  

We should be proud people who have chosen to and are able to call Australia their home, feel such patriotic pride and want to fly the Australian flag above their homes, their cars, their businesses.  

Anyone who has been lucky enough to travel overseas, pretty soon understands why people say that Australia is the best country in the world. 

Thousands of people actually choose Australia Day to take the pledge to become Australian citizens. 

Every country has its pluses and minuses, every country. But life is what you make it. Work hard, treat others like you want to be treated. Be grateful for what you actually have, do not always moan about what you don’t have. 

We don’t live in a warzone, we have freedom of religion, freedom of thought, good education and generous welfare and medical systems that are the envy of so many other countries. 

Last year’s election results illustrate exactly what happens when peoples’ buttons are pushed to the limit and they push back. 

Keep telling Australians that they shouldn’t celebrate on January 26 and the more they will and so they should. 

Got something to add? Join the discussion and comment below.

Get 10 issues for just $10

Subscribe to The Spectator Australia today for the next 10 magazine issues, plus full online access, for just $10.

SUBSCRIBE 10 issues for $10 REGISTER 3 articles a month

Already a subscriber? Log in