Around Canberra
On 25 March 2025 Prime Minister Anthony Albanese announced 3 May as the date for the federal election.  I arrived in Canberra on 4 April and spent a few days in the capital city.
Parliament House.
Old Parliament House is now the Museum of Australian Democracy.
In 1972 four aboriginal men launched a land rights protest opposite Parliament House.  Ben Coe Tupou is the grandson of one of those four.  The area, designated as sovereign land and marked off by a cord, has been continuously occupied since 1992, and people there have kept the flame going since 1996.  Unlike in New Zealand, where British colonialists signed a treaty with the Māori, there was no treaty between indigenous people and colonialists in Australia.  There are over 300 indigenous sovereign nations in Australia, and the aboriginal people have faced a long history of discrimination and abuses.

Periodically government leaders have sought to address the wrongs.  On 27 May 1967 voters overwhelmingly approved a Federal referendum which removed two discriminatory sections from the Constitution.  On 13 February 2008, Prime Minister Kevin Rudd made a formal apology.  On 14 October 2024 a federal referendum to create a First Nations Voice in the Constitution went before the voters, but was rejected. 

Today, many events and functions in Australia open with formal Welcome to Country or an Acknowledgement of Traditional Owners or Acknowlegement of Country.  These show respect and an acknowledgment of the relationship between the indigenous people, or traditional owners, and those who are more recent arrivals.

Respect and sensitivity are important, but there are instances where measures can go too far, to the point where they offend other Australians. For example, recently in a course at Macquarie University in Sydney students born and bred  in this country were referred to as "guests"  (>).  The differing interpretations of Australia's story typically come to the fore on 26 January, Australia Day, which marks the landing of the First Fleet in 1788.  As in the United States, these issues always seem to be simmering in the background.  I spoke with a man walking in the neglected rose garden in front of Old Parliament near the sovereign aboriginal encampment, and he offered his opinion that Canberra is "the most woke city in Australia."  However, he said, it is "fake wokeness," for appearances.  In an April 1 forum, opposition leader Peter Dutton made some headlines when he spoke out against indoctrination in schools and universities, but thus far concerns about a woke agenda have been a minor issue in the campaign. 

See also:
The 1967 Referendum
Apology to Australia's Indigenous Peoples
Uluru Statement from the Heart
Reconciliation Australia

ACT Greens headquarters in Braddon.

A campaign poster defaced by a sticker from the European Australian Movement, a neo-Nazi organization.
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