Sunrise host Nat Barr has slammed Prime Minister Anthony Albanese for not taking leadership over the Australia Day row and demanded an end to ‘tiptoeing around’ it.
In a bruising encounter with agriculture minister Murray Watt on Monday morning, Barr blasted the PM’s hands-off stance on the controversy surrounding Australia’s national day.
It follows Woolworths refusing to sell Australia Day merchandise, big corporations ditching the day as a public holiday, and Cricket Australia now abandoning the term for the West Indies Test at the Gabba this week.
‘Do you think most Australians are getting sick of this tiptoeing around Australia Day, and there should be some leadership from the top so that we don’t have to all sort of be embarrassed about what we’re doing on that day?’ Barr quizzed Mr Watt.
Sunrise host Nat Barr has slammed Prime Minister Anthony Albanese for not taking leadership over the Australia Day row and demanded an end to ‘tiptoeing around’ it
The Labor minister defended the PM, saying he wasn’t calling for a boycott on Woolworths like Coalition leader Petter Dutton did earlier this month.
He added: ‘I don’t see the prime minister being the one who’s getting out there leading some sort of debate about Australia Day.’
But Barr snapped back: ‘Should there be?’
Mr Watt replied that Australians were capable of making up their own mind without being told what to think by the government.
‘Well, no, I think it’s a democracy, people are entitled to their different views,’ he said.
‘What I don’t think is right is what we saw from Peter Dutton a week or so ago, talking about using Australia Day and the position of a supermarket to boycott it, risking all of the jobs that exist in that supermarket.
‘We’re much more focused on things like the war on inflation, rather than culture wars and whether supermarkets sell the right kind of thongs.
‘I think that that’s what most Australians want their government focused on as well.’
NSW Premier Chris Minns branded the Cricket Australia decision as ‘strange’ and said he would be celebrating the national day.
‘The idea that you would take a national day away from any country, particularly Australia, is a strange one,’ he told 2GB’s Ben Fordham.
‘We should [be], right now, trying to pull each other together, and this is the day that we’ve set aside to celebrate what it means to live in the greatest country on Earth.
‘I definitely will be doing that.’
The minister said Cricket Australia and big business were entitled to make their own decisions on whether they celebrated Australia.
Barr said Cricket Australia were walking ‘a fine line’ by axing the references to Australia Day for this week’s test.
But Mr Watt insisted: ‘Cricket Australia is an independent organisation and they’re entitled to make their decisions about what they want to do.
In a bruising encounter with agriculture minister Murray Watt on Monday morning, Barr blasted the PM’s hands-off stance on the long-running controversy
Barr asked agriculture minister Murray Watt if PM Anthony Albanese should be showing more leadership on the Australia Day row
‘There’ll be some organisations that will be loudly celebrating Australia Day, there’ll be some that aren’t.
‘As a government, we’ve made clear that we have no plans whatsoever to change the date from Australia Day.
‘I’ll be celebrating Australia Day myself on Thursday at a citizenship ceremony and probably a Barbie after that.
‘I know the Prime Minister is planning to celebrate Australia Day, but we respect the fact that different people have got different views about this.
‘Cricket Australia are big enough and ugly enough to make their own decision.’
