Lake Macquarie council has endorsed a motion, that will see the Mayor write to the Prime Minister, requesting the Federal Government review the wording of the national anthem.
Councillor Brian Adamthwaite moved the notice of motion, calling for the wording to be changed from “for we are young and free” to “for we are strong and free”.
Councillor Adamthwaite believes the current passage excludes Indigenous Australians because it references “colonisation and white settlement”
The motion stated, “When we sing the words ‘for we are young and free’, we ignore more than 40,000 years of culture, tradition and history,”
Earlier this year, the Recognition in Anthem Project also called for the line “for we are young and free” to be changed to “in peace and harmony”.
Prime Minister and Cabinet Assistant Secretary Peter Rush have responded by saying the government “would need to be convinced of a sufficient groundswell of support in the wider community to warrant changing the anthem.”
