The motion to swiftly start renaming places of interest or giving them dual existing and Indigenous names was defeated at council but was a close-run thing.A public backlash erupted on talk radio with locals wondering where this idea had come from and why it was such a pressing priority given all the other issues in that council area.Mornington Shire council couldn’t even convince the Dan Andrew’s led Government during the harsh winter COVID lockdown to exclude the peninsula from the COVID restrictions.This despite an absence of the virus in their area and the destruction of hundreds of small businesses and the collapse of tourism caused by its classification.One would think spending more time on important issues like the local economy and people’s jobs would be the focus of the largely independent councillors — after all the Bellarine Peninsula just across the Bay wasn’t locked down.Mornington council seems, like so many other local government regions, captured by Green/Woke agendas that their residents couldn’t care less about.
The Mayor Despi O’Connor — a Mt Martha schoolteacher — speaking at the council meeting where the place name issue was voted down, expressed her disappointment.Mayor O’Connor – and I’m not making this up – said the council’s Reconciliation Action Plan set for a June deadline to implement 37 separate points “should not have a European watch on the process.”I’m sorry, what does that mean exactly? Is the Mayor suggesting the Mornington Shire council work to some non-European calendar?She is keen on this name changing idea, naming places like Arthur’s Seat after Bunurong or Boon Wurrung tribal names. Arthur’s Seat would become Wonga, like Wonga Park I suppose, and even Point Nepean would change to Monmar. Ratepayers would be forced to foot the bill for the signage changes and I for one doubt very much the dual names would last long.This renaming of historical places is about erasing European history in this country, not about collegiate co-operation.Mornington Shire was of course one of the first Local Government areas to declare their area to be in a climate emergency — that was in 2019 — and at the end of 2020 they dropped a 150-year-old ritual of opening the council meeting with a prayer.We can see where all this is going: prayers, European name places and climate panic all once the preserve of inner-city radical councils like Yarra now spreading to semi-regional areas like Mornington that takes in the tourist towns of Sorrento, Blairgowrie, Rosebud, Rye and Portsea.Councillors such as Mayor O’Connor love driving this stuff while pulling in an annual allowance of more than $100,000 dollars plus a car.This same council spent six months and a reported $50,000 to find a name for the new but not completed Rosebud Aquatic Centre. They are calling it the Yawa Aquatic Centre which is the indigenous name for swimming.Wouldn’t the Rosebud Aquatic Centre be easier to find.At the same time someone with too much time on their hands has complained to the council about Chinaman’s Creek in Capel Sound and Chinaman’s Hat — a shipping beacon in the south channel of Port Phillip Bay.
Strangely a council official said there were no plans to re-name either. We have a debate about Arthur’s Seat getting a new name, but a beacon shaped like a Chinaman’s hat from the gold rush days isn’t a concern.Weird council indeed. This issue won’t disappear and the agitators on council will continue to waste time on issues other than roads, rubbish and rates.This from a council by the way that only offers a fortnightly collection of recyclable bottles and paper and on the other Monday green bin waste.How long do local residents believe London Bridge, a rock structure on the back beach at Portsea, stays named after its lookalike from the UK, or Diamond Bay and Point Nepean are retained?
I don’t have any issue with us reaching into Indigenous languages to find attractive and appropriate names to attach to freshly developed streets, new residential developments or recently discovered natural features.What I do have a problem with is this idea that we should be involved in the wholescale erasing of history. As a declaration I live in the area under the control of the Mornington Shire Council, in a street named after a bird.At the end of a street near me in 1803 the British frigate Calcutta with more than 300 convicts on board pulled into Sullivan’s Bay and established the first European settlement in Victoria.There is a monument and a story about the historical landing and of the local aboriginal people. In 2003 there was a bicentennial ceremony and we learned that the 299 male and 16 female convicts on board the British frigate Calcutta lasted just seven months before they packed up and relocated to then Van Diemen’s Land.They renamed that Tasmania. Next thing you know agitators will want to change the name of Australia Day — oh yeah, I forgot that debate has been raging forever.
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