Any decision to change the date must be made at a Commonwealth Government level,but the council,which conducts citizenship ceremonies on Australia Day,will consider becoming involved in the increasingly popular movement to change the date,should the motion be successfully endorsed.

One councillor,Dr Olivia Ball,the city’s Aboriginal Melbourne deputy portfolio lead,said that January 26,as an anniversary of the arrival of the British colonisers,“heralded an avalanche of harm to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people”.

“There is growing sentiment that Australia’s national day should be changed to a date that is more unifying,which is what a national day should do,bring us together,” Ball said. “We hope,in time,to ‘come together after struggle’ – makarrata – and find a way to celebrate our evolving identity as a proud multicultural nation.”

First People’s Assembly of Victoria co-chair Marcus Stewart said it was a “positive step”.

“We need holidays that bring us together,not days that tear us apart. Celebrating invasion only rubs salt into wounds. So I’ll welcome any mature conversations about what we choose to celebrate and how we create a better future together for everybody.”

But Aboriginal leader Warren Mundine said that while he supported changing the date from January 26,he wished councils would focus on more meaningful ways to improve the lives of Indigenous Australians.

“My personal opinion is if people really want to do something for Aboriginal people,changing the date would not be my first,second or 100th top thing,” said Mundine,the former chair of the Coalition government’s Indigenous Advisory Council.

Mundine said he would prefer to hear the council discuss what it is doing to improve the health,safety,employment and education of Aboriginal people.

“I just find it bizarre that the first thing that comes to these people’s heads is Australia Day. I’ve got family members who don’t even talk about changing the date. It seems to be a whole lot of people who are sitting up there in their elite positions who want to have these discussions.”

Laura Thompson,the CEO of Clothing the Gaps,which makes t–shirts that say “not a date to celebrate”,said it was wonderful that councils were hearing the voices of their constituents.

“We share resources around why January 26 marks the beginning of colonial violence for Aboriginal people and why they see this date as in fact the day of mourning,” Thompson said.

“When councils take this local leadership,I think it’s really important because I think at the moment,we’ve seen a lack of federal leadership on this issue.”

Thompson said the nation needed an Australia Day date that everyone could celebrate.

“I think when local councils and local leadership is involved,then we’re more likely to get that federal leadership and hopefully get the date changed.”

Meriki Onus,a member of Warriors of the Aboriginal Resistance and an organiser of the Invasion Day protests,said the council should cease celebrating Australia Day on January 26,but that a discussion around changing the date should be put on hold until there was something to celebrate.

“Australia has along way to go. I question whether there’s anything to celebrate at this stage,particularly Aboriginal people and the nation’s history,” Onus said.

“We have no treaty. We have some of the highest incarceration rates in the world. Our people are still being dispossessed. And our sacred sites are still getting desecrated.”

She said these issues needed to be addressed before the council jumped to “tokenistic gestures” such as changing the date.

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