News Service from House Harris

NT: Territorians snub historical significance of Australia Day

DARWIN, Jan 19 AAP - Territorians do not share the same historical reverence for Australia Day as people from southern states, a prominent professor says.

Charles Darwin University Emeritus Professor David Carment says Australia Day will be met with mixed feelings by many people in the Northern Territory.

Prof Carment said there were several reasons why January 26 celebrations were not as historically important in the Northern Territory as in southern parts of the country.

These included the NT's high indigenous population and the belated European settlement of northern Australia.

"While Australia Day marks the anniversary of the establishment of the first permanent European settlement in Australia in 1788, this event is not as historically important in the Northern Territory as it is in southeastern Australia," he said.

The first attempt at a European settlement in the NT was in 1824 but it took at least three more decades before civilisation became rooted in Australia's final frontier.

"It was not until the establishment of Palmerston in 1869-1870 that Europeans were successful in creating a territory presence that lasted," Prof Carment said.

Many people in the territory also regard Australia Day as marking the commencement of the white invasion of Aboriginal land.

"The original Australians, the Aborigines, remained a majority of the population in the Northern Territory for far longer than they did in the Australian states and today form almost a third of the Territory's population," Prof Carment said.