Extra public holiday is act of disrespect for our Anzacs
I WAS surprised, and disappointed, to learn Queenslanders will have a public holiday next Monday, April 26 because Anzac Day falls on the preceding day, Sunday, April 25.
March and April are awash with public holidays with the usual Easter double, show holiday and, looming is, Labour Day on Monday, May 3.
This Anzac Day double-dipping has surely occurred before, it’s just that I didn’t notice it pass by.
It seems the Queensland Holidays Act 1983 stipulates that when a public holiday falls on a weekend, the following Monday is an extra public holiday – hogwash.
Why should we get an extra public holiday when more than 100,000 of our brothers and sisters paid the ultimate sacrifice for our freedom?
Many thousands more were wounded or captured and lived out a life of misery.
We are not alone in this act of disrespect as the ACT, SA and WA also have the day off whereas NSW, Victoria, Tasmania and the NT do the right thing.
I have profound memories of watching, or participating in, more than 60 Anzac Day marches and quite a number of Dawn Services.
I can still remember, as a very young boy, watching the passing parade of very old Boer War veterans, ageing World War I veterans and young World War II veterans.
Included in that number were my father, great uncles, uncles and an aunt.
On my dad’s side there was my great-uncle Sidney Ellis Clare Johnson of Little Plain, NSW.
He enlisted in 1915 as a 26 year old, which was quite old given that many teenagers had already signed up to serve.
He was sent to Egypt then onto Gallipoli and later Palestine.
He was killed in action on November 3, 1917 at Tel Khuwielfe, Gaza the day after the victorious Battle of Beersheba.
His mother, my great-great grandmother, was sent his belongings – a
fountain pen, sheepskin jacket, silk flag, pipe, balaclava cap and scissors.
In time she also received the infamous “Dead Man’s Penny,” bearing the words, “He Died for Freedom and Honour”.
I bring it out each Anzac Day to remember him.
I urge you to attend your local Anzac Day event, be it Dawn Service, march or both, and I also urge you to lobby your state politician to see if we can get this disrespectful double-dipping arrangement removed from the act.
Locally services will be held at Acland, Cecil Plains, Clifton, Cooyar, Crows Nest, Drayton, Goombungee, Gowrie Junction, Greenmount, Highfields, Jondaryan, Kingsthorpe, Millmerran, Oakey, Pittsworth, Quinalow/Maclagen, Toowoomba City, Westbrook and Yarraman with many of those locations holding a Dawn Service as well at the traditional street march.
For full details of services in your area go to https://www.tr.qld.gov.au/ our-region/whats-on/events/728anzac-day-services