The length of a Welcome to Country ceremony delivered at a Sydney Anzac commemoration has sparked backlash after it lasted for nine minutes. 

The address was given by a Gadigal Elder at the commemoration of the 90th anniversary of Sydney’s Hyde Park Anzac Memorial on Sunday night. 

2GB radio host Ben Fordham on Tuesday questioned the appropriateness of the drawn-out ceremony.

Fordham said that while the speaker did mention her ancestors’ involvement in the war, the length of the address was excessive and detracted from the event. 

‘It was meant to be about the Anzacs, but attendees had to sit through a nine-minute Welcome to Country. You don’t need nine minutes to welcome people,’ he said. 

‘One person contacted us saying it didn’t fit with the tone of the event. It’s not about diminishing the speaker’s efforts, but nine minutes is too long.

‘Some attendees thought it was excessive and self indulgent, many are already uneasy about being welcomed to their own country. Making them sit through nine long minutes is not going to help the cause.’ 

A year on from the failed Voice referendum, the value of Welcome and Acknowledgement of Country ceremonies are still being widely debated in Australia.

The renewed scrutiny began in September with the Giants versus Lions AFL semifinal in Sydney, where Aboriginal Elder Brendan Kerin said the ceremonies ‘weren’t to cater for white people’. 

‘It’s a ceremony we’ve been doing for 250,000 years BC – and the BC stands for Before Cook,’ he told the crowd, referring to Captain James Cook’s arrival in Australia in 1770 ahead of European settlement.

‘Prior to colonisation, you could get in a lot of trouble for walking on someone else’s lands without being welcomed onto those lands,’ the Marrawarra and Barkindji man said. 

But the modern form of a Welcome to Country was invented in 1976 by Dr Richard Walley’s Middar Aboriginal Theatre group, after Maori and Cook Islands visitors to Perth Arts Festival requested a ceremonial welcome. 

The musician, dancer and writer invoked a blessing in the local language, sang a Nyoongar song celebrating their lands and the troupe did a ceremonial dance, all of which was a huge success and struck a chord in the Indigenous community. 

It was later adopted by the Northern Territory Tourism Board, then the Australian Tourism Commission and earned a global platform when it was included in the Miss Universe beauty pageant held in Perth in 1979. 

Since then the ceremonies have grown to become a regular feature of everyday life in Australia, and are seen as a sacred tradition to launch public events. 

But some Aussies continue to find them grating. Earlier this month a ceremony performed in Azerbaijan was dubbed a ‘complete farce’.

Delegate Dr Clare Anderson performed an acknowledgement of country to a near empty-room in the former Soviet republic as part of the 2024 United Nations Climate Change Conference.

‘To start – whilst we’re not on Australian land – I’d still like to start with acknowledging the traditional owners of Australia and the Torres Strait Islands and pay my respects to their elders, past, present and emerging,’ Dr Anderson said. 

Critics found Dr Anderson’s performance of the ceremony so far from Australia nonsensical. 

‘What a complete farce – here’s a video from the “Australian Pavilion” at the climate w***fest at Baku – funded by Australian taxpayers,’ fumed former Liberal and United Australia Party MP Craig Kelly. 

‘Imagine, all that coin to pay for constructing an exhibition stand, flying a delegation half way around world, setting up video facilities to record it all – and they get five people to attend,’ Mr Kelly continued.

‘Why are Australian government officials doing a welcome to country in Azerbaijan,’ Coalition senator Matt Canavan also asked. 

Another point of controversy with Welcome to Country ceremonies is their public cost.

Brisbane City Council has shelled out $135,000 of ratepayer money on the ceremonies in the last two years.  

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