Jan 18 2009
ANZAC Day is NOT a public holiday for Most Australians in 2009
ANZAC Day is for me, and I guess for a lot of Australians under 50, just another public holiday. For those of you who are not Australians- ANZAC Day in Australia and New Zealand is the 25 April – and commemorates one of Australia and New Zealanders greatest military defeats.at Gallipoli, in modern day Turkey, was a disaster of military planning by the British, but is was the ANZACs (Australia New Zealand Army Corp) who bore the brunt of the casualties in 1915.
Occurring just 15 years after the birth of the Australian nation ANZAC Day has come to be a time to remember the dead of all wars and is traditionally marked by dawn services and marches.
In 2009 April 25 is a Saturday and the only States which will give people the paid holiday on Monday 27 April are Western Australia and the ACT. All other Australian states and New Zealand will lose the paid holiday (unless they are routinely working on Saturdays).
The RSL and other returned servicemen associations don’t seem to have a problem with this. Explaining that the only reason for the holiday is so that people can attend dawn ceremonies. Well sorry mate, but I do have a problem with it. Most Australians on a salary have a certain number of public holidays factored into that package. ANZAC Day is one of the few holidays that you can lose just because of the vagaries of the calendar (poor New Zealanders some years lose both Waitangi Day AND ANZAC Day). Who wins: the employer. Its not like they give you another day’s annual leave to compensate – which would be fair I think. Nope – you just loose the day.
So I for one, though it no longer applies to me, am delighted that from 2010 Australia’s federal government has seen fit to legislate so that ANZAC day will be taken on next working day if it falls on a Sunday (in 2010) or Easter Monday (2011 – ANZAC Day’s holiday will be on the Tuesday)
Poor old New Zealanders will however continue to miss out on paid leave because of when ANZAC Days falls – so I for one will again fail to get anywhere near a dawn ceremony – way too early in the day for me! 
3 Responses to “ANZAC Day is NOT a public holiday for Most Australians in 2009”
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Grumble. More paid holidays I say! In fact, more paid anything would be a good start.
Well you are a POM - I expect you to grumble LOL. I have got less interested in paid holidays since I don’t get paid for them!
Hi Lis, I’ve commented on this in this blog post:
http://lifeinaustralia.today.com/2009/01/21/sunday-fun-day-in-woy-woy/