Move to Protect 25 Statues of Colonial-Era Figures in Sydney Rejected

Published on February 8, 2024

A One Nation Party MP in NSW has seen her attempts to protect the state’s historical statues rejected by Heritage Minister Penny Sharpe saying enough protections were already in play. NSW One Nation MP Tania Mihailuk, formerly of the Labor Party, took her case to protect 25 effigies of figures involved in the colonisation of Australia, by moving them under a state heritage register. The move to protect the statues comes after a statue of early explorer Captain Cook was sawn off from its ankles by anti-Australia Day protestors weeks earlier. Further, concerns about statues became more prominent following the Black Lives Matter protests in the United States which grew following the murder of African-American man George Floyd by a white Police Officer in Minneapolis in 2020....