A SUBURBAN council is planning to strip the name of Melbourne’s founder from a park in the name of reconciliation.
Darebin City Council wants to rename Batman Park in Northcote to acknowledge that Wurundjeri people were the area’s “first inhabitants and traditional owners”.
It has sparked calls to rebrand the federal electorate of Batman during the Australian Electoral Commission’s next redistribution late next year or in early 2018.
Batman MP David Feeney said he would support the change if Wurundjeri elders felt Batman’s name “was an affront to them, their traditions and their history”.
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READ NOW“It doesn’t change our history but it is a signpost to our current values and what we see our future as being,” he said.
“There are some historians who point to (Batman’s) behaviour and his alleged involvement in the collection of bounties by hunting First Australians in Tasmania. All of that conduct might have been normal for white settlers at that time but plainly by today’s standards that is absolutely abhorrent and would shock and appal any decent person.”
Hundreds of Darebin residents have weighed in on the proposed Batman Park name change with “overwhelming support”, according to council.
But 75 per cent of people in a 2200-strong poll by Leader newspapers want Batman’s name retained.
Batman signed an 1835 treaty with Wurundjeri elders for control of more than 200,000ha, in return for blankets, flour and other goods.
Community development director Katrina Knox said Darebin had one of the state’s highest Aboriginal Torres Strait Islander populations.
“Batman Park is a much-loved and well-used local park, and initial findings show there is overwhelming support to rename it,” Ms Knox said.
Suggestions for new names include Be Be Jern and Billibellary, who were two Wurundjeri elders present at the signing of the treaty with Batman. Gumbri, the name of the last girl born on the Coranderrk Aboriginal Reserve in Healesville, has also been floated.
The Wurundjeri Tribe Land and Compensation and Cultural Heritage Council said that it would not comment on the proposed name change.
But spokesman Ron Jones previously said that having the park named after Batman was a slap in the face to the Aboriginal community.
A decision on the new name will not be made until after Victoria’s council elections on October 22.
monique.hore@news.com.au
@moniquehore