Marie citizen speech

Gunnedah shire’s Citizen of the Year Marie Hobson, spoke at Wednesday’s citizenship ceremony. Below is what she said to the 15 people who officially became Australians this week. 

It is hard to express how proud I feel today to see you all here to embrace Australian citizenship.

I imagine it would not have been an easy decision to make but as a born and bred Aussie, I can say you are in the best country in the world and a rather special country town.

I was born in Gunnedah four years after the end of World War II – we are called the Baby Boomers because of the baby boom when the men returned from war. At the same time, there was a boom in immigration as people fled their homeland in war devastated Europe and came to Australia searching for a better life for themselves and their families.

When I was growing up in Gunnedah, I was fortunate enough to be exposed to these wonderful cultures – we had Italians living across the road, a Dutch family around the corner, Greeks in the cafes and Chinese in the restaurant, market gardens and variety stores that sold everything. I quickly developed a taste for all of this amazing food and made lifelong friends. One of the Italians I knew has been a prisoner of war put to work on farms in the area because of the manpower shortage and after the war he went home and returned with his family.

These immigrants all had one thing in common. They worked hard and embraced the culture of their new country while retaining the best of their homeland.

I was also privileged to have a neighbor in my street called Mikie Maas who came to Australia from the Netherlands after the war and she threw herself into every activity that would make her new country even better.

When she died, she asked for the Dutch flag to be placed over the foot of her casket, because that’s where her roots were but the Australian Flag had to go over her heart.

In the classic patriotic song, I Am Australia, written by Bruce Woodley and Dobe Newton, it says: “We are one but we are many, and from all the lands on earth we come, we’ll share a dream and sing with one voice, I am, you are, we are Australian”.

So, wherever you come from, we welcome you, and we are proud to call you Australians.