Talk:Australian honours and awards system/Archive 1

Untitled

Should we mention the Australian of the Year here? If so, does something like the following belong, or is that too extensive? --Robert Merkel 02:18, 23 February 2006 (UTC)

Australian of the Year

See main article: Australian of the Year

Awarded to a single individual who has who have a consistent record of excellence, who have made outstanding achievements in their field, and contributed in a significant way to the nation. There is also awards for the Young Australian of the Year, Senior Australian of the Year, and a Local Hero award.

Awarding

Are the awards still given out on the Queen's Birthday and Australia Day?Ozdaren 13:33, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

Answers to questions

== Dates of awards ==
Yes, honours lists are still published on Australia Day and the Queen's Birthday each year. The following awards are announced on those days:

• awards in the Order of Australia
  
• Distinguished and Conspicuous Service Decorations, Nursing Service Cross and Meritorious Unit Citations
  
• meritorious awards (Public Service Medal, Australian Police Medal, Australian Fire Service Medal, Ambulance Service Medal, Emergency Services Medal)
  
  

Awards of Bravery Decorations are also made twice a year, but not on Australia Day and the Queen's Birthday. No fixed dates are used, but typically they occur about March and August.

The award of the Australian Antarctic Medal is always announced on midwinter's day.

The Order of Australia (apart from the OAM) and the meritorious awards are all subject to quotas. The annual quota is therefore split between the two lists in each calendar year, and there is no carry-over of surplus awards to the next calendar year.

== Australian of the Year ==
The Australian of the Year is not an Australian honour or decoration. Awardees do not receive any insignia, and hold the title only for the calendar year. The Australian of the Year awards are organised by the Australia Day Council, not the Australian Honours Secretariat, and it is quite separate to the honours system.

Guran70 23:16, 21 May 2007 (UTC)

Letters after name

Are they added after the name, as per the norm with the OBE, CBE and MBE?Londo06 09:24, 15 May 2008 (UTC)

Yes, the postnominals (if the award has them) are written after a person's name PalawanOz (talk) 12:25, 15 May 2008 (UTC)

Image copyright problem with Image:VietnamMedalRibbon.jpg

The image Image:VietnamMedalRibbon.jpg is used in this article under a claim of fair use, but it does not have an adequate explanation for why it meets the requirements for such images when used here. This is an automated notice by FairuseBot --05:47, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

Ribbon Changed PalawanOz (talk) 11:50, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

File:CVAustRibbon.png Nominated for speedy Deletion

An image used in this article, File:CVAustRibbon.png, has been nominated for speedy deletion for the following reason: All Wikipedia files with unknown copyright status --CommonsNotificationBot (talk) 19:39, 14 May 2012 (UTC)

Lead and other suggestions

G'day, it is good to see more work being put into this article. At the moment it seems that there is a decent amount of content, but the article still lacks a lead summarising it. A couple of paragraphs of three or four sentences would probably be sufficient. Does anyone have any plans to write something for this? Once this is added, it might be beneficial to put it up for peer review to get a few extra hands working on it, or some extra suggestions for improvement. I'd also suggest adding a few more citations and possibly tweaking the heading levels for the Awards section. Regards, AustralianRupert (talk) 05:08, 9 February 2013 (UTC)

1-3) I agree. 4) No, I do not have any plans to write something for this. 5+) I agree. Pdfpdf (talk) 07:00, 9 February 2013 (UTC)

G'day, I might see if I can put something together, but I am by no means an expert on this topic, so feedback/help/fixing would be great. BTW, thanks also for fixing my earlier error. I had a bit of a laugh at your edit summary ;-) AustralianRupert (talk) 07:57, 9 February 2013 (UTC)

(I should have said: "Is that a reflection of the fact that the two parties have become indistinguishable?") Pdfpdf (talk) 08:41, 9 February 2013 (UTC)

Wow! (You didn't waste any time before doing that, did you!) Pdfpdf (talk) 09:05, 9 February 2013 (UTC)

G'day, it could do with expansion, but it is probably beyond me, though. Regards, AustralianRupert (talk) 10:01, 9 February 2013 (UTC)

"has largely replaced the Imperial or British honours system that previously applied to Australia, although Australians remain eligible for some Imperial awards." - I think this is not quite correct.

• largely replaced - Why "largely"? What remains?
• Imperial or British - This is probably overly pedantic of me, but it wasn't/isn't called EITHER the "Imperial honours system" OR the "British honours system", it has been/is called BOTH the "Imperial honours system" AND the "British honours system". How you capture that in words is beyond me, so I changed it to "Imperial/British".
• although Australians remain eligible for some Imperial awards. - That's rather ambiguous isn't it? I think that to explain it without ambiguity would take more space than is merited in the lede, so I just removed it. After all, it is explained unambiguously in the body of the article.

Cheers, Pdfpdf (talk) 12:49, 9 February 2013 (UTC)

Rename to "Australian Honours System"?

I am not sure what is involved in changing the title to ‘Australian Honours System’. Orders, decorations, and medals of Australia is a subtitle not a title. Anthony Staunton (talk) 02:55, 9 February 2013 (UTC)

a) It needs consensus. b) In this case (for technical reasons, not political) it will require an admin to "do the deed".

I would support such a proposal. Pdfpdf (talk) 06:51, 9 February 2013 (UTC)

G'day, while I wouldn't be opposed to a move, at this stage I hasten to point out that this article uses the same name as others, for example: Orders, decorations, and medals of the United Kingdom, Orders, decorations, and medals of Canada and Orders, decorations, and medals of New Zealand. There may have been some underlying policy reason or consensus when this article was originally created, so it would probably be best to try to get as many people as possible involved in the discussion before moving. Cheers, AustralianRupert (talk) 07:57, 9 February 2013 (UTC)

Hmmm. It looks like I'd better survey the current article names before expressing any more personal opinions! Pdfpdf (talk) 10:22, 9 February 2013 (UTC)

Pages Orders, decorations, and medals of Australia (ODM of Aus) Orders, decorations, and medals of Canada Orders, decorations, and medals of Estonia etc. - seemingly ad infinitum, but in fact there are "only" 163 Refer Category:Orders, decorations, and medals by country Other names (random selection) Orders and decorations of the Commonwealth realms Awards and decorations of the United States military Awards and decorations of the United States government List of Italian orders of knighthood etc. Nearly 500 pages link to (ODM of Aus)

Redirects to (ODM of Aus) - 6 pages Australia Day Honours Australia Day honours Australian honours system Australian Honours System List of Australian Awards Orders, decorations, & medals of Australia

Honours system / State decoration See Template:Decorations by country Pages (in Category:Orders, decorations, and medals of ...) Fijian honours system Irish honours system Papua New Guinea honours system Sri Lankan honours system etc. Redirects (to ODM of ...) British honours system Canadian honours system Hong Kong honours system New Zealand Honours System etc.

It looks like the answer is: "Flip a coin" and/or "Take your pick". Pdfpdf (talk) 10:22, 9 February 2013 (UTC)

Pdfpdf Thank you for a valuable summary. I agree with AustralianRupert's that there needs to be consenus. There are difference between orders, decorations and medals. Orders usually include the word order in their title but a decoration may have medal as part of its name. The Medal of the Order of Australia would be considered a decoration rather than an order or a medal. There is no such thing as military or civilian decorations or medals in the Australian system but there are general and military divisions in the Order of Australia. As well as orders, decorations and medals there are also commendations and citations which would comfortably be encompassed in the name the Australian Honours System. Anthony Staunton (talk) 08:54, 10 February 2013 (UTC)

There are differences between ... - I'm sorry, but I'm afraid I'm not quite sure what point you are making here, nor what its relevance is to renaming the article. Sorry, could I bother you to descend to kindergaarten-level and explain?

There is no such thing as military or civilian decorations or medals in the Australian system - Really? It's quite clear that civilians are never awarded a VC, or any of the gallantry awards, or any of the Military Long Service awards. Similary, I'm pretty sure no-one in uniform (other than a suit & tie) has been awarded the Public Service medal. So, I'm sorry, but I don't understand.

As well as orders, decorations and medals there are also commendations and citations which would comfortably be encompassed in the name the Australian Honours System. OK. That one I understand!

So, are you saying something like: 'ODM is not a very good name because this article covers "things" that don't fit well into any of "O", "D", OR "M".'? If so, yes, I agree.

But for me, I personally think the most relevant thing is that ODM doesn't say or imply anything about the Honours system itself. Hence, in my no doubt biassed opinion, "Australian Honours System" is a much better title for this article.

HOWEVER:

• ODM is a very widely used name. Does that imply we need two articles: one about the system, and one about ODM? I hope not! Surely one article (of whatever name), with a redirect to it from the "other" name, is sufficient?
• Note that whichever name has been used, they all seem to end up in a category named "ODM for xxx".

I think we need to cast the net wider and get other opinions. Pdfpdf (talk) 11:58, 10 February 2013 (UTC)

The first sentence of the Orders, decorations, and medals of the United Kingdom states ‘The British honours system ... consists of three types of award: honours, decorations and medals’. The British VC is described as a military decoration and the British GC is described as a civilian decoration despite the fact that civilians are eligible for the VC and five have been awarded although the last was in Afghanistan - in 1879! Perhaps half the the original awards of the GC have been to the military and it is nearly 40 years since a civilian has lived to receive the GC. Although the overwhelming majority of gallantry awards go to the military a much higher percentage of bravery awards also go to the military. Both the VC and the GC are decorations and they do not need to be qualified with the phrases military or civilian since hopefully it will be clear from eligibility criteria as to who will be the majority of recipients. Nice call on the PSM and you are probably right but in this case just because it is for public servant does not make it a public service decoration. I am saying ‘ODM is not a very good name because this article covers "things" that don't fit well into any of "O", "D", OR "M" and I thank you for putting it so succinctly. Anthony Staunton (talk) 14:58, 10 February 2013 (UTC)

Australian Royal Honour?

Orders, decorations, and medals of Australia#Order of Australia says: "The disc is surmounted by an enamel Crown signifying the position of The Order of Australia as an Australian Royal Honour."

a) Is this true?

b) What is "an Australian Royal Honour"?

Also, who are "The Council for the Order of Australia"?

Also, I guess that one of the implications of my questions is that the section is "under-referenced". Pdfpdf (talk) 12:42, 11 February 2013 (UTC)

Not sure about the first 2 questions. But, "The Council for the Order of Australia" are the group of people that actually decide who is appointed to what grade within the Order, They are sort of like the backbone I suppose?!?. Nford24 (Want to have a chat?) 12:52, 11 February 2013 (UTC)

Thanks. Do you have URL to a reference? Pdfpdf (talk) 14:47, 11 February 2013 (UTC)

Australian Royal Honour?

Orders, decorations, and medals of Australia#Order of Australia says: "The disc is surmounted by an enamel Crown signifying the position of The Order of Australia as an Australian Royal Honour."

a) Is this true?

b) What is "an Australian Royal Honour"?

Also, who are "The Council for the Order of Australia"?

Also, I guess that one of the implications of my questions is that the section is "under-referenced". Pdfpdf (talk) 12:42, 11 February 2013 (UTC)

Not sure about the first 2 questions. But, "The Council for the Order of Australia" are the group of people that actually decide who is appointed to what grade within the Order, They are sort of like the backbone I suppose?!?. Nford24 (Want to have a chat?) 12:52, 11 February 2013 (UTC)

Thanks. Do you have URL to a reference? Pdfpdf (talk) 14:47, 11 February 2013 (UTC)