New Zealand to Hold Referendum on National Flag
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New Zealand is to hold a referendum on whether to change the national flag, Prime Minister
John Key has announced. Mr Key, who on Monday called an election for
20 September, said the vote would be held within three years.
The current flag shows the Southern Cross constellation and includes the Union Jack
- the UK's national flag - in one corner. Mr Key said the flag represented a period
of history from which New Zealand had moved on.
"It's my belief... that the design of the New Zealand flag symbolises a colonial and
post-colonial era whose time has passed," he said in a speech at Victoria University.
"The flag remains dominated by the Union Jack in a way that we ourselves are no longer dominated
by the United Kingdom." "I am proposing that we take one more step
in the evolution of modern New Zealand by acknowledging our independence through a new
flag." Mr Key said that he liked the silver fern
- popularised by national teams including the All Blacks - as an option, saying efforts
by New Zealand's athletes gave "the silver fern on a black background a distinctive and
uniquely New Zealand identity". But he said he was open to all ideas and that
retaining the current flag was "a very possible outcome of this process".
