//it used to be that the day was celebrated on the closest weekend to the 26th, thereby taking off Monday making it a long weekend, an excuse to have another 'bludgers' holiday, and another non-productive day, as if we needed any more.//

Ahh... right. See, the thing is, they didn't actually change the number of public holidays when they shifted the date. The 'bludgers', as you so charmingly refer to people who have jobs, didn't get another 'bludgers' holiday, or another day off. But back in the good old days, they had it scheduled on a date which suited everyone better.

Do you think employers like it when the 26th of January is a Wednesday? That one day off in the middle of the week suits nobody. Public holidays should be arranged to maximise productivity. Long weekends do that better than random days off.

//So it also blows the 50,000 to 60,000 year myth out of the water.
More like between four and ten.//

No, ALTRAV, we have found human remains in Australia at least four times older than your top estimate. And we know they're human because there are no other animals with bones that match ours, and we know that they're that old because they have been radioactively dated.

Now, at this point, you may be tempted to argue against radioactive dating. I know runner doesn't believe in it. But I do, because radioactive dating is more physics than archaeology, and if you want to argue the toss when it comes to physics then the gloves will come off.

So go on, ya big Jessie... make my day. Tell me there's no such thing as physics, and it's all done by magic elves. Go on, I dare you.

It's quite interesting to see the effort that the hangers-on put into protecting their own interests at the expense of those who really paid & are paying the price.

Toni,

"Do you think employers like it when the 26th of January is a Wednesday? That one day off in the middle of the week suits nobody. Public holidays should be arranged to maximise productivity. Long weekends do that better than random days off."

You have a point, Toni, and employers don't like it when it falls on a Tuesday or a Thursday either; a number of places that I have worked at would ask the staff and the workers if they wanted to take the intervening days off and usually gave the option of working, taking an unpaid day off or else taking a day from their annual leave.
This allowed the employers to be able to plan ahead and arrange the workload to suit the available workers.

Individual, do you mean the abo's?
Toni, OK I'll play along.
'There's no such thing as physics, and it's all done by magic elves'.
Now what?
Oh, I get it, that was a joke, Ha, Ha, No I don't get it, what have magic elves got to do with how old a skeleton is?
I think you must be following a different line of thinking, I rather prefer the 10,000 odd number, but if it's not then that was never the point.
The point was that the abo's are also 'blow-ins', as the joke goes, 'they came for a visit and never left'.
That must be why they're still here after however long they've been here.
As long as we're all agreed and clear on the teeny little fact that they came from somewhere else.
Wait a minute, I believe this is somewhat of a revelation.
WOW! That's amazing, did you know that, that applies to a great number of people here today.
And they weren't only Indians or Indonesians.
Well Toni, I think we've cleared that little myth up.
Thanks for the 'heads up'.

//As long as we're all agreed and clear on the teeny little fact that they came from somewhere else.//

Yep, but so did Italians. So by your logic, there's really no such thing as Italians. They're just blow-ins from North Africa.

But you claim to be Italian all the time, even though by your own arguments they can't possibly exist. You are, in fact, an African. Possibly even Sudanese, since it's in North Africa, although I think it more likely that you're Tunisian.