Qantas has quietly condensed the wording of the Acknowledgement of Country that is broadcast on its flights to passengers.
The change to its Indigenous welcome in Australia that pays respects to the longest continuously living culture on the planet when a Qantas aircraft touches down onto the Country of the Traditional custodians with no fanfare more than 12 months ago.
The ceremony intends to honour the cultural significance of an Aboriginal mob or language group as the Indigenous inhabitants occupying the area of the modern city's airport.
The national carrier first introduced the Acknowledgement to Country back on November 1 of 2021 not long after international flights resumed from being grounded amid the global pandemic.
"Acknowledgement to Country is one of the things you'll hear our crew doing once we restart as well, which is a new addition and something we're really excited about," Qantas chief customer officer Stephanie Tully first told reporters three days before it was first used.
More than three years on, a Qantas spokesperson confirmed the airline did modify some of the words of the acknowledgement without announcing the changes.
Qantas says it consulted with Indigenous leaders as well as its own Indigenous staff before the 'emerging' was removed from 'We pay our respects to Elders past, present and emerging'.
The inclusion of the word 'emerging' has been contested by some Indigenous people, who believed it undermines the importance of Elders among Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander cultures.
The Acknowledgments of Country have sparked criticism from some elements, including certain media commentators, who question, in their words, why non-Indigenous people must be welcomed by Traditional Owners "to their own country".
This in part appears to be driven over confusion regarding the Traditional Owner meaning of the word with the English word Country for an internationally recognised modern nation state with precisely defined political borders.
Before one of the AFL finals last year, Metropolitan Local Aboriginal Land Council cultural educator Brendan Kerin gave football fans a history and cultural lesson during his delivery of the Acknowledgement of Country.
"A Welcome to Country is not a welcome to Australia," he said.
"Within Australia we have many Aboriginal lands, and we refer to our lands as Country, so it's always a welcome to the lands you're gathered on.
"A Welcome to Country is not a ceremony that we've invented to cater for white people."
In May last year a passenger scrawled racist derogatory remarks about Aboriginal people on the in-flight magazine on a Qantas subsidiary service. Dual Olympian and Federal senator Nova Peris, a proud Gija, Yawuru and Iwatja woman, was on board and raised the issue.
The racist ranting specifically complained about expressing "respect to Elders".
Qantas expressed extreme disappointment over the defacing of the magazine.
"We're appalled that someone would make these racist remarks," a Qantas spokeswoman told National Indigenous Times.
The Indigenous welcome changes happened under the watch of current Qantas chairman John Mullen, who was not sitting on its board during the installation of the early Acknowledgement of Country broadcasts.
Mr Mullen has signaled a reversal of the direction for the airline since the departure of former chief executive Alan Joyce.
He has previously said Qantas, who has a policy of supporting Indigenous culture in recent years, like other big-brand companies would be advised to stay away from campaigning on social causes and to stick to the core task of making profits for shareholders.
"Clearly, in some areas corporates and others overstepped the enthusiastic adoption of some of this more radical or woke initiatives and this has caused a backlash in some quarters," Mr Mullen recently wrote in the Australian Financial Review.
