ALDI joins Woolworths in dropping Australia Day merch while Pauline Hanson dishes blistering rebuke of Bunnings

ALDI has joined Woolworths, confirming it will not be stocking Australia Day merchandise despite customers threatening to boycott.

The German retailer has previously stocked a wide range of Australian-themed products leading up to January 26.

In 2014, ALDI faced controversy from some shoppers branding a shirt that read: “Australia est. 1788” as “racist”, despite approval from the federal government.

Coles, however, has confirmed it will stock shelves with Australia-themed merchandise throughout January.

In the wake of the controversy, One Nation leader Pauline Hanson pulled another major retailer into the fray, releasing a statement on X which read: “Today I was in a Bunnings store where an employee told me staff had been instructed to wear no items associated with celebrating Australia Day because it might offend someone.”

“This follows the announcement from Woolworths that it will no longer stock Australia Day merchandise, and news that more than 80 local governments will not hold citizenship ceremonies on Australia Day this year,” Ms Hanson said.

“Just because businesses like Bunnings and Woolworths command virtual monopolies does not give them the right to dictate to Australians.

“These businesses do not get to decide our national day on January 26 is offensive.”

Opposition Leader Peter Dutton also weighed in on the saga on Thursday, urging Australians to “boycott Woolworths” as the supermarket’s decision not to sell the merchandise was “against the national interest (and) the national spirit”.

Agriculture Minister Murray Watt questioned Mr Dutton’s “priorities” over his call for a boycott and said the Opposition Leader was “out there fighting yet another culture war” while Australians were “thinking about how they can pay their supermarket bills rather than what kind of thongs they can buy”.

“I don’t think that’s the kind of priority most Australians have right now… it’s a matter for all Australians and all businesses – what they say, what they do – when it comes to politics,” Mr Watt said.

“We don’t live in some dictatorship where the government of the day tells you what you can think and what you can say and what you can sell.”

Ms Hanson cited the results of the last major poll on the issue, released on January 24 last year, which revealed “more than 62 per cent of us want our national day on January 26”.

“As poll after poll has demonstrated, Australians have decided our national day must be held on January 26. Any other position is just intent on pursuing the division of this country by race,” she said.

“It was precisely this sort of division that was emphatically rejected at the referendum.”

Ms Hanson urged her fellow countrymen and women to “get out there on January 26, celebrate our country loudly and show these out-of-touch corporations we are proud to be Australian.”