The Lord Mayor of Sydney has sparked outrage among citizens of Australia's largest city by decorating town hall with a single tree in a modest "generic" festive show aimed at not offending the immigrant non-Christian community.
Talkback radio programs have been inundated for two days with angry callers accusing left-leaning independent Lord Mayor Clover Moore of being a "scrooge" and pandering to political correctness by "abolishing Christmas."
Sydney's Daily Telegraph highlighted the ill-feeling with pictures comparing Sydney's Christmas decor with that of London, New York and Paris and saying in a front-page banner headline: "As the great cities of the world light up, Sydney asks... WHERE'S OUR CHRISTMAS."
As the great cities of the world sparkle with festive lights, the symbol of Sydney's Christmas is a lonely tree perched on the balcony of Town Hall, the paper said, adding: "2004 is the year Sydney forgot Christmas and across the city, people are infuriated."
Even the Sydney-based state Premier of New South Wales, Bob Carr, urged the lord mayor to do more by ensuring Sydney lived up to its reputation as a world-class city that rivals other cities with its Christmas decorations.
"There is nothing like the sparkle in a young child's eyes when they see the first Christmas decorations appearing in the city and suburbs," he said.
Moore attempted to fend off the criticism with a comment on Thursday that only made matters worse by Friday. "We are just trying to keep a generic approach without trying to push one religious belief," she said.
"We are cognisant of the fact that in Australia we are a very multi-cultural society."
Sydney, with its population of almost four million, has a large multicultural community, with immigrant groups representing all major religions.
But callers to radio stations, including non-Christians, have argued that few if anyone objects to a Christian festival being celebrated with fairy lights and Santa Claus decorations.
Dan Mullens, producer of the Alan Jones show on Sydney radio station 2GB, said the program had been flooded with angry callers.
"We have had hundreds of callers, every one protesting about this," Mullens told AFP. "It has just been enormous, the biggest response to any controversy for a very long time.
"It is something people feel very, very strongly about and most of them are telling us they believe Ms Moore is pandering to political correctness. This is essentially still a Christian society. People like Christmas, no matter what their religion is.
"We haven't heard from any of the multi-cultural groups who would supposedly be against Christmas celebration."
A spokesman for Moore admitted there had been protests about it, but said it was all a misunderstanding.
"We have actually increased expenditure on Christmas this year," he said.
"We have about 200 ethnic groups represented in Sydney so we are encouraging people to celebrate Christmas how they want," he said.
"But we get both sides, with people saying we would expect more Christmas decoration and others ringing up saying 'don't go spending our rates on Christmas decorations.'