<Tr> <Td> National Colonial Flag </Td> <Td> Australian Federation Flag </Td> <Td> Eureka Flag </Td> <Td> Anti-Transportation League Flag </Td> <Td> Murray River Flag </Td> </Tr> <P> As Federation approached, thoughts turned to an official federal flag . In 1900, the Melbourne Herald conducted a design competition with a prize of 25 Australian pounds (2017: A $3,700) in which entries were required to include the Union Flag and Southern Cross, resulting in a British Ensign style flag . The competition conducted by the Review of Reviews for Australasia--a Melbourne - based publication--later that year thought such a restriction seemed unwise, despite observing that designs without these emblems were unlikely to be successful; nonetheless, it suggested that entries incorporate the two elements in their design . After Federation on 1 January 1901 and following receipt of a request from the British government to design a new flag, the new Commonwealth Government held an official competition for a new federal flag in April . The competition attracted 32,823 entries, including those originally sent to the Review of Reviews . One of these was submitted by an unnamed governor of a colony . The two contests were merged after the Review of Reviews agreed to being integrated into the government initiative . The £ 75 prize money of each competition were combined and augmented by a further £ 50 donated by Havelock Tobacco Company . Each competitor was required to submit two coloured sketches, a red ensign for the merchant service and public use, and a blue ensign for naval and official use . The designs were judged on seven criteria: loyalty to the Empire, Federation, history, heraldry, distinctiveness, utility and cost of manufacture . The majority of designs incorporated the Union Flag and the Southern Cross, but native animals were also popular, including one that depicted a variety of indigenous animals playing cricket . The entries were put on display at the Royal Exhibition Building in Melbourne and the judges took six days to deliberate before reaching their conclusion . Five almost identical entries were chosen as the winning design, and the designers shared the £ 200 (2009: $25,000) prize money . They were Ivor Evans, a fourteen - year - old schoolboy from Melbourne; Leslie John Hawkins, a teenager apprenticed to an optician from Sydney; Egbert John Nuttall, an architect from Melbourne; Annie Dorrington, an artist from Perth; and William Stevens, a ship's officer from Auckland, New Zealand . The five winners received £ 40 each . The differences to the current flag were the six - pointed Commonwealth Star, while the components stars in the Southern Cross had different numbers of points, with more if the real star was brighter . This led to five stars of nine, eight, seven, six and five points respectively . </P> <P> The flag's initial reception was mixed . The then republican magazine The Bulletin labelled it: </P> <P> a staled réchauffé of the British flag, with no artistic virtue, no national significance...Minds move slowly: and Australia is still Britain's little boy . What more natural than that he should accept his father's cut - down garments,--lacking the power to protest, and only dimly realising his will . That bastard flag is a true symbol of the bastard state of Australian opinion . </P>

When was the british flag raised in australia