31 January — Bellenden Ker Top Station in Queensland receives the highest monthly rainfall total on record, with a total of 5,387 millimetres or 212.09 inches of rain recorded.[2]
February
9 February – Associated Securities Limited, Australia's fourth-largest finance company, is placed into receivership. In a statement to the stock exchange, ASL directors state that the results for the six months to 31 December had shown a loss of $2.5 million, plus an extraordinary loss of $1 million from foreign exchange movements.[3]
12 February – Harry M. Miller's Computicket theatre and sporting booking agency collapses.[4]
March
9 March – The Arbitration Commission awards Australian women the right to six weeks' compulsory unpaid maternity leave with the option of extending the leave to one year.[5] The provisions, which will flow to all awards covering women in the private sector, will take effect on 2 April.[5]
April
4 April – Domico Speranza hijacks a Pan-Am plane at Sydney Airport for 4 1/2 hours until shot dead by police.[6]
11 April – A truck drivers' blockade, which had disrupted the eastern states for 10 days, ends.[7] The truck drivers had been protesting against state road taxes and low cartage rates.[7]
May
24 May – James William Miller, aged 39, is charged with the Truro murders - the murders of four young women 100 kilometres north-east of Adelaide.[8] A fifth body is found with police searching for two more bodies, bringing the number of victims to a total of seven.[8][9] Miller is charged with murdering Veronica Knight, 18, Sylvia Michelle Pittmann, 16, Vicki May Mowell, 26, and Connie Iordanides, 16.[8]
June
8 June – Philip Silleny attempts to hijack a TAA aircraft near Brisbane but is disarmed by hostess Esme Qazim and other crew.[10]
9 June –
A fire at Luna Park Sydney kills seven.[11] Four young boys, a father and his two young sons die when the fire, believed to be caused by an electrical fault, engulf the ride.[12] The park is forced to close.
Australia's first modern uranium mine opens at Nabarlek in Arnhem Land.[13] A $25,000 party is held to celebrate the launch of the mine, which is also the first to open on Aboriginal tribal land.[13]
21 June – Up to a million workers stop work across the country to protest the arrest of unionists in Western Australia for addressing a public meeting without police permission, causing public transport, industry and commercial services to be thrown into disarray.[14][15]
23 June – New South Wales Premier Neville Wran opens the Eastern Suburbs six-station railway line which runs from Sydney city to Bondi Junction.[16] The railway line has been a source of continuing controversy since work on it began. In 1976, Neville Wran referred to the project as probably "the most monumental financial scandal" in the state's history.[17]
July
1 July –
Commonwealth death duties are abolished.
Responsibility for education in the Northern Territory is transferred from the Federal to the Northern Territory Government.
22 September – The standing conference of Canonical Orthodox churches in Australia is established.[citation needed]
26 September – New South Wales Attorney-General Frank Walker tables the 960-page Finnane Report in state parliament.[26] The New South Wales Government gags Opposition calls for a debate report only 30 minutes after it is tabled.[26]
27 September –
Australia announces the abolition of traditional trade preferences with Britain.[citation needed]
Ian Sinclair resigns as Federal Primary Industry Minister following allegations that he forged his father's signature on his family's annual returns.[26] According to the Finnane Report tabled in State Parliament, Ian Sinclair was dishonest in arranging loans from a group of companies of which he was "de facto managing director" to the family pastoral company.[26] Sinclair had denied the allegations the day before.[26]
October
7 October – The Australia Refugee Advisory Council is established.[27]
14 October – Australian Council of Trade Unions (ACTU) President Bob Hawke wins preselection for the safe ALP federal seat of Wills, making way for him to enter federal politics.[28] Hawke defeated the Socialist Left candidate Gerry Hand winning 38 votes from the 70-member selection panel.[28]
20 October – Prime Minister Malcolm Fraser proclaims the first section of the Great Barrier Reef (the Capricornia section) a national park, making it the third Australian national park to be declared this year.[30]Malcolm Fraser also announces the allocation of $300,000 to research projects to be set up in the region to increase the Federal Government's knowledge of this area.[30]
November
5 November – The first New South Wales Lotto draw takes place. No-one chose the six winning numbers in the draw, so only half of the first prize – $193,576 – will be divided among the five members of the in the Money syndicate.
6 November – The Royal Commission into Drug Trafficking (Woodward Royal Commission) reports to the New South Wales Parliament, recommending increased penalties and no concessions for soft drugs.
30 November – The Australian Council of Trade Unions (ACTU), at a meeting of 24 major unions, rejects proposals to block the mining export of uranium.
December
16 December – Sunday trading in Sydney public bars begins.
28 April – Collingwood beat a sixty-year-old record for the greatest VFL winning margin when they demoralise St Kilda by 178 points, beating South Melbourne's 171-point margin also against St Kilda, from 1919.
28 July – Fitzroy set a still-standing record winning margin when they beat Melbourne by 190 points at VFL Park. Their score of 36.22 (238) was a record until 1992.
12 August – Robert de Castella wins the men's national marathon title, clocking 2:13:23 in Perth.
^"Heliport opened". The Sydney Morning Herald. 30 August 1979. p. 8. Retrieved 13 January 2024.
^Murdoch, Lindsay; Comerford, Damien (31 August 1979). "Plane crash kills six". The Age. p. 1. Retrieved 13 January 2024.
^ abcdeKruger, Andrew; Bowers, Peter; Ellercamp, Paul (27 September 1979). "2am: Sinclair resigns". The Sydney Morning Herald. p. 1. Retrieved 13 January 2024.
^"Advertisement: 60 Minutes premiere". The Sydney Morning Herald. 11 February 1979. p. 86. Retrieved 13 January 2024. The National Nine Network and BHP proudly present 60 Minutes
^Harry Gordon (2002). John Ritchie; Diane Langmore (eds.). Stedman, Ivan Cuthbert (1895–1979). Australian Dictionary of Biography. Vol. 16. Melbourne University Press. Retrieved 4 January 2022.
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