Prime Minister John Howard has used a citizenship ceremony in Canberra to remind immigrants of the need to embrace Australian values and to learn English as revellers celebrated across the nation.

Several thousand people made their way to Canberra's Commonwealth Park for a flag raising and citizenship ceremony today for nearly one hundred immigrants from around the world.

“You may be drawn from the four corners of the Earth but you are united by a common love of this country of ours and you are united by a common commitment to its traditions, its values, its triumphs as well as an acknowledgement of its failures, it successes as well as its mistakes,” Mr Howard said.

Mr Howard said Australians believed passionately in the equality of men and women, but also in the importance of a being able to speak English.

“I think most Australians think it's very important that we embrace as our common method of communication with each other a single language and that is the English language,” he said.

“We don't ask you to forget your homeland, we recognise that from now until the day you die you will have a special place in your heart for the country in which you were born.”

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