"The the honour system was introduced in Australia in February 1975 and it was a unique Australian Award," she said.

"Previous to that they were the British Honour Awards."

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Another element of these awards that make them so unique to Australia is how anyone can be nominated for the Order of Australia Medal.

"It's a way of the community celebrating volunteer work, achievement or service to the community," she said.

"Anyone can nominate any other person.

"It doesn't have any political interference at all, it's not nominated by any political group. And it's non religious, non gender specific and it's just uniquely Australian and anyone can nominate any other Australian for it."

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Ms Shea said the association works to encourage the community to nominate people they feel should be acknowledged.

"Some people think it's maybe an elitist group and only elitist people receive the Order of Australia Awards, but that's not the case," she said.

"It can be an ordinary person who has worked for 30 years selling raffle tickets at the Mowbray football club or has worked on morning teas at the Georgetown rotary sausage sizzle or something like that."

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There are four levels of award - a Companion of the Order of Australia (AC), Officer of the Order of Australia (AO), Member of the Order of Australia (AM) and Medal of the Order of Australia (OAM).

The Order of Australia also has a military division, with awards recommended to the Governor-General by the Minister for Defence.

Ms Shea said the Governor General wanted to use the awards for a better representation of people, especially women, and multicultural and the indigenous population.

"It's about creating an awareness of the award to diversify the recipients that receive it. There's been a focus in the last five years particularly, they often announce what per cent of the awards when to groups such as women for that year."

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