Craig Kelly (Hughes, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Australia has a long and proud sporting reputation. It is something that has evolved over a century through the efforts of men like Bradman, women like Dawn Fraser, the great Murray Rose, Shane Gould, Dally Messenger, the Ella brothers, Arthur Beetson, Glenn McGrath, Rod Laver, Cathy Freeman and Greg Norman. The list goes on and on. Our reputation across the world is for hard play but fair play. It is a long and proud tradition. Every nation knows that if you come up against someone wearing the green and gold you will be in for one hell of a fight, but the guy or the woman wearing the green and gold will be playing it hard but fair.

But last week, with one stage-managed press conference, that tradition and heritage has been destroyed across the globe. We now have the international media branding our entire nation as a nation of sporting cheats. At this press conference no sport, no club and no individual was named. It was simply a broad brush cast across the entire sporting landscape. Every single Australian sportsman and sportswoman has had this accusation brought against them. Simply by failing to give details they have labelled everyone as guilty. They have smeared every Australian sport. Until we get the full details every sport remains under suspicion.

After these alarmist headlines, when we looked at the detail we found that the report the government relied on, which they called 'Australia's blackest sporting day' used weasel words such as 'maybe', 'could be' and 'suspected'. All we are left with is unspecified, hysterical assertions which slandered our athletes and our sporting institutions. No doubt, like any large group, there will be a percentage of wrongdoers. Some individuals will from time to time bend and even break the rules to maximise opportunities for themselves. And there should be an investigation; no-one disagrees with that.

Why last week did we have such a media frenzy whipped up with a lavish and sensational media conference using sporting CEOs as props?

This Labor government has done much damage to Australia but if it is found that last week their orchestrated emergency press conference was nothing other than a beat-up of a few isolated incidents or an orchestrated attempt to push Labor's other disasters off the front pages, I say God help the Labor Party because of the retribution they will receive from the Australian sporting community and lovers of sport.