Llew O'Brien (Wide Bay, National Party) | Hansard source

Last weekend at Parliament House, thousands of people, including constituents of Wide Bay, peacefully protested against vaccine mandates responsible for sacking teachers, roadworkers, police and nurses.

The convoy to Canberra was the largest protest anyone had seen at Parliament House for any issue in decades. The people I spoke to were hardworking Australians from far and wide who had lost their livelihoods, careers, decades of hard work and dedication, and their social lives to state government health orders. We had thousands more people expressing their democratic right to peaceful protest than on any other hot-button issue of late, but with far fewer arrests. They did not engage in destructive behaviour or vandalism at Parliament House or put themselves in danger. Much smaller protests, such as Blockade Australia and Extinction Rebellion, get more mainstream media attention for their causes by breaking the law. They vandalise the parliament with spray paint, set prams on fire, block bridges, trespass on private property and glue themselves to roads and parliament furnishings.

Many came out to condemn the convoy, but peaceful protest and freedom of assembly are fundamental tenets of democracy in Australia. Other countries are re-employing people who were stood down over their vaccine mandates, and it's time the states gave our workers their jobs back.

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