Peter Khalil (Wills, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

Notwithstanding the last speaker, the previous speakers in the opposition have not been able to acknowledge, or won't admit to, three things about this MPI. No. 1: they won't acknowledge that the government's policy is actually a reaffirmation of the longstanding bipartisan policy of successive Australian governments that has been in existence for decades. No. 2: they won't acknowledge that it was actually they, the opposition, when they were in government under Scott Morrison, that, in 2018, decided to do foreign policy on the run, breaking and breaching decades of bipartisanship, and for what? For a pathetic attempt at short-term political gain. And No. 3—and this is a general point: as you've seen in the first couple of months of government, our foreign policy is based on a sensible approach to the national interest, not a personal political interest, not a short-term political gain in a by-election. In this case, our foreign policy is in alignment with the international community's broad agreement that Jerusalem is a final status issue that should be resolved as part of any peace negotiations between Israel and the Palestinian people. Let's be very clear: the position of successive Australian governments has been that there can be no lasting peace that does not address that final status of Jerusalem, and, as the Prime Minister said earlier today, he will not and his government will not undermine that approach.

This goes back in history; I'll reach back to 1967, to when your own Liberal external affairs minister, Paul Hasluck, called for the commencement of 'an effort to build long-term peace' and outlined that in relation to the future status of Jerusalem. I'll talk about how, even more recently, your former Prime Minister John Howard said himself in a joint press conference that the status of Jerusalem is something that would be resolved by the parties in discussion. And, of course, former Liberal foreign minister Julie Bishop said something similar:

Matters relating to Jerusalem are subject to Final Status negotiations between Israel and the Palestinian Authority

This wasn't changed in the Gorton government. It wasn't changed by Malcolm Fraser. It wasn't changed by Bob Hawke. It wasn't changed by John Howard, Julia Gillard or Malcolm Turnbull—or Tony Abbott for that matter. But it was changed by Scott Morrison, the exception amongst all those prime ministers. He decided, 'Oh, I'll exploit the sensitivity of this issue for a short-term political purpose,' when he decided to drop in the media during the by-election for Wentworth that he was going to move the embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, and he was trying to do this, of course, so that he could win the by-election in Wentworth for Dave Sharma. Scott Morrison said at the time he was persuaded by the arguments of Dave Sharma, leaving no doubt in all of our minds that this was simply a cynical attempt to get Dave Sharma re-elected in Wentworth. It didn't work. They lost the by-election. The voters of Wentworth saw right through that political stunt, and they lost the by-election.

This confirms our suspicion about what we know about Scott Morrison in doing this—

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