Russell Broadbent (Monash, Liberal Party) | Hansard source

It's most interesting to listen to the debate that we've had on the floor of the Federation Chamber today. It's been spoken with passion on a motion brought forward by the member for McPherson which is quite apt for the time to give opportunity for such addresses, be they passionate or be they more concerned with the local community.

I support the member for McPherson for a very good reason. I would go back a number of years to waves of migrants that came to this country and made a huge contribution. They were the Serbians and the Croatians. But what they brought with them was the blood rivalry, the revenge, the great sadness for the war-torn countries of Europe that they had left to come to this new place of freedom, opportunity, freedom of association and freedom of speech, not having any understanding of where we were at. I note that the member for Calwell, Maria Vamvakinou, brought to my attention a number of times that, when waves of new immigrants come into her community, which is one of the first places they stay in Melbourne, they would then have to explain to the immigrants that you don't have to kill the brother-in-law or the father down the street in this country. For that even to have to be said for us would be something that we wouldn't really consider. It could be the case that someone has such a passion about what's happened to their family in the past, and that family that caused the problem is now living down the street in Australia, and they have revenge in mind. It wouldn't come into our mind.

But what is insidious in this—and I thank the member for McPherson for bringing it to the attention of the parliament—is that they come to Australia for freedom and opportunity, sometimes not for themselves but definitely for their children. These groups that come just work hard, 24 hours a day if they have to. They'll do anything, any job, anywhere, any opportunity—they will take it up. But their children get the opportunity to go to our schools and our universities and, in that generation, make an enormous contribution to what happens in Australia. It's the parents that suffer the indignity in this country of an outrageous regime thinking that it can influence what happens in this nation, in their diaspora community, with threats such as, 'We will kill your children if you don't obey what we want you to say.' Ninety-five per cent of Australians around this country, from Perth to Parramatta, from Darwin to Tasmania, wouldn't even understand what these people have to put up with. The opportunity is given by our freedom of movement in this country—for people to come in here from a country such as that on a holiday visa, visiting visa or whatever visa they got themselves in on and say: 'Goodness, gracious me! I can do what I like here in Australia. I can go into that country and set up a quasi organisation, pretending I'm visiting for good reasons, to influence good relationships between Cambodia and Australia, and, instead, threaten their safety and blackmail people into our way of thinking so they must support our regime.'

I pray that the government is working towards the best outcome. I thank the member for McPherson again for bringing this to the notice of not only this parliament but the Australian people. I pray that the Cambodian community, or any other community in our district and our responsibility, is given the safety, protection and care that comes with what it means to be a Cambodian-Australian. They call themselves Cambodian-Australians. Their children will call themselves Australians of Cambodian descent.

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