Rebecca White (Lyons, Australian Labor Party, Assistant Minister for Women) | Hansard source

There's something I'd like to address first before I get into my substantive contribution. Maybe it's the reason for the opposition leader fleeing the chamber. I wanted to address his remarks, where he characterised a very serious matter, an ongoing police investigation into an alleged sexual assault by the Sydney Swans football players, by describing it and characterising it as lewd behaviour. That diminishes the seriousness of this issue, and, as a leader in our nation's parliament, I think that he should come back in and make further remarks to demonstrate that none of us in this place take this matter as anything other than seriously. This is an incredibly serious moment for our nation. I'm pleased to see the Sydney Swans respond the way they have this week. I have to say they were a little bit slow to respond in the way women of Australia deserve. Unfortunately, in this country, one in five women have experienced sexual violence by the age of 15. This is not an abstract concept. It is not lewd behaviour. It needs to be called out and named for what it is. I urge the opposition leader to do that now.

To the contribution that I will make on this motion, I'm an animal lover. In my first speech, I spoke about growing up on a farm and being Tasmanian. I have a soft spot for one creature in particular. One of my favourite animals is the eagle. I love eagles, so I'm always on the lookout for news about eagles. It wouldn't be surprising to those in this chamber to hear that I also am on the lookout for news about politics. So imagine my surprise that just this week there was a combination in a news story of politics and an eagle. I thought, 'How lucky could I possibly be?' It turned out it was rather interesting. I don't know if the opposition leader saw it as well. The Western Australian Liberal leader compared the opposition leader's chances of becoming a PM with his own chances of becoming the coach of the West Coast Eagles. If your own members in your own political movement rate your chances that poorly, why should any of us or the rest of the Australian population take your leadership seriously? From what I can tell, the chances of the Leader of the Opposition becoming the coach of the West Coast Eagles is about as likely as me becoming the coach of the Tasmanian Devils.

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