I rise to speak on the Online Safety Amendment (Digital Duty of Care) Bill 2026 and to oppose it quite strongly. One of the most fundamental responsibilities of the parliament is to ensure that the laws we pass are clear, properly defined and capable of being applied without political or ideological prejudice. This responsibility becomes particularly important when legislation has the potential to restrict freedom of expression and speech. While we all support protecting children from violence, exploitation and genuinely harmful material online, we must be very careful not to confuse protecting people from harm with protecting them from ideas the government happens to disagree with. Unfortunately, I believe that this is a very real danger with this legislation.

This bill gives unprecedented powers to the government and the eSafety Commissioner, authorising them to make decisions that, to be honest with you, in many cases, should be decisions made by parents, not government. The bill explains a plethora of extremely concerning recommendations. I agree with Senator Henderson's comparison of it with a dog's breakfast. Its intention to protect children is perplexing considering Labor has already imposed restrictions on under-16-year-olds on social media platforms and begs the question: is that legislation a complete and utter failure of Labor once again?

The bill is full of vague phrases and makes restrictions around undefined terms such as 'gender equality', which I'll expand more on shortly. It threatens online social media platforms with penalties of up to $109 million for failing to protect users from online harm, something the bill can't even properly define and something that will be decided by the government of the day. No doubt this will only serve to have a chilling effect on public debate and free speech.

I have real concerns about many proposed sections in this bill, but one of the ones that I find very concerning is proposed section 25E(1)(c), which covers 'material or conduct that encourages or promotes hostile attitudes towards women or gender equality'. It seems very reasonable, but the bill doesn't define what 'hostility towards women' or 'gender equality' actually mean. This leaves the scope of the provision unclear and open to broad interpretation.

To better understand my concern, one can turn to the explanatory memorandum accompanying the bill, which, when expanding on section 25E(1)(c), refers to a 'growing proportion of adolescents' expressing 'misogynistic attitudes'. The word 'misogyny', which has an established dictionary meaning of hatred of women, once again, at face value, seems like an appropriate term to describe hostility towards women. But when referring to misogyny, the explanatory memorandum cites a federal government funded study into misogyny conducted by the University of Melbourne that adopts a definition of misogyny developed by feminist academic and activist Kate Manne. It is a definition that broadens the meaning of misogyny dramatically beyond the commonly understood meaning of hatred of women.

Manne's definition of misogyny is less about hatred of women and more about mechanisms that enforce what she describes as 'patriarchal expectations'. Manne describes her new definition of misogyny as aligning with other semantic activism, which is effectively the practice of changing the meaning of words for the purpose of achieving a social engineering goal—in other words, weaponising words in the Left's never-ending culture wars. Manne's analysis of misogyny encompasses concepts such as traditional gender roles and expectations that women provide men with care, sympathy and attention. That women caring for men—and indeed men caring for women—can be considered as a form of misogyny is clearly outside what Australians ordinarily understand as hatred of women.

Of course, any disagreement with any of the many and varied forms of feminism is considered misogynistic also and therefore hostile to women. If this broader concept informs the interpretation of hostile attitudes towards women, serious questions arise about section 25E(1)(c)'s reach as it relates to online content teaching children about a pro-life view of the world, including that human life begins at conception. Will this section also prohibit online teaching that a man and a woman are determined by biological sex? These are all captured by this definition of misogyny.

This bill needs to address these serious matters of violence against women and men, which is something we all support. But this certainly adds many questions. The bill's failure to define gender equality raises questions about how the term will be interpreted, particularly in the light of the government's approach, which places an emphasis on disadvantages experienced by women while being blind to the serious disadvantages faced by men. I suspect that this government doesn't actually know what gender equality really means. For example, the government's main policy document on gender equality is clearly titled Gender Equality (Working for Women). Its first objective is addressing gender based violence. Whilst we should all be concerned about violence towards women, the strategy does not address the fact that the vast majority of victims of violence are male.

As a former police officer, I have a very good understanding of violence and domestic violence. And as a father and grandfather of five girls I feel we need to address violence against females. But I also know that to achieve equality we need to understand that men can be and all too often are the victims of violence. Official Australian Institute of Criminology statistics show that males have consistently accounted for a substantial majority of homicides in Australia. From 1989 to 2025, on average, approximately 70 per cent of homicides had male victims. Australia's 2024-25 domestic violence homicide data showed that male victims are a substantial group also. The Australian Institute of Health and Welfare's domestic homicide analysis shows that, of the reported 98 domestic homicide victims, over half—49—were male. Where Labor's gender equality policy does mention male victims, it states, 'Men are also victims of men's violence,' which is obviously true but ignores the significant number of female offenders. The same Australian Institute of Health and Welfare 2024 domestic homicide data for intimate partner homicide showed that approximately 30 per cent of offenders were female, and police data shows similar rates for offending for domestic violence assaults. That's a third.

These figures support a response to male victims and female offending alongside efforts to address male perpetration and violence against women. With glaring inconsistencies in the government's interpretation of equality, it's fair to ask: when the government is using the term 'gender equality' in legislation, what does it actually mean? While I've spoken a lot about the bill's reference to gender equality and misogyny, the bill's ultimate flaw is that it grants extraordinary powers to the government and eSafety Commissioner, forces companies to regulate an extensively complicated and undefined mess and takes away responsibility and accountability of both parents and individuals. The government should never be awarded these sweeping powers to censor what someone has access to, because it appears that what they consider safe or harmful is completely subjective.