Chris Pearce (Aston, Liberal Party, Parliamentary Secretary to the Treasurer) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I grieve for the people of Australia and, in particular, for those in my own state of Victoria because the Labor Party’s social engineers are at it again. Once again the Victorian people are going to be the guinea pigs in the ALP’s social laboratory. This time, the Victorian Labor government seems determined to go even further than it ever has before. It is going to attempt to perpetrate the most insidious assault upon people’s rights that this nation has ever seen. I refer, of course, to the Victorian government’s Orwellian ‘charter of human rights and responsibilities’. I believe that this Trojan horse will, if it is allowed inside this nation, work to subvert the powers of our elected legislators throughout the land and empower the unelected in their place. As such, this insidious charter is a monstrous attack on Australia’s democratic tradition. This is not just a Victorian issue. It is a matter of concern for all Australians.

Professor George Williams, who was one of the Victorian Labor government’s chosen consultants for this project, has been quite up front about the scope of this charter and about the intentions of those who are behind it. In December last year he wrote that he saw this charter as:

... a model that New South Wales could follow, along with the 2004 ACT Human Rights Act.

I am so appalled by this attempted subversion of Australian democracy by the Bracks Labor government that I am seeking advice as to what avenues are available to this federal parliament to invalidate the legislation if Premier Bracks manages to ram it through the Victorian parliament before the forthcoming state election. I am currently investigating what powers exist under the Constitution to protect the people of Victoria and, ultimately, the people of Australia, from the excesses of the sociopathic socialists in the states.

Social engineering is nothing new to Labor, but this move is more extreme and more dangerous than any of their other crazy ideas. This Bracks legislation is the creature of the ultraliberal and neo-Marxist elements that influence the course of ALP governments. It is steeped in political correctness. It is a monster created by those who think they have the right to dictate the manner in which Australians should live their lives. Nobody should be in any doubt that the charter currently before the Victorian parliament is a major part of a premeditated national push—orchestrated by the Left of the ALP—to introduce similar legislation into every state and territory of the Commonwealth.

Compared to the Victorian charter, the ACT Human Rights Act 2004 was like a movie trailer—the sneak preview that gave us a glimpse of the blockbuster horror movie that was coming our way. Make no mistake: all of these assorted acts, charters and other pieces of legislation are a serious attempt to impose Big Brother political correctness on every Australian. This is about dictating to every Australian how they should live their lives. This appalling legislation is about usurping the values upon which our nation was built and has thrived. It is about enshrining in law a philosophy that is utter anathema to the great bulk of Australians. This is about the all-powerful state having control over every individual, every day of their lives.

It may be 17 years since the fall of the Berlin Wall, but the ghosts of Karl Marx and Joseph Stalin still haunt the ALP. And just as the ALP was tainted by communism in the 1950s and 1960s, today the ALP is infected by left-wing political correctness. While Labor is currently trying to introduce these subversive measures at a state level, spare a thought for what we could get if the federal government fell into their hands. History shows that the federal ALP comrades have been just as enthusiastic about such repressive measures as their state colleagues. So the Bracks Labor government is sending us a sharp reminder of the past and an urgent warning for the future. If we want to know quite clearly what the federal Labor Party has in mind for the people of Australia, I do not think we should bother asking this Leader of the Opposition. He has difficulty making his position clear on anything. Rather, I suggest we look at Labor’s plan, as detailed in chapter 7 of the ALP National Platform and Constitution 2004. This is the same platform that Latham took to the last election. See, Labor leaders change, but Labor itself never changes.

Let us take a look at Labor’s blueprint for government. Chapter 7 makes many grandiose statements about the need to protect human rights. It tells us Labor will seek to incorporate what it describes as Australia’s international human rights obligations into domestic law. It tells us Labor will introduce a legislative charter of citizenship and aspirations, which also has an Orwellian ring about it, but it does not go into details. What it does not tell us is whether or not a federal Labor government would follow the lead of its comrades in the states and territories and introduce some sort of bill of rights. Given the alarm currently on display in Victoria, it is essential the federal Leader of the Opposition comes clean with the Australian people on his plans for such legislation and how it will affect Australians’ lives.

One of the biggest question marks hanging over the Victorian charter is why it is being introduced at all. The human rights of not one single Australian is under threat. I have not seen hundreds of thousands of Victorians marching in the streets, demanding Labor defend their basic rights. Human rights in any state have been far from a barbecue stopper issue. With the advent of Labor’s bill of rights, I would suggest that is about to change forever. Labor’s legislation is clearly designed to undermine the supremacy of the parliament as the ultimate law-making body. The Victorian charter will lead to a US style situation where laws will be made by unelected judges as they interpret legislation according to what they construe as the meaning of the charter.

We will soon see a situation where a majority in both houses of parliament will not be enough to govern. A majority on the state Supreme Court will also be necessary. We will replicate the problems faced by our American cousins who now regard any legislative change as being dictated more by the US Supreme Court than the congress. In anyone’s language, this must devalue our democratic processes and, indeed, the parliament itself. In Labor’s human rights utopia, Australia will see a massive rights enforcement industry spring up almost immediately, with faceless bureaucrats dictating whose rights are to be protected and under what circumstances. Not surprisingly, Labor’s civil libertarian lawyer mates are rubbing their hands together with glee at the windfall the legislation will lavish upon them.

Respected commentator Janet Albrechtsen recently used her column in the Australian newspaper to point out the ramifications of the charter as it applies to the Aboriginal community. Ms Albrechtsen went as far as describing section 19 of the bill as:

... a licence for more aboriginal children to be abused in the name of culture.

I am sure every member of this House has been both sickened and enraged by revelations of domestic violence and child abuse by some in the name of Aboriginal culture. Clearly, it is an evil we should all be aiming to eradicate. The introduction of legislation which even remotely might facilitate such monstrous behaviour is to be condemned by every right-thinking Australian.

It is incumbent upon the opposition leader in this place to decisively wash his hands of any such possibility. As we know, the ALP holds the rights of criminals in higher regard than those of victims. The charter will send our society further spiralling into the sad malaise where victims of crime are treated as second-class citizens. Prominent Queen’s Counsels Peter Faris and Philip Dunn have warned the bill of rights would throw Victoria’s courts into chaos with people testing laws against the charter. They have quite unambiguously stated that criminals will not only have greater opportunity to abuse the justice system and walk free if they are not tried quickly enough, but will even have greater rights to stand for parliament.

As I alluded to earlier, social engineering is a nationwide Labor disease. This legislation introduces a terminal aspect. We have already witnessed the Victorian Racial and Religious Vilification Act in action, where two Christian ministers have been dragged before the courts for the crime of preaching. I assure the House, that will pale into insignificance compared with the impact this charter will have on the lives of each and every individual living in the state of Victoria.

This charter is bad legislation. What makes it bad is obvious. It is unnecessary, and unnecessary legislation is always bad. It seeks to replace the values on which our nation has been built; it undermines the parliament as the final arbiter of law making; it bestows power on an unelected and unaccountable judiciary, which the Constitution declares Australia is never meant to have; it undermines the criminal justice system; it will further alienate the legal system from Australians; it will entrench in law the cultural defence aspect; and it enforces Labor’s calculated and underhanded social engineering program.

When I was elected to this parliament I committed to serving the people of Aston and the community to the best of my ability. I remain steadfast in that. In order to maintain that commitment, I must take a stand on this issue. Let me make my position very clear, perfectly clear, to every Labor Premier throughout Australia: keep your hands off the rights of Australians. Submit your charters and your so-called bills of rights to the people. Ask the people to make their judgment or face the prospect of action in this parliament to render that legislation inoperable. (Time expired)