Chris Hayes (Werriwa, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

This evening I would like to talk about an issue which I have been involved with now for some time. Earlier this year I met two people at a party in the Northern Territory—Christine and Lee Rush. During the course of the evening I discovered that they are the parents of Scott Rush. Scott is one of the Bali Nine currently on death row in Kerobokan Prison in Indonesia. What transpired that evening was a significant story as it unfolded. Lee Rush, about my age, who obviously loves his kids, was very worried about his son. He thought his son was mixing with the wrong crowd and certainly had grave reservations about the people he was associating with. He suspected his son was involved with drugs.

Lee told me that evening that he knew his son would probably never speak to him again but that he was determined to do something about it so that this would not be his son’s future. What he did was to go to the police. He told the police what he suspected his son was involved in, with whom his son was associating, where his son was going, his exit time to Bali and when he was returning, and therein started an Australian police operation. Lee and Christine Rush said to my wife, Bernadette, and me, ‘We didn’t think at that juncture we were signing our son’s death warrant.’ Their son was apprehended in Bali, and he was tried and convicted. He was initially sentenced by the court to life imprisonment, which is obviously a substantial penalty in itself. However, he appealed to the District Court. The District Court confirmed his sentence of life imprisonment. He further appealed to the Supreme Court. When he appealed to the Supreme Court he was one of a number of applicants, one of three drug mules. Whilst they were all tried by the one court, they were sentenced by separate sentencing panels. Without the police or the prosecution seeking to have his sentence increased, his sentencing panel came to the decision to increase his sentence from life imprisonment to execution. Two paragraphs of that decision took this young man’s life. The sentencing panel does not record in its judgement any comparison with anyone who was arrested on the very same day or for the same crime. The others who appealed under the same circumstances as Scott Rush had their sentences of life imprisonment maintained. Presently, Scott Rush is the only drug mule in the death tower at Kerobokan Prison. Notwithstanding that, presently two other Australians involved with the Bali nine are also in the death tower.

I have been talking about this for some time—as a father, quite frankly—and I think we should have a view on this. We are one of only 130 nations that have an abolitionist approach to the death penalty. In modern society, I really think we have adequate means for punishing people for their crimes and an ability to actually rehabilitate people in the process. That is why I decided to take a stand on this. What father has not had concerns about the people his kids are associating with? What father—or what parent—would not go out of their way to do something to ameliorate the situation in the hope of giving their kids a better future? Here is a father who tried to do that and, as Lee Rush says, in the process he signed his son’s death warrant.

Today I received a letter that was written on 10 October. I would like to read this letter. It is addressed to me from Kerobokan Prison and says:

Dear Mr Hayes

Today is World Day against the Death Penalty. I’m not sure what is happening outside but it’s just another day inside the death Tower.

I’ve been kept informed of your Motion in The House of Representatives which I understand is supported by many other Australian Parliamentarians. I’d like to thank you and your colleagues for caring and taking a principle position in relation to the death penalty. All of us in the Death Tower are following your motion with keen interest.

Efforts by people like yourself and Mr Ruddock and Mr Dreyfus help give us hope that we can have a future. I don’t want to be in any way political but from a practical point of view of someone inside on Death Row it makes practical and good sense to have a consistent position of opposing the death penalty without discrimination.

If the Opposition is just (for) us Australian citizens it makes us stick out, like sore thumbs, amongst all the other nationals who have also got the death penalty. I say this because I share my cell with a Nigerian, Emmanuel, who’s dignity and kindness helps comfort us on our many dark nights.

So taking consistent stand for everyone on the death penalty that helps us here on the inside of the wall. On this day I want to repeat something I’ve said before. I AM really sorry for the crime I have committed. I really do want the chance to show I’m capable of reform and that I will be completely reformed. I want the chance to give back to the communities that I have offended. I could be a very unusual ambassador against the cancer of drugs in Australia and Indonesia today.

I’m writing underneath a sign that says in Indonesian “Don’t even try drugs” and, it’s right! That’s the message I’d like to get across to other people who like me didn’t understand.

Finally I hope your colleagues in Parliament listen to you when you speak to the Motion which I hope will be passed. If it is passed it will help, in a practical way, people like myself and my parents. Because what happened to us, could happen to any Australian family.

I thank you most sincerely, Scott Rush

It is a parent’s nightmare to have their child committed to death. We saw what an emotive issue this is when Nguyen was executed in Singapore. I recall very vividly the vigils that took place on that occasion and the prayers that were offered. Unfortunately, it still eventuated that this Australian was executed in Singapore.

It is my intention not to wait until people are executed but to be prepared to make a stand as someone who is committed to youth, as someone who has a family and as someone who has from time to time not been totally happy with the company that my kids have kept. As Scott Rush says in his letter, this is something that could afflict any family. As a parent I think it is time that we expressed our general opposition to the death penalty. There must be other ways by which these matters can be dealt with and other ways that punishment can be mete out to best fit the crime that has occurred. I think I would like to be in a situation where we can generally claim clemency for Australians currently on death row overseas and also, as Scott Rush says in his letter, be consistent and maintain our principled position and our opposition to the death penalty. This was something that was unanimously moved in this parliament in— (Time expired)