Melissa Parke (Fremantle, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Assistant Minister for Health) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

This morning the Parliamentary Friends of the ABC hosted a briefing by ABC Managing Director, Mark Scott, and ABC Regional Director, Fiona Reynolds, concerning the creation of a new ABC regional division ahead of its launch on 1 July. The ABC has, of course, been delivering content to and about regional Australia for 82 years, reflecting the diversity of regional Australia and sharing its many stories at a local, state and national level.

But my main purpose in talking about the ABC today is to defend it against the despicable, over-the-top attacks by News Corporation media and by senior members of the government. Tony Jones and the ABC were quick to apologise for the decision by Q&A producers to have Zaky Mallah as an audience member on the show this week. This is more than the government has done for its extreme negligence in the handling of the Man Haron Monis letter to the Attorney-General asking for advice regarding contacting Islamic State.

Firstly, the letter was not passed on to the police and then it was not provided to the review of the Sydney siege. And what is the government's excuse for this grave error? Because it was on the second tab of a spreadsheet. Monis was a man with known extremist views and past violent actions, who actually went on to commit terrible crimes, including murder, during the Lindt Cafe siege. Where is the government's apology for its repeated negligence in the handling of this matter? Where is the government's apology for having allowed parliament to be misled over the inclusion of the letter in the review for days longer than necessary?

I wait, without much hope, for more confected outrage from News Corp about this and other matters, such as the government having paid people smugglers to turn boats around.