Josh Burns (Macnamara, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The Victorian election campaign has been at times a pretty ugly demonstration of our democracy, and I rise tonight on a matter that, frankly, I would rather not rise on and that gives me absolutely no joy, seeing some of the behaviour and some of the failures of leadership by the Victorian Liberal Party. Matthew Guy wants to be the Premier of Victoria. That is a high office. It's an office that demands respect and appreciation for the huge responsibility that comes with being the leader of the state of Victoria. Yet what we've uncovered and what is being demonstrated by the Liberal Party—how they are willing to get to the high office of Premier—has been absolutely despicable.

Let me take you through some examples. First of all, there is Mr Tyler Baker-Pearce, who in Narre Warren South is running as a candidate. This is a man who has stood outside Auschwitz-Birkenau taking a selfie, smiling and putting a hot emoji on it. He has a long history of vile, antisemitic remarks. This man somehow was awarded the Liberal Party' preferences over the Labor Party. The Labor Party preferenced the Liberal Party above this character. The Liberal Party decided to grant this Neo-Nazi their support in the election. This is coming after months and months of the Liberal Party dancing with these extremists.

I'll give you another example. There was a Freedom Party candidate, Rebekah Spelman, who publicly called for the Premier to be hanged. She publicly called for the Premier of Victoria to be hanged, and she gets Matthew Guy's preferences in the upper house—above-the-line preferences. This person, calling for violence against political leaders, gets the Liberal Party's support. Sadly, there's more. There is the person who stood next to well-known Neo-Nazis only the other day and again called for the Premier to be turned into red mist—a reference to sniper bullets being aimed at the Premier. It's not the first time she's called for violence against the Premier. The Liberal Party in Victoria preferenced her in the upper house in Western Metropolitan.

There's more. In their seat of Narre Warren North, they're running a candidate who, frankly, has views that are unbefitting of the Liberal Party. The Liberal Party are our opponents. I respect the Liberal Party, and I respect many members of the Liberal Party in this place. But this candidate is unfit to be a member of your party, let alone a candidate in the state election, and you're running him in a seat in Narre Warren North. After some of the views that he expressed against our First Nations people and against a whole range of different issues, including women's reproductive rights, he doesn't get Matthew Guy's preferences; he gets his full endorsement. He dismissed his comments as 'silly comments'.

I've seen some pretty rough-and-tumble stuff in politics in my time, but this cannot be the standard that is acceptable in our democracy by any of the major political parties. There have been moments when the Labor Party, and people inside the Labor Party, have expressed views that, frankly, are unworthy of the Labor Party. If anyone has any suggestions of people and members of the Labor Party who do that, I am always open, because we must hold ourselves to a higher account. Our democracy is diminished, the people of Victoria are diminished and the Liberal Party in Victoria is diminished when they hold themselves to such an appallingly low standard. Violence and threats of violence against parliamentarians will end in a way that we have seen internationally. It will end with one of our colleagues being on the receiving end of violence. We must work together to call out violent acts. We must work together to ensure that the standards of politics in this country are those that are worthy of the people that we are privileged to represent, and the standard that I have seen set by those seeking to hold high office in Victoria has been absolutely appalling.