Marielle Smith (SA, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

I move the following motion standing in the name of my colleague Senator Wong:

That, in the opinion of the Senate, the following is a matter of urgency:

The need for all Senators to share accurate information about the efficacy of COVID-19 based on official health advice; to combat disinformation campaigns that encourage vaccine hesitancy; to support government action based on health advice that seeks to reduce the risk of COVID-19, including the introduction of vaccine mandates by all State and Territory Governments; and to support the Prime Minister's comments on radio station 2GB in August 2021 that businesses have a "legitimate" right to refuse entry to someone who had refused to get vaccinated.

I rise in support of the urgency motion, and urgent it is.

You don't put your hand up for public life unless you believe that, when you get to a place like this, when you take a seat in a chamber like this, your voice will matter; that your words will matter; that they will have influence, meaning and impact; and that you can use those words to help lead our nation, to help lead your communities, to be a leader, to influence and to engage. I truly believe that most people who put their hand up for a seat in this chamber or in the other place are trying to use their voice for good, that they believe in the impact of their words and in the impact that their words can have. But at the moment, in this place and in the other place, too many of our fellow senators aren't using their voice or their influence to lead but are undermining leadership and what it means to be a good leader.

We're at a point in time in our history when reliable information matters more than ever and when science matters more than ever. When you undermine science and you undermine good information, you undermine information which will keep people safe and healthy and could actually keep them alive. When you undermine that information and that science you put people at risk, and we must call that out. We must call it out in this chamber and we must call it out in public. We must use our voices to do that—to call out those who are seeking to undermine our response to this pandemic and who are seeking to frighten, to incite fear and to spread misinformation.

No-one wanted this pandemic. No-one was prepared for the devastation and destruction it has caused, not just in Australia but around our world. Around our world millions of lives have been lost and families devastated, communities devastated and nations devastated. Lives have been destroyed and livelihoods have been destroyed. For too long we were completely vulnerable to the devastation the pandemic was causing. But then science entered—the incredible men and women who worked tirelessly around the clock to deliver a vaccine. How lucky are we? How lucky are we to have science and how lucky are we to be the beneficiaries of their work?

Notwithstanding the government's sloppy delivery of the vaccine rollout, how lucky are we now to have more ready access to a vaccine which might just be the thing that saves our lives? It might just be the thing which protects our neighbours and keeps our children safe. To be able to do that—to keep the people we love safe—is a blessing and it's a miracle of science, and I'm so grateful for it. I am double vaccinated and I'm gratefully double vaccinated, as are the 77 per cent of my fellow South Australians aged over 16 who have rolled up their sleeves to get vaccinated and to keep our community safe.

I put my hand up for public life to use my voice to lead in my community—to serve my community. But there are people in this place who are using their voices to spread toxic fear and misinformation which put their fellow Australians at risk, encouraging misinformation that can turn into vaccine hesitancy, and we need to call that out. And it's not just those who are engaged in the explicit peddling of misinformation and disinformation, those who are explicitly doing this to their fellow Australians and explicitly undermining our response to this pandemic, but also those who are dog whistling and playing word semantics, seeking to undermine this rollout and to undermine our response.

The consequences of this misinformation are real and they're personal. When they encourage vaccine hesitancy and create fear they risk the health and wellbeing not just of individuals but of communities. The consequences are real for the small business owners in my community, who are already confused and stressed out about how to protect their staff, their customers and their clients. They think they know where their Prime Minister stands when he legitimises vaccine mandates on one hand but then quietly and softly undermines them on the other. And the consequences are real for those of us in this place for whom misinformation and disinformation are hitting close to home.

The consequences were real and personal for me when I found out that my vaccinated 102-year-old grandfather was having people not turn up to visit him because they thought the fact that he was vaccinated meant they could catch COVID. He's 102 and he missed out on those visits because of that fear. It's absurd, but it's happening. It's happening because people let the misinformation happen, and they peddle it, encourage it and stoke it. It's happening because misinformation has become a business model and an electoral model, and it's putting Australians at risk.

In my state of South Australia we're about to open up. Whilst there is much to welcome in that, and I trust that those decisions have been taken on health advice—as we've trusted that the decisions throughout this pandemic were taken on health advice and, when they were, supported them—I have to say that I'm deeply concerned for the parts of my community which are at most risk and potentially have the most to lose when and if COVID returns to our state. Those are populations like our South Australian First Nations communities, for whom the double-vaccination rate is just 46.7 per cent. That's dramatically lower than in our whole eligible population. And you know we have seen the particularly dangerous, particularly toxic spread of misinformation amongst our First Nations populations. That, combined with a vacuum of appropriate public health messaging, has left people at risk.

I want to commend my fellow senators, Senators Dodson and McCarthy, and also Linda Burney and all those who have stepped up to call out this misinformation, to keep these communities safe in the context of this fearmongering. We have seen what happens when communities with significant First Nations populations become the site of a COVID-19 outbreak. We saw what happened in Wilcannia—nothing short of a public health crisis. But we have these low rates in other parts of our country as well; we have them in South Australia. And it's not the fault of local populations. There were significant issues in terms of the vaccine rollout, in terms of support provided to these communities and in terms of public information and messaging. But these communities need our support now, and I'm worried.

I'm also worried about the kids in our community who can't yet get a vaccination. I'm the mother of two children under the age of five. When this misinformation spreads through our community, when vaccine hesitancy spreads throughout our community, it puts kids at risk, too. It puts those who can't get a vaccine at risk. This is dangerous stuff. This is not coming to this place, to this building, and using your voice to do good. This is not coming here to lead in our communities, to support your fellow South Australians. This is not coming here to stand up and say, 'Thank God for the miracle of science; thank God for this blessing; thank God we're not on the front line of this war, this pandemic, alone now, without any armour; thank God for science and scientists, who have given us this vaccine, who have given us an opportunity to be safer.'

Millions of people have died worldwide, and I know there are countless people around the world who would love to have access to a vaccine but can't. And here we do have access; here we have this armour. So, let's listen to the scientists. Let's listen to science. Let's value and appreciate this miracle and call out the people here and the people around our country who are turning uncertainty and fear into a business model, turning it into an electoral model, saying, 'Here's my shot at re-election: I'll stoke this fear, I'll stoke this fire'—instead of leading their communities, instead of doing everything they can to uphold the health advice, to uphold science and scientists, to uphold the armour that we now have in this war, in this pandemic.

Call them out. It is grossly irresponsible. And it's not a game. It's not student politics. This is real: real lives, real communities—my community—our kids, our First Nations populations, our vulnerable populations, who deserve so much more, who deserve leaders, who deserve people worthy of the chairs they take up in this place. It's time to call them out.