Murray Watt (Queensland, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Northern Australia) Share this | Hansard source

[by video link] You would think that this urgency motion that the Senate is debating today is pretty simple. We are not asking much of senators today with this motion. All this motion seeks to do is to call on all senators, regardless of their party, regardless of their state, to share accurate information about the efficacy of the COVID-19 vaccines based on health advice—not based on 'Dr Google', 'Dr Facebook', 'Dr Clive Palmer' or 'Dr Conspiracy Theorist' but based on health advice from recognised experts in the field, many of whom are employed by this federal government.

This motion calls on all senators to combat the disinformation campaigns that we are seeing from far too many quarters in our society—and, sadly, from senators who supposedly were elected to represent the best interests of all Australians but who seem to be more preoccupied with spreading fear and disinformation about vaccines that stand as our best chance of keeping our communities safe, keeping our economies working and keeping people in jobs.

This motion calls on all senators to support government action—regardless of which level of government and which party—that seeks to keep communities safe, and that government action includes vaccination mandates, which are imposed on the basis of health advice. These mandates, just like other actions that have been taken by governments—state, federal and local—are based on health advice. They are not being done on a whim; they are not being done as part of some power grab, as is being alleged; they are being done on basis of health advice, with the express purpose of keeping our communities safe, keeping people alive, keeping our economies going and keeping people in work.

It is important to note that these mandates have been imposed by all state and territory governments. We only hear from the Prime Minister and his colleagues about mandates that have been imposed in Labor states. They are completely silent about the fact that these mandates have also been imposed by their Liberal and National party colleagues in state and territory governments. It's as if a mandate imposed by a Labor state is a terrible thing and a mandate imposed by a Liberal or National state is a wonderful thing. That goes to the dishonesty that we are seeing from this Prime Minister and, unfortunately, from so many of his colleagues as we all should be combining to combat COVID, to combat disinformation and to keep our communities safe.

This motion also supports comments that this Prime Minister has made before. There are not many times that you will see opposition senators giving this Prime Minister a pat on the back for doing the right thing around COVID, but from time to time he has done the right thing, especially when he was speaking to Sydney radio in August and commending the New South Wales government for bringing in vaccination mandates and for noting that businesses have a legitimate right to refuse patrons who are unvaccinated. In August it was okay for the Prime Minister to back the New South Wales government and to back New South Wales businesses that exclude patrons on the basis of their vaccination status, but, when it comes to Queensland, or any Labor state, it's a different matter.

This goes to the core of how this Prime Minister has approached this issue and every issue. He is constantly looking to pick fights with Labor states, and with the residents of those states, while giving a free pass for exactly the same kind of behaviour that we see from Liberal state governments. What we need at the moment, as we seek to recover from COVID-19, is a prime minister and a government who will actually bring the country together and not seek to divide the country on the basis of the colour of their state government. That's what we need, and it's not what we're getting from this Prime Minister.

I'll be interested to see how the vote goes on this motion, because we've heard a lot from a couple of senators, particularly Senators Hanson and Rennick, who, along with their colleagues, over recent weeks have been promising Australians who support their position on mandates that they won't support government legislation and that they won't vote with the government during this fortnight. Here is another test for Senator Hanson and Senator Rennick, to see whether their word actually means anything: if their word means anything, they will continue to vote against the government as they promised to do. (Time expired)