Bridget McKenzie (Victoria, National Party, Shadow Minister for Infrastructure, Transport and Regional Development) Share this | Hansard source

For everyone following along at home and listening to the rhetoric, particularly from the Greens, let me read the coalition's amendment, put it on the record, as you might not have it in front of you:

Omit all words after "That the Senate", substitute:

"(a) reaffirms Australia's commitment to free speech and lawful assembly, and condemns all forms of extremism, intimidation, and violence, regardless of the cause;

(b) condemns the recent disruption of public rallies by Neo-Nazis, pro-Iranian Government extremists and those supporting terrorist organisations; and

(c) condemns the public display of symbols, slogans, or imagery that glorify or support proscribed terrorist organisations and urges the strict enforcement of existing laws against the glorification of terrorism and incitement to violence".

I am astounded that this is somehow a cause for debate, and I'm appalled that the party of government in this place finds itself unable to support an amendment as balanced as the one that we've put forward as a mature response to Senator Faruqi's motion.

The reality is that the one thing that unites new Australians and old Australians is a love of our country. Being a patriot isn't being a racist. We, on this side of the chamber, actually support the right to peaceful protest. We back our police, who put themselves in harm's way to keep order. Fringe extremists who tried to hijack the weekend's rallies deserve zero endorsement from anyone in this place. Their ideology is the opposite of Australian values. But let's be very clear. The vast majority of people at those rallies and the hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of Australians who support them but didn't go were expressing mainstream concerns about unchecked population growth, housing and social cohesion—concerns that we actually must hear, not attempt to smear, which is what is happening today. Senior ministers condemned the rallies and highlighted only extremist links. Senator Watt said they spread hate and were linked to Neo-Nazis. We reject both the hate and the tactic of tarring the many with the actions of a few. Old and new Australians alike want a safe, cohesive, confident nation. That's the Australia we speak for.

Last week, the Greens promoted a bill to entrench the national right to protest. This week, they want us to censor people who protest. Senator Faruqi herself has participated in marches with supporters of terrorist groups, sharing the platform with Hamas supporters and sympathisers, Iranian militants and antisemites. So spare us your sanctimony, your hypocrisy and your self-righteousness. You're happy to march alongside pictures of the Ayatollah Khomeini, who actually ordered a now proscribed terrorist organisation to bomb a synagogue in our country. But that's okay—we're really only worried about the Neo-Nazis! We should be worried about it all. Jew-hating, gay-hating and women-hating protesters on the other side need to be called out as well. It's ridiculous to suggest that everyone marching on the weekend was a Neo-Nazi, just as it would be ridiculous for me to suggest that those who marched across the Sydney Harbour Bridge were all terrorists. They're equally ridiculous contentions. That's why the coalition's amendment to this motion is a sound, sensible, mature response to a problem that doesn't just exist in this chamber but has spilt over into the streets of capital cities right across our country.

I'm not a globalist—like the Greens and many now in Labor are—who imagines a world without borders. A sovereign nation sets its intake of immigration in the national interest and with community consent. The Lowy Institute's poll suggests that 53 per cent of Australians say our immigration settings are too high and are having negative social, economic and, I would suggest, environmental impacts in our community. I'm prepared to have an open and honest conversation about that. I just wish the government was too.