Alex Antic (SA, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

I note that we are taking note today of all answers given to coalition questions, but I think it's important to note, in passing, that it is now 20 past four on the first day of sitting and we seem to have spent most of the day in this chamber talking about things which I doubt are of particular interest to Australians in the mainstream. We started the day by talking about motions in support of the action in Iran. We then spent an hour debating a statement on the Closing the Gap situation. This chamber then spent what seemed like an eternity debating a censure motion in relation to a sitting senator, who made comments outside the chamber, and then passed that motion. Now, we've been talking about motions in relation to—whatever the last one was, it wasn't relevant anyway. At least we're now talking about something that does have some bearing on the Australian people, and that's this government's inaction when it comes to the issue of the returning of the ISIS brides.

I have said for a long period of time that the first and only or most important job for any government is to keep their citizens safe, to keep Australians safe, and to protect our way of life. That's not something we're seeing out of this government. I'm minded to cast my mind across the Pacific to the United States and wonder what lessons are learnt from the actions of, I would say, the strongest world leader currently in power anywhere in the world and indeed one of the most accomplished of the last 50 years, perhaps. I think it's an indictment on politics generally that we now have a billionaire real estate mogul who's famous for selling steaks and wine and skyscrapers that has basically outshone every single career politician in the United States and every foreign policy expert over the last 30 years. I think it is an indictment on the political system. I think we've seen that reflected here today. It proves that career politicians really aren't just ineffective; they're actually pretty useless, honestly. They're pretty useless. That's what we have seen through the actions of this president.

We're seeing it again now, of course, with the response to the ISIS brides—a lot of dithering, a lot of chin-scratching and a lot of scratching of the noodle. 'What are we going to do? There's an esoteric problem here. What are we going to do with this?' It's actually pretty simple. The coalition has intimated and said that it will introduce legislation to make it a criminal offence to facilitate the re-entry of individuals linked to terrorist hotspots and terrorist organisations who've committed terror-related offences overseas. Australians are sick and tired of being put second. That is not the motto, although it's the motto of this government over here—Australia second or last, or whatever it might be.

While the government spent a week dodging questions about the ISIS brides and playing the blame game, it's time for direct and positive action to be taken in the parliament to strengthen our laws and protect our Australian way of life. Ultimately, that should be the first position of any government. I think the Albanese government needs to come clean with the Australian people. We need more information about what they know about whether any of these ISIS-linked individuals are coming back. Are they coming back? What specific security assessments have been done or will be undertaken?

Remember, these are not just people who went to see the ruins of Palmyra or to taste the local food; these are people who went to Syria for the purposes of supporting the caliphate, supporting ISIS, which I would say is the most egregious terrorist outfit that has graced God's green Earth over the last 50 years or so. Australians expect that our borders and our communities are going to be protected from such individuals. That is the red line for most Australians. They're not interested in esoteric arguments about what this person did or what that person did—whatever it was, the job of this government is to keep Australians safe, and that is a job at which this government is failing badly.

Question agreed to.