Tammy Tyrrell (Tasmania, Independent) Share this | Hansard source

This week, on the anniversary on the Christchurch terrorist attack, a simple message of solidarity with Muslim Australians was met with a wave of exactly what we were advocating against: Islamophobia. It was hate speech—the kind of baseless hate that by now feels very familiar. We've seen it before. We've heard it here in this very chamber. One Nation in particular has made a pattern of singling out certain races or religions, including Muslims, and deciding every so often who to target next. It's not new, and it's not on.

But this time something else is going on too. A lot of this content isn't even coming from real people; it's being generated and amplified by AI bots, many from overseas, and much of it is pushing One Nation misinformation and propaganda, making them seem bigger and louder than they actually are. That's not a glitch; that's a strategy. If One Nation didn't want that fake AI generated material spread in their name, they would call it out clearly and immediately. They haven't, and that silence matters. Silence in this context isn't neutral; it signals acceptance.

We are watching politics and technology collide in the worst possible way. Social media has the power to take something small and make it feel mainstream. It can make the appearance of consensus when none exists. It can turn a lack of understanding into fear and pass it off as public opinion. That matters because the issues being distorted are serious ones. Migration is one of the most important policy areas we deal with. It shapes our economy, our communities and our future. It is integral to maintaining Australia's essential services and, more so, it's about the human beings attached to the numbers: families fleeing violence, children starting school in a new country and workers contributing to the communities they now call home. They are not abstract numbers; they are real people making real decisions, often under difficult circumstances. Yet that reality is being drowned out by bots—by hateful messaging by politicians who benefit from keeping the debate angry and divided, not honest and grounded.

We shouldn't normalise this. On the anniversary of Christchurch, we're reminded where unchecked Islamophobia and hate can lead. It starts with words: dehumanising language like calling Islam a disease, conspiracy and hate dressed up as concern. It doesn't always stay there. It can move from screens into the real world, often with devastating consequences. Hate doesn't stay contained. It spreads, it hardens attitudes, it isolates communities and, in the worst cases, it turns into violence.

So we have a responsibility to be clear about what's happening now. This is organised. It is being artificially amplified, and it is aimed at turning Australians against each other for political gain. At the very least, people deserve to know who or what they're listening to. If a message is coming from a bot, it should be labelled as a bot. That's not complicated, it's not controversial and it's basic transparency. Right now, people are reading content thinking it reflects genuine public sentiment, when, in many cases, it's part of an automated campaign designed to provoke and divide. That undermines trust for the public. It lowers the standard of our politics, which isn't fair on the people who elect us.

But regulation alone won't fix this. We also need to reset the tone of how we speak, especially in this place. Every policy debate, particularly on migration, should start from a simple and obvious truth: they are human beings—not numbers, not problems to be managed but people. They are people who deserve dignity, people who deserve respect and people who deserve better than being used as a convenient target. If we lose sight of that, we lose the point of the debate entirely.

We can disagree on policy. We should; that's part of a functioning democracy. But there is a line between disagreement and dehumanisation, and too often that line is crossed—in the case of One Nation, very deliberately. We can't stay silent while hate is spread, we can't ignore the role of AI in amplifying that fear and we can't accept politics where division is rewarded and respect is treated as weakness. So call it out, expose it and deal with it. Call out the use of bots to manipulate public debate, call out the amplification of hate and call out those in this chamber who benefit from it and don't even take responsibility. If we don't, the loudest voices won't be the most honest ones; they'll just be the most hateful. That's not a standard we should accept. We can do better, and we owe it to Australians to do better.