Paul Scarr (Queensland, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

On the Saturday just gone, I had the absolute honour of attending the opening of an exhibition called the Public Exhibition on Crimes of Communism hosted by the Queensland chapter of the Vietnamese Community in Australia and also the World Victims of Communism Association of Australia.

It was a great honour to attend that exhibition and to make some comments at the opening, just as it is an honour every 30 April for me to attend in my capacity as a senator the commemoration of the fall of Saigon to the Communists on 30 April 1975. And it was great and deep honour to be presented by my good friend Dr Cuong Bui AM a tie with the colours of the Republic of Vietnam. This is still worn with great honour and dignity by members of our Vietnamese community in Queensland. Dr Bui has been an extraordinary leader for the Vietnamese community, the broader multicultural community and the whole Australian community in my home state of Queensland. He fled Vietnam many years ago in 1975. He knows many, many individuals who lost their lives during that flee from communism in 1975.

At the exhibition, you can see the horrors of communism: photos of people who were seized from the Baltic state of Estonia and sent to starve in the gulag archipelago in the Soviet Union; the killing fields of Cambodia; the devastating consequences of the so-called great leap forward in China where millions upon millions of people died in the devastating famine that was triggered by the policies of the Communist Party of China; a Hungarian flag on display which had the hammer and sickle carved out of the centre, so that the Hungarian flag had a hole in the centre. This of course is the flag that was used by those who rose up in Hungary against the Communists in 1956.

Perhaps most movingly we heard a presentation from a Hong Kong democracy activist who told us about the horror of what is happening on the ground in Hong Kong today under the rule of the Communist Party of China.

At the exhibition I made a number of reflections. The first was in relation to the inherent evil of communism and how it is an absolute anathema to the fundamental freedoms of the individual—freedom of speech, freedom of religion, freedom of association—that all of us in this place hold sacred. I reflected on how the evil of communism is a total anathema to the family as the essential building block of our society, putting the state above all else in our society, and how the evil of communism is an anathema to economic progress and prosperity.

The second reflection I made was that Australia has become the home to so many people and generations who have lived and prospered here having fled the horrors of communism, whether from those Baltic states, including Estonia, that I referred to, or from Poland, Hungary, the Soviet Union, Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia, Cuba or other countries all over the world that have suffered the scourge of communism. So many people have lost their lives fleeing communism, including hundreds of thousands of Vietnamese people.

The third reflection I made was on the importance of the exhibition in shining a bright light on the horrors of communism. In that respect I had a conversation with a member of the Vietnamese community called Tony, who explained to me how he is in the process, with support from the United States government, of exhuming the remains of one of his family members from a re-education camp gravesite in modern-day Vietnam and that it is occurring in darkness, at night, because the Vietnamese government doesn't want photos of the exhumation to be taken. That surely is the best example of why it is necessary to have exhibitions such as this, to shine a bright light on the evils of communism and all those who have suffered from communism over generations.

So, I say to the people of my home state of Queensland: take your children to see this exhibition and show them the horrors of communism. Not only that, but take your children to see this exhibition so they can talk to the survivors of communism about what they experienced and how much it means to them that they've found safety in our beautiful country of Australia.

I should note that I said a few words earlier in the week about the fact that the Greens member for Ryan, Ms Elizabeth Watson-Brown, refuses to display the Australian flag in her electorate office. That's the member for Ryan, Ms Elizabeth Watson-Brown MP. And my good friend Senator McGrath has drawn attention to this fact that Ms Elizabeth Watson-Brown MP, the member for Ryan, refuses to display the Australian flag in her electorate office. Well, I suggest that Ms Elizabeth Watson-Brown should make her way to that exhibition on the evils of communism. Ms Elizabeth Watson-Brown MP, the member for Ryan, who refuses to display the Australian flag in her electorate office, should go to that exhibition which has been put on by the Vietnamese community in Queensland. She should go to that exhibition. She should consider that exhibition and she should consider the fact that the Vietnamese community at that exhibition is proudly flying the Australian flag and the fact that I and Mr Milton Dick MP, a member of the other party and Speaker in the other place, presented the Vietnamese community with an Australian flag that had flown in this chamber. And the Vietnamese community—that wonderful community, hundreds of thousands of people, who have made their way and prospered in this country, who sought and gained refuge in this country—are displaying our beautiful Australian flag in that community centre, because they understand the significance of the flag and what it means to them, because this country provided them with safety.

How appalling it is that the Greens member for Ryan, Ms Elizabeth Watson-Brown, refuses to display the Australian flag in her electorate office when the Vietnamese community across the river in Darra is displaying proudly, with honour, at their community centre an Australian flag that has flown in this Senate chamber. They display that flag because they, our Vietnamese community, appreciate the values of this country and what it represents to all those people who've fled from persecution and the evils of communism and other extreme authoritarian regimes all over the world. They appreciate the significance of that flag.

Dr Bui, who Milton Dick MP and I presented the flag to, appreciates the significance of that flag. But the Greens MP for Ryan, Ms Elizabeth Watson-Brown, can't bear to display the flag in her electorate office. What an absolute disgrace. I say to Ms Elizabeth Watson-Brown, Greens MP for Ryan: come across the river to Darra. It used to be in the federal electorate of Ryan. Hopefully, it is again at the time of the next federal election, because I look forward to talking to the Vietnamese community about Ms Elizabeth Watson-Brown MP, who refuses to display the Australian flag, so she can see the significance of that flag for one of our wonderful communities who have found refuge from persecution in this beautiful country.

We should always remember the horrors of communism, the evil of communism and the 100 million people who have died at the hands of communism. We should always remember that so many people found refuge from communism in our beautiful country, and we should acknowledge and honour our wonderful Vietnamese community, who have been so successful in our beautiful country since fleeing from communism and are now part of our wonderful Australian story.