Chris Bowen (McMahon, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Immigration and Citizenship) Share this | Hansard source

The Deputy Leader of the Opposition went to the 'very strong approach' taken by the Howard government in relation to this. On 29 January 2007 somebody very eloquently put the case as to why people who are guest speakers of Hizb ut-Tahrir or members of Hizb ut-Tahrir would not automatically be denied a visa. The speaker said this:

… because there is often a thin line between stupid extravagant language and language which is deliberately designed to incite violence or to bring about violence or to threaten the security of a country … and people can say a lot of ridiculous things and they should be able to say ridiculous things in a democracy.

Well said, John Howard! He defended why Hizb ut-Tahrir was not proscribed and why guest speakers were allowed in. He was referring to a particular case. It is well known that I have been critical of my predecessor, the member for Menzies, in relation to his ham-fisted dealings with the character test of Mohamed Haneef which resulted in hundreds of thousands of dollars of compensation being paid.

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