Fiona Scott (Lindsay, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

Today I rise to pay homage to the 130 innocent people who were murdered in France. We must always remember to have sympathy for the victims, their families, friends and loved ones. For me, one of the most powerful moments was seeing the solidarity of the French people singing. These recent events in Europe and indeed the world demonstrate that people are being seduced by an evil cult and are committing despicable acts on innocent people.

We must be vigilant. We must be tough, but we must not be scared and run. Nor should we be foolhardy or rash. Here in Australia, it is horrifying and bewildering to know that there are people in our great country, right now, planning acts of violence in some twisted show of support for the horrific and violent organisation that is ISIS. It was scary today to see the New South Wales Deputy Police Commissioner, Catherine Burn, confirm this fact. While Australian police across all jurisdictions are doing an incredible job in preventing these senseless attacks, sadly, some have slipped through the net.

We call these people terrorists, because that is what they are

I fear the label is being used by some as a badge of honour, some twisted justification that they have some political or religious cause to hide behind that gives them some right to murder innocent people. Let us be clear about this. They are not martyrs. They are not heroes. They are simply gutless. They are not justified through some twisted and misguided religious calling—not to the Islamic faith, not to anything. Those seduced by ISIS are simply pawns of this evil regime. They are servants to thuggery, rape, murder and torture. They have forgotten that sanctioning their evils on humanity only exposes them as imperfect; shows their teachers for what they truly are—vile and full of hate.

Many Islamic people in our community throughout Australia have condemned these acts and have expressed their desire to live in a peaceful Australia. So the Islamic community must continue to be active to ensure that radicalisation of their young people who are perverted by the twisted and evil uses of ISIS no longer occurs. While significant sections of the Islamic community are indeed doing this, there are still some senior figures sending out confusing and conflicting messages. We need to be sure that this also stops. We all have an interest in ensuring that children are not radicalised. We all have an interest in ensuring that when we see any of those messages on the internet, or any acts of young people being radicalised, those children and the preachers involved are rapidly reported to all local security agencies to ensure not only the peace and freedom of our community but also the welfare of the young people being perverted by this twisted cult.

We must keep our communities safe. We love the freedom and safety we have in Australia, and it is important that we protect that. Many Muslim people do not want to see their young people killed—they do not want to see their young people going off for a cause that stands for nothing but evil. One in five Australians mad enough to travel to Syria and Iraq will end up dying there. Calls for unilateral action to defeat ISIS are not realistic. In fact, in many ways this is marching to the ISIS tune—dragging countries one by one into a world war. The peoples of the world must work together—we must work swiftly and smartly to defeat this curse. We must ensure that our actions are measured and calculated, and that we attack those who would choose to attack us. We need to not allow this hatred to infect us. At the end of the day, we need to think about the freedoms we have here. The fight is about our democracies, it is about our freedoms. I love the French words liberte, egalite and fraternite. They are important because we must protect our liberty, we must protect our freedoms. These are what we fight for. It is important that we fight for our values. If they do not want to join us then perhaps they should find somewhere else to live. Freedom stands up for itself, and we must ensure that our countries are free, that our children are safe and that ISIS is ultimately defeated.

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