Tim Hammond (Perth, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

I rise together with my colleagues on both sides of this place to pay tribute to the life of Jo Cox who, as we know, was senselessly killed as she met with constituents in Birstall, West Yorkshire in June this year. Jo Cox was the MP for Batley and Spen, where she was born and bred, and was first elected at the 2014 general election. She had barely been in the Commons long enough to get her feet under the desk, yet she had already built a reputation for working hard, particularly on international issues, and was widely regarded in the House of Commons as a rising star.

Ms Cox grew up in Yorkshire and was the first in her family to go to university. She did it in style, attending Cambridge no less. There she was struck by the still-rigid class structure in which it did matter where she was from, who she knew and how she spoke. Before her election she was again working in areas where the impact of her contribution was commendable. She worked for Oxfam as the head of public policy and then went on to work for the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.

Ms Cox was the chair of the All-Party Parliamentary Group on Syria and argued that military action could be beneficial to the Syrian people. She was a leading campaigner for the Remain campaign in the Brexit referendum, and a couple of the themes we saw in the referendum campaign sadly and tragically played out in the context of Ms Cox's death.

Jo Cox was killed as she met with constituents as part of what is called in the UK a 'constituency surgery'. It is a practice that does not really apply in precisely the same way in Australia but is widespread over there, but it fundamentally comes back to the same thing. Ms Cox was doing in the UK the same sorts of things that all members in this place and places in states and territories do as part of their everyday lives—that is, just engaging with the community in an effort to make sure that she understood the needs of her community and properly reflected those needs, attitudes, wants and desires in the people's place in the United Kingdom.

In the course of going about her everyday work, as we know, she was tragically killed by Thomas Mair, a local white supremacist, who railed against her participation in the Remain campaign. Mr Mair was described as someone previously thought to be perhaps a bit odd but harmless—if only that were to be the case. Whilst there is evidence to suggest that Mr Mair did suffer from OCD, a psychiatric assessment found that he was not so mentally ill as to no longer be responsible for his actions. The reality was that we saw a lone wolf at play—someone from the far right, a white supremacist terrorist. He was a terrorist, plain and simple.

The context of this crime is important and it does touch upon a couple of key themes that resonate not only throughout the community in the United Kingdom but also much closer to home. The Brexit campaign was marked by something similar to the Donald Trump 'post-truth' divisiveness, which sparked a flurry of activity surrounding hate speech in the United States. It was marked by its vilification of foreigners and scare campaigns about migration from the EU. Reams have been written about the connection of Mair's actions with what he believed to be a threat to the interests of white Britain, but really what we saw in relation to how those warped, inappropriate, ill-conceived and, quite frankly, unacceptable views were perceived as legitimate was the Brexit campaign itself, which actually served to confect that threat.

Much closer to home, what is deeply concerning to me is the fact that we see similar threads throughout exchanges and social media, in the media and in other forums in relation to what can only be described as unacceptable hate speech; speech and communication which can only have one intent, and that is an intent to divide, an intent to vilify and an intent to belittle. It tries to create a perception, for completely baseless reasons, that one group of this society is superior to another. Every breath we take and every step we walk must be dedicated to stamping out any form of traction that this dialogue might receive in the context of the various forums that we see. That is why, whether we like it or not, what we do in this place resonates so strongly out in the community in relation to our opportunity here, as leaders of our respective communities, to make sure we do that, to make sure we lead.

How do we lead? It is very, very simple: we lead by calling out any single form of language or conduct that serves to divide, belittle, bully or attempt to vilify one section of the community at the expense of others. That is also why we need to take such significant and strident steps to preserve the sanctity of the protections that are carved out in our current legislation. That is why we must make sure in this place that we lead by example and rise above any kind of debate that may have the effect of watering down very hard fought for protections in our legislation, such as section 18C of the Racial Discrimination Act. The effect of doing so can have such profound and potentially tragic outcomes, and that is why it is so important.

The other really important factor that strikes very close to the heart of the tragedy of Mrs Cox relates to the fact that her family lost a member of their lives just by doing her job. That happens all too often in every single walk of life; we see families faced with the prospect of their loved ones not coming home from work. It applied in the most tragic of ways to Mrs Cox; it applied in 195 cases of workplace deaths in this country. In my home state of Western Australia, it applied 35 times when we lost workers on worksites. This is a rate of 2.6 deaths per 100,000 workers in my state, which, tragically, is the highest rate in the country. Regardless of what we do, coming home safely from work in whatever walk of life, in whatever part of the world you live in, should not be an aspiration. This should be a fundamental, acceptable human right. We must make sure in this place we do everything meaningfully possible to make sure that occurs every single time. In this place, we are elected not to represent our own interests; of course we are elected to represent the interests of our constituents. And Mrs Cox did that, with a bias towards those who had no voice of their own.

As I conclude my remarks, I acknowledge and pay tribute to her wonderful family, who have been so strong in such trying circumstances in making sure that they continue to lead the fight that Mrs Cox began—that is, calling out injustice, calling out for those who are marginalised and making sure everyone within the country of the United Kingdom, just as we should do here, has an equality of opportunity to achieve. Jo Cox died as she lived: working for the marginalised and forgotten, upholding democracy and campaigning for a better future for the people she represented. May she rest in peace, and may her life be an example for us all.

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