Tim Watts (Gellibrand, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

When this address-in-reply contribution was interrupted some 2½ months ago I was in midstream talking about how the current Prime Minister, Malcolm Turnbull, was being led by the nose by that irascible senator, Senator Cory Bernardi, and section 18C of the Racial Discrimination Act was being used as a political plaything in the coalition to advance various ideological and tactical interests. The more things change, the more they stay the same. I do understand, however, that the member for Moore has just tabled in the House of Representatives a report on section 18C from the Parliamentary Joint Committee on Human Rights, so I will not belabour the point by going back to that particular well. I will move onto another change in circumstances that we have experienced in the interim, between the start and the end of this speech—the election and swearing into office of a new US President.

The Australia-US alliance is a long one and one founded on shared values and interests. The United States has been a champion of the rules based international order that has emerged since the Second World War—an international order that has benefited Australia enormously. As a result of the intimate relationship between Australia and the US through ANZUS, Australian security and strategic policy has been closely entwined with that of the United States for many decades now. This is all to the good. This has been a relationship based on shared respect at multiple levels between the Australian and the American people, demonstrated by the fact that Australia is the only country in the world with a positive net migration flow from the United States. I should add that that migration includes my father's partner.

We have a close trade relationship—another marker of our relationship with the US. The US is one of our biggest trading partners, one of our biggest sources of foreign investment and one of our biggest destinations for overseas investment. There is also shared respect between our defence forces, who have served side by side in conflicts including the Second World War, the Korean conflict, Vietnam, Iraq and Desert Storm through to the second Iraq conflict in 2003, Afghanistan and more recently operations in Iraq and Syria. In Iraq today Australia is one of the largest coalition partners in the fight against ISIS. I saw this relationship firsthand in 2015 when I visited the MER as part of the ADF parliamentary program. I saw firsthand the practical intimacy and the genuine regard in which the ADF is held in the eyes of US armed forces. Australians like David Kilcullen have worked intimately with US forces at the highest levels, and notably the new US defence secretary James Mattis is a man who is well regarded by the ADF and mutually regards us extremely well also.

All of this is intended as a very warm prelude to an area where we have taken a different view to the United States in recent times. The recent executive order on immigration signed by President Trump, that imposes a temporary ban on entry to the United States from individuals with passports from seven nations, has caused much consternation in Australia and in my electorate. Melbourne's west is home to significant communities of Sudanese Australians, of Somali Australians, who have been very concerned about the impact that this ban may have on them and their friends and families. More broadly, Melbourne's west is home to a significant community of Muslim Australians who have been concerned about the characterisation of this executive order as a 'Muslim ban'. Thon Maker, an Australian born in what is now South Sudan and who sought refuge in our country a decade ago, is now a highly successful basketball player in the National Basketball Association in the US and has recently begun starting for the Milwaukee Bucks.

There was a period when it was very uncertain whether these dual passport holders would be caught by this immigration ban. It seems that this has now been clarified, and I do give credit to the foreign minister for her interventions on this front. However, I do want to make the point here that the way that this intervention has been characterised has been problematic—not by the foreign minister, by the executive order. Australia and America are both stronger for their diversity, and this is a view that Australia will robustly put within the context of the new US presidency.

As Bill Shorten said at the time of this executive order:

Australia has had a non-discriminatory immigration policy for more than four decades. It's made us stronger. We don’t just tolerate diversity, we embrace it. We are the home of the fair go for all. All races, all faiths, all cultures.

And:

Wherever possible, I want the United States to be able to go about its business without interference from Australia. And I would expect the reverse to be true. However, there are some issues where silence will be interpreted as agreement. For that reason, I need to say Mr Trump's ban on refugees based upon their religion or country is appalling and ought to be ended as soon as possible.

I share these views expressed by the opposition leader and take this opportunity to reiterate them in this chamber. I also take this opportunity, drawing on the close relationship between Australia and the United States over many decades, as a friend, to say that Islam is not the enemy of the United States. This is a view that President George W Bush expressed so eloquently in the wake of September 11 and in the lead-up to the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. Similarly, the people in the nations subject to this executive order are not the enemies of the United States. Many of them are the victims of the same repressive regimes that we have sought to work so closely with the United States in combating around the world.

For my constituents I also offer this message: ANZUS has served Australia very well over many decades. The nature of the Australia-US alliance has changed over this time; it has evolved and, as a mutual self-defence treaty, it necessarily has given us great freedom in how we decide how best to make use of this relationship, to make this relationship work for Australia's interests and for our shared interests with the United States. Given this, we should not be precipitate when Australia and the United States disagree. It is okay to disagree within the alliance—and I expect to do so frequently during the presidency of President Trump, to be frank. However, disagreements need not mean the end of the alliance. There are some in this building—particularly in the other place—who seem keen to rush to this conclusion, and I strongly suggest to them that Australia's security and strategic interests should not be used as political playthings in this place.

Labor expressed a different view from that of the United States in 2003 when we took a position of principled opposition to the US war on Iraq at that time. I believe Simon Crean deserves enormous credit for being very upfront with this—for travelling to Townsville to speak directly to the Australian troops who were being deployed to Iraq and to outline this principled position. But this did not mean that we questioned the future of the Australia-US alliance; we were acting independently within the context of a mutual self-defence treaty. Similarly, I have long argued for closer ties between Australia and our neighbours in South-East Asia. I genuinely believe that the Australian identity and Australia's strategic and security interests lie in an intimate, interwoven relationship with South-East Asian nations. Diaspora communities from South-East Asian nations in Australia are an enormous strategic asset for Australia and, as countries like Singapore have shown, small countries working collaboratively within this region are able to achieve enormous results through multilateral forums.

It is not a binary choice between ANZUS and working closely with South-East Asian nations. This is not an either-or decision; we can have both, and I encourage all members within this chamber—particularly within the other place—not to create a false dichotomy between Australia's strategic interests with the United States and with our allies in South-East Asia. That being said, it is important that, when we disagree with the United States on issues of principle like the so-called Muslim ban, we say so. Australia's second nearest northern neighbour is the largest Islamic country in the world. Malaysia, another Islamic country, is also a key strategic fellow traveller with Australia in our region. Characterising current geostrategic conflicts as the West against Islam hurts Australia's interests with these nations, and we should be explicit in calling this out.

However, as I say, this is not an either-or choice, and I encourage members to be reflective when disagreements arise between Australia and the US; to stand up for our principles, true, but not to throw the baby out with the bathwater; and to be consistent in the prosecution of Australian values at home and overseas but not to underestimate the importance and the enduring significance of the Australia-US alliance to Australia's strategic influence and our ability to secure our interests overseas.

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