Peta Murphy (Dunkley, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

I rise to speak on the Online Safety Bill 2021 and to endorse every word of the contribution of the member for Gellibrand. Minister, how is it that you would expect women across this country to believe this government's commitment to online safety when this government won't do anything about the member for Bowman and his admitted online activities, and when women across this country have seen constituents of the member for Bowman go on television and subject themselves to exposure across the country in order to call out his behaviour, which, in one case, caused a women to be suicidal?

How is it that this government thinks that it can sit there with a straight face—all of the members of the government—and say, 'Do as we say but not as a member of our government does'?

I'm rising today more in sorrow than in anger. I've been angry and the women in my community have been angry at the way the member for Bowman has behaved and at the way the Prime Minister and the ministers in this government have behaved, in their failure to make their own accountable for their online behaviour. But something has shifted, at least, in me today. Now I'm just so sad to have to stand here, because I know that there are people on your side of the chamber, Minister Fletcher—and some of them are in the chamber at the moment—who have a deep commitment to online safety, who have themselves experienced significant online harassment and who want change. I know that, and I can see members of the government in the chamber who are in that position. I feel sad for them that they have to sit there and vote time and time again to protect the member for Bowman.

But it goes beyond the member for Bowman, doesn't it? He's now become a symbol of this government's refusal to take responsibility and hold to account people who are on the government side—an example of the lack of consequences of bad behaviour for people who are part of this government. It is sad for democracy. It's sad for the people of Australia when their trust in government is diminished time and time again when they watch people who are supposed to be the leaders of this country refusing to act in a way that families in Australia do every single day. When a member of their family behaves badly, they say to them, 'You have to accept the consequences of your behaviour.' Parents say, 'If it hurts me that I have to punish you for your behaviour, I have to accept that, because taking responsibility and being held responsible is part of being a good citizen.'

In terms of online safety generally—and the government's failure to do something as simple as to hold the member for Bowman to account for his own words, in that he said he would resign from his parliamentary roles, let alone holding him to account for his behaviour—let's put this debate into some wider context. Let's talk about the domestic violence crisis in this country. Over and over again, people on both sides of this chamber acknowledge that the domestic violence crisis and the fact that one woman is killed every week by their partner are manifestations of gender inequality, of disrespect for women and of behaviours like those that we've seen from the member for Bowman, who has admitted them. They start off as sexual harassment and trolling and lead to a culture in this country where one woman a week is killed. That's why you have to make him be responsible. It's that important. (Time expired)

Question agreed to.

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