Josh Burns (Macnamara, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

This afternoon I rise to speak about the Australian Jewish University Experience Survey, a survey conducted by the Scanlon Foundation in collaboration with the Australasian Union of Jewish Students and the Zionist Federation of Australia. The survey came in after there had been a number of anecdotal issues raised by students across the country, and the results of the survey are truly shocking. The results showed more than 50 per cent of Jewish university students hide their identity on campus, that 64 per cent have experienced some form of antisemitism on campus and that one in five Jewish students avoid campus altogether to avoid antisemitism. Eighty-five per cent of Jewish students who had experienced antisemitism did not report their incident to the university as they believed the university wouldn't take it seriously and wouldn't make a difference.

These results are truly shocking. But, now that we have the data, we need to do something about it. This morning we were joined by Alissa Foster, the national president of the Australasian Union of Jewish Students; Jeremy Leibler, from the Zionist Federation of Australia; and others. We met with the Minister for Education, and I was pleased to be joined by the member for Berowra and the member for Wentworth, my co-chairs of the Parliamentary Friends of IHRA.

These results are alarming. No student should have to go to university fearful for their identity. We need to do something about it so we have a better future for these students.

See this speech in context