Clare O'Neil (Hotham, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Home Affairs) Share this | Hansard source

What we've seen is a deep contrast with the opposition, who have tried at every turn to duck, weave and find some way to make politics out of this decision.

Now, you would think that the work that our government has tried to undertake to protect the community would be supported across the chamber, but we have seen and heard some absolutely extraordinary things in the last three weeks. On Monday we saw the opposition, led by the Leader of the Opposition, come into the chamber and vote to protect paedophiles over children. That's what they did. They came in here and, instead of supporting Labor's attempts to criminalise paedophiles who loiter near daycare centres and schools, the Leader of the Opposition came in here and played politics.

And that wasn't it. The work that the government was doing with that bill was not just about protecting children from paedophiles. It was also doing things like criminalising people who are violent domestic abusers who contact their victims. How could the opposition not support that? And yet, for politics and politics only, they came into the chamber and voted against it.

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