Rebekha Sharkie (Mayo, Centre Alliance) Share this | Hansard source

I was in the Federation Chamber last night and heard the allegations made with respect to the AFL by the member for Clark. It's hard to know whether I was more horrified by those allegations or by the fact that leave was not granted for the member for Clark to table these documents. The call is on the Prime Minister to read these documents. It's a very simple call, and I think it's one that every Australian would support.

We as a parliament provide a huge amount of money to the AFL. Many parliaments have done so. Importantly, children look up to these players as gods. They see them as their heroes. If we do not do everything we can in this place to ensure that the AFL is a place of integrity and that we are investigating and considering such horrific allegations—allegations of drug use, allegations of drug testing being done in a clandestine way so that it's subverting what should be the true form of how drug testing should occur, and allegations that we're seeing a cover-up to protect players—the question we need to ask here is: are we in this place also running some sort of protection racket for the AFL? The whole community would think it absolutely unbelievable that we would do that—that we would potentially run some sort of 'hear no evil, see no evil, speak no evil' arrangement in this place. This place is supposed to be the apex of Australia, where our best actions are a reminder to the rest of Australia that we are here for transparency and justice. To not allow the member for Clark to table those documents last night was, I think, an appalling action against democracy in this place. I would urge the government to consider this suspension of standing orders and allow the member for Clark to table these particular documents, which have very grave allegations in them. Let's have a full investigation from the top down, run from the Prime Minister's office all the way down.

See this speech in context