Tania Lawrence (Hasluck, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

'All that is left is their name on that memorial.' These were some of the many fine words spoken by the member for New England yesterday. It was significant because he spoke not to the names but to the people behind those names—the people that they represent in each of our towns around the country. The member for Canning spoke to some 4,000 to 5,000 memorials and 103,000 people that died on the roll call. The reasons for which they died were different conflicts. This is not the time to ponder why they went. Instead, it's to consider the reality that they did. And then they died for it. What we have left are memorials around the country. I've got so many memorials in my own electorate, and they represent ordinary people who came off the farms to go and fight. We've also got soldiers, from Chidlow to Guildford, who were awarded the VC. We do the most to recognise that because many of their families never even had their bodies returned.

As the member for New England spoke to, that brass name is all that's left for a family to walk to, to reflect upon and to remember. So for the Greens Western Australian Senator Steele-John to say that these are not politically neutral spaces is wrong. These are the equivalents of grave sites. This is not a place to get political. This is purely to remember the individuals who gave their lives in our name. It is absolutely shocking to hear of past events that the member for Burt has referred to, the desecration of the war memorials. It is not just here in Canberra, where we saw everything from red dye being spilt into the reflection pool and different memorials for Vietnam, Korea, World War I and II being desecrated with slogans; what is also absolutely shocking are the terms in which it's been done. If vandalism, as Senator Steele-John and the member for Melbourne seem to believe, is a part of freedom of expression, then we will have no safe way of commemorating anything—no safe way to respect the fallen; no safe way to pay homage to those whose sacrifices have in fact enabled the Greens to stand here in this parliament and spout those ugly sentiments.

We often say in this place that the standard we walk past is the standard we accept. The vandalism that a member of parliament won't call out is the vandalism that that member, by omission or otherwise, actually endorses. I don't see Senator Steele-John out there with a paintbrush, nor do I see the member for Melbourne with one. But the fact that they are not out there with a spray can is inconsequential. It's the fact that they are actively encouraging it that needs to be called out.

And it's not just them. I know that there are WhatsApp groups, Signal groups and people organising themselves around the country to be able to demonstrate their frustration and their anger about what's happening in the Middle East. I get that and I respect that because we all feel the same frustration. We all feel concern for the absolute catastrophe that is happening before our eyes. We're seeing tens of thousands, up to 40,000 people, now dead in Gaza alone. But this is not a reason to then turn on our fallen and desecrate their names for a cause that they have nothing to do with. That completely detracts from what they died for. This is not the time. It's not the place. There are so many other ways in which to conduct peaceful protest, and I call upon those who are community leaders, who are rallying people around them, to demonstrate their anger and what change they would like to see. But I especially call on people in this House and in the Senate from the Greens, who are actively not condemning these acts, to stand up for what is actually right and the peaceful way of expressing our democratic right to protest. To all the veterans back in my electorate of Hasluck, I'm sorry for what has unfolded. I'm sorry for what you must be experiencing. Particularly those from the Vietnam War, who have always felt that they've been treated differently, I'm sorry again.

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