Ted O'Brien (Fairfax, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

We who are elected to this place, our national parliament, spend an inordinate amount of time thinking, debating and legislating important matters of state, as we should. However, let us not forget that we are also here to provide national leadership on the protection and promotion of Australia's way of life and the values that bind us as a nation. It is in this context that I rise today to reject the public comments made last week by Mr Keysar Trad that suggested violence against women in the home is acceptable, albeit as a last resort. Mr Trad's deplorable imagery of some medieval checklist as a pathway en route to domestic abuse should never be tolerated, but rather called out for what such a tool would be—an accessory to a crime.

Violence in the home—no matter who the perpetrator is or who the victim is—is never acceptable. Domestic violence is against our values as a people and our honour as a nation and it flies in the face of our way of life.