Luke Howarth (Petrie, Liberal Party, Assistant Minister for Youth and Employment Services) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I feel compelled to discuss this today, but I do so with a heavy heart. I use these opportunities to speak in the chamber about positive things happening in my electorate of Petrie, so it saddens me to break from this. On 31 March 2016, in the suburb of Kippa-Ring in my electorate, a jealous man, Arona Peniamina, stabbed his wife 29 times with a kitchen knife, with such rage he left the tip of the knife wedged in her head. Sandra Peniamina still bravely tried to escape, but on the family's driveway he finally killed his wife by smashing her head with a bollard. The court heard that Mr Peniamina believed his wife was having an affair and that the children would be taken from him. That Supreme Court jury found him guilty not of murder but of manslaughter. I cannot fathom their thinking in bringing that decision down, but I do know that we have failed Sandra and her children and that we are continuing to fail as a society by allowing that violence to go insufficiently punished.

We want to go further on this. This man was not an Australian citizen. In the Senate, this sitting period, we failed federally when Labor and Greens senators defeated the Morrison government's Migration Amendment (Strengthening the Character Test) Bill. The bill is aimed at protecting Australians from people who commit serious crimes against them. It aims to protect Australians from the most serious offences and crimes committed by noncitizens, people who are guests of Australia, by preventing them from ever coming here in the first place. Peniamina was not an Australian citizen. He had been afforded the privilege of living in Australia, with all the good fortune that brings, and he forfeited that right when he brutally ended his wife's life. Our legal system sees the states and territories controlling the laws the courts abide by, but federally we control our immigration laws. Members of the Morrison government take very seriously the responsibility to protect our community's safety in the face of serious criminal and national security threats.

The migration amendments sought to consider visa cancellation or refusal where a noncitizen has been convicted of offences involving violence against a person, weapons, breaching an apprehended violence order or similar, or non-consensual sexual acts. Australia is not alone in demanding this through its visa standards. We are seeing more and more examples in our judicial system of violent criminals getting sentences under the current 12-month sentencing test. If they are not Australian citizens, we want the right to cancel their visa and kick them out of the country. What are we doing here as representatives of our electorates if we can't pass bills that protect our constituents from violent criminals? Shame on Labor and the Greens with this one. Arona Peniamina revoked his right to enjoy Australia's hospitality, and we do not want the likes of him here.