Zoe Daniel (Goldstein, Independent) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

My question is to the Prime Minister. Considering the situation in Israel and Gaza, many members of the Goldstein community and other diverse communities are feeling anxious, insecure and unsafe. When can vulnerable institutions in our communities, including synagogues and schools in Goldstein and surrounds, expect to get access to fast-tracked grants promised by the government or other support?

Anthony Albanese (Grayndler, Australian Labor Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I thank the member for Goldstein very much for her question. I thank her for her engagement. We had a meeting along with some others yesterday at which this issue of course was one of the issues that was raised.

Earlier this week, I announced the additional $10 million that the cabinet made a decision about on Monday to add to the $40 million that we committed to the Securing Faith-Based Places program. I can indicate to the member for Goldstein that today the government is awarding the $50 million program in full to help keep Australians across the country able to practise their religion in a safe way. The Albanese government is committed to ensuring that people of all faiths can live in Australia free from violence and discrimination. The $50 million Securing Faith-Based Places program grants will improve security at religious schools and preschools, places of worship, and faith based community centres. Grants have been approved in every state and territory across different faith communities, including the Jewish community and the Islamic community, who are both feeling particularly vulnerable at the moment. The Securing Faith-Based Places program helps protect Australians from crime and violence motivated by religious or racial intolerance by funding security infrastructure, and that is why it is an important program.

I say as well that we have seen a devastating loss of innocent life since the heinous attacks on Israel by the terrorist group Hamas. The scenes that we've seen today from the explosion at a Gaza City hospital are deeply distressing. It is clear there has been a devastating loss of life, and our thoughts are with those killed, those injured and their loved ones. The protection of civilian lives must come first, and respect for international humanitarian law is absolutely paramount. We condemn as a government any indiscriminate attacks and targeting of civilian infrastructure, including hospitals. Australia joins with others in calling for international law to always be upheld.

Every innocent life matters, whether Israeli or Palestinian. Every innocent life matters. And here in Australia, where we can be, I think, a microcosm for the world, where people overwhelmingly live in harmony next to each other, enriched by the diversity of communities like the member for Goldstein's and my own in the electorate of Grayndler, I see our diversity as a strength. But we need to cherish it and we can't take it for granted, and that's why we need to work as well, follow the advice of the Director-General of ASIO and work with all community leaders to make sure that harmony is maintained in this nation.

Peter Dutton (Dickson, Liberal Party, Leader of the Opposition) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

on indulgence—I join with the Prime Minister's remarks. The Prime Minister and I spoke on Monday in relation to these matters, and included in that conversation was a conversation about the support for communities to increase safety. We very much support the government's announcement. Obviously, when we were in government, there was a significant effort undertaken to provide support to faith based organisations and others in the community that felt a vulnerability. That is heightened at this point in time. The tragic circumstances that we see we commented on at the beginning of the week, and to the great credit of this chamber there was a bipartisan position in condemning the actions of the terrorist group Hamas. Nobody wants to see the loss of any civilian life, and the conduct of Hamas in telling people to stay in harm's way is a deplorable act but not the first and not the last. We are sure of that.

To the Islamic communities here in our country, to people of Jewish faith, to people of any faith: they deserve to live in our country unencumbered by racism, by prejudice or by attacks otherwise, and this parliament has and always will stand for those principles. We support the government in those endeavours.