Jenny Ware (Hughes, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Similarly, neither did I.

If we turn to the purpose of this legislation, its stated purpose is to extend the existing offences for urging force or violence and for displaying hate symbols and to introduce new offences for threatening force or violence against targeted groups and their members. I've already stated that this legislation has become necessary, and we are seeking some amendments to make this legislation even stronger in force because of the dreadful attacks that we have seen on Australian Jewish people. They were attacked simply because of their Jewish faith and ancestry, and it is completely unacceptable.

Returning to what seems to have inflamed the situation in Australia, the initial spark of the antisemitic attacks that we are now seeing across our country came with the 7 October terrorist attacks on Israel by the recognised terrorist group Hamas. There can be no equivocation or denial on this. The October 7 attacks were the single greatest loss of Jewish lives on any day since the Holocaust. October 7 was a day of murder, torture, kidnapping and brutal sexual violence perpetrated by Hamas against Jews in Israel. The attacks were deliberately cruel and barbaric. We don't need to repeat a description of the heinous acts in this chamber, but there is no doubt they were designed with the purpose of maximising pain and sorrow amongst Jewish people. They also involved taking over 100 people hostage, many of whom have still not been released, more than a year after the first attacks.

What we saw here in this country was bad actors rejoicing in a day that was marked by the murder, torture, sexual assault and kidnapping of innocent Israelis. I have called out in this chamber members of the left, in the Labor Party as well as the Greens party, who would usually be calling out acts of violence against women. There was no call, particularly by the Australian Greens party, for the hostages to be released. There were calls for a ceasefire, and the reality is that there was a ceasefire. On 6 October 2023, there was a ceasefire. What alternative did Israel have but to go and get back her citizens? If that attack had occurred here in Australia, I would fully expect my government to instruct the military to go and return Australians, whether they be family members or friends or other Australians. These people were innocent civilians who were taken by a terrorist organisation on that day, and it is completely shameful that most members of the Labor Party and all members of the Greens have failed to call that out.

What we have seen, as a result, is a lack of leadership from the very top—from the Prime Minister of our country. Why is this legislation before the House today? It has come about due to the Prime Minister's failure to lead on this issue. From day one, he refused to admit or speak about antisemitism unless he also mentioned Islamophobia and other discrimination at the same time. The attack on the Israeli people on October 7 was nothing but an antisemitic attack. It defies belief that the Prime Minister of this country was unable to call it that. Other leaders throughout the world were able to. They showed strong leadership. What we have seen from this Prime Minister and from most, but not all, members of the government has been complete silence and complete weakness about antisemitism in this country and the antisemitism that occurred on 7 October that gave rise to that. He should have made very clear through his actions from the very beginning that those who sought to spread antisemitic attacks in Australia would feel the full force of the law. He didn't. He could and should have been clear about the scale of the horror inflicted by Hamas and that Australia stands with its long-term friend and ally Israel. The Prime Minister could and should have used our laws and our police forces to clamp down on those who sought to weaponise the Hamas attacks for their own hateful purposes here at home.

I have a friend. His name is Simon, he lives in the eastern suburbs of Sydney and he is Jewish. His four-year-old daughter walks to preschool accompanied by two armed guards. That is not and should not be the Australia of 2025, but that's the reality. Jewish students don't wear their school uniform in public. Jewish students on university campuses have been subject to violent attacks. Other Jewish people have been subject to doxxing simply for being part of a WhatsApp group. This is completely unacceptable. If this were happening to any other group of Australians, the Prime Minister, the foreign minister, the Labor Party and the Greens party would have been calling this out, but they haven't.

When we had, for example, in the Prime Minister's own home state of New South Wales, an angry mob on 9 October standing outside the Opera House and chanting, 'Where are the Jews?' or whatever they were saying, he was silent. We saw Jewish shops being vandalised, Jewish students being harassed and roaming gangs in places like Caulfield in Victoria hunting for Jews. This was in 2023 and 2024. This was not Germany in the 1930s. I never thought I would see this in my lifetime. I agree with the member for Wannon when he used those words as well.

At a time when we're responding to an unprecedented wave of antisemitism here in our country and we are seeing armed guards outside Jewish schools, it is completely appropriate that we focus on antisemitism. The Prime Minister did not do that, and his failure to do so was an indication that he did not take the threat of antisemitism seriously. In my electorate of Hughes in southern Sydney and south-west Sydney, I have fewer than 1,000 Jewish Australians. However, the very silent but very large majority of people that I've spoken to in my electorate when I've been out doorknocking, when I've conducted mobile offices and through email say that they are absolutely horrified at the Prime Minister's silence on this issue. They will very shortly get an opportunity to express to this Prime Minister and his government just how unhappy they are. A prime minister that doesn't defend his nation and doesn't stand up for a group of Australians is not worthy of being the Prime Minister.

We do have existing criminal laws that are meant to deal with things like the urging of violence against groups defined by either race or religion. This is in division 80 of the Criminal Code. These laws were not used. Why not? Protests in our streets in which antisemitic displays abounded were permitted to drag on for months and months. Universities were permitted to be used as encampments that served as a hotbed of antisemitic action. Our human rights institutions were not given focus or direction nor were they called to account when they abandoned the Jewish community. Through his actions, Prime Minister Albanese sent a very clear message that, despite what he might say, there will be no real consequences for those who target and attack Jewish Australians. This was a green light for antisemites.

The government that he leads has also abandoned Israel on the international stage. In the wake of 7 October the instinct of the Labor government was not to stand with Israel, which had just been the target of a horrific atrocity—it was to call on Israel to exercise restraint. This was followed by a series of votes in the United Nations in which Australia, under the leadership of this Prime Minister, reversed a longstanding bipartisan position on Israel.

The Foreign Minister Wong went to Israel and yet refused to go and have a look at the scene of the initial massacre. Why would she do that? She was meant to be there as our Foreign Minister, representing us on the international stage. I say that the Foreign Minister is not worthy, through her actions, of continuing to hold that position.

While I commend the changes in this legislation, I still say it has come far too late, and it reflects the fact that the Prime Minister has been asleep at the wheel on this issue of antisemitism. (Time expired)

Anne Webster (Mallee, National Party, Shadow Assistant Minister for Regional Health) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It is, as the member for Hughes has just said, too little too late when it comes to this legislation and the broader issue of dealing with the scourge of rising antisemitism occurring in our country since the Hamas terror attacks on 7 October 2023. Make no mistake: this bill is necessary because of the repeated failures of the Albanese government. The Prime Minister has been stoking tensions over the past 16 months through his weak leadership and failure to act decisively to stamp out antisemitism. He has been missing in action on this very important issue.

This is all about leadership, or the lack thereof. Australians look to their prime minister to set the tone of the national response to any crisis. The Prime Minister should have made clear through his actions from the very beginning that those who sought to spread antisemitic attacks here would feel the full force of the law. He should have been clear from the very beginning about the scale of the horror inflicted by Hamas, and underscored Australia's allegiance to its long-term friend and ally, Israel. He could—and should—have used our laws and our police forces to clamp down on those who sought to weaponise the Hamas attacks for their own hateful purposes here at home. He did not.

At a time when we were seeing an unprecedented rise in antisemitism, the Prime Minister and his ministers failed to acknowledge the presence of antisemitism without concurrently mentioning Islamophobia—always seeking a moral equivalence. Neither have a place in this country. Both are condemned. But acknowledging Jewish Australians' experiences of antisemitism does not diminish the experience of Muslim Australians. The Prime Minister did not address this, and his failure to do so was an indication that he did not take the threat of antisemitism seriously.

We saw ongoing failures to take decisive action against antisemitism in Australia. Antisemitic displays were not prosecuted, protests were not stopped, and universities were permitted to be used as encampments. Worse still, the tone was set incorrectly from October 2023 when police arrested a man carrying an Israeli flag in Sydney during protests supporting Palestine—allegedly for his own safety. Offensive references to Jewish people were made at the same protests, which to this day continue to be debated and forensically examined to find out what was actually said. Existing criminal laws that are meant to deal with things like the urging of violence against groups defined by race or religion in division 80 of the Criminal Code were not used. Hence, antisemitic sentiment was allowed to fester. Through the Prime Minister's actions—or, conversely, inactions—the Prime Minister sent a very clear message that, despite what he might say, there will be no real consequences for those who target and attack Jewish Australians.

Because of this Prime Minister's inaction, we are now experiencing acts of outright terrorism—the firebombing of cars and targeting of homes, childcare centres and synagogues, including the horrific attack on the Adass Israel synagogue in Melbourne in December. Most recent was the finding of a caravan packed with explosives and an alleged antisemitic plot to attack several Jewish targets. In Australia in 2025, who on earth would have thought this could be. This is now a clear campaign of terror and is not something I would ever have imagined happening in our lucky country, a place where, for generations, migrants have come across the seas to find safety, opportunity and a chance to live a better life. This is not the Australia we know and love. Attacks on Jewish Australians are attacks on our way of life—attacks on every Australian. Attacking people because of their Jewish faith or ancestry is un-Australian. Under Labor, the Jewish community now feels under siege and abandoned.

This abandonment traces back not only to the failure of the Prime Minister and his government to take decisive action but also to the diplomatic abandonment of Israel, the only liberal democracy in the Middle East. This government has overturned a decades-long bipartisan position on Israel in our foreign policy, as evidenced by voting patterns at the United Nations. On the international stage, Australia appeared to reward Hamas's terrorist attacks. Diplomatic abandonment has been coupled with a weak stance on border security, including the provision of visas to thousands of people from Gaza, a war zone ruled by a listed terrorist organisation, many without proper security checks. People on visas who sympathise with terrorist groups like Hamas and Hezbollah should be deported today. Those fleeing Gaza or Lebanon should be turned back if they are terrorist sympathisers. They do not have a place in this country.

This failure of decisive action is a leader in crisis. In the application of existing laws, the diplomatic abandonment of Israel and weak stance on border security all can only be for perceived local political gain. The Albanese government is more concerned with winning votes in Western Sydney and appeasing voters in inner-city electorates than with ensuring the protection of Jewish people in Australia and maintaining our values and way of life. If you might forgive a brief digression, we see the same callous political games played with regional Australians. To save their seats in inner cities from the Greens, Labor is railroading regional communities with a radical rollout of wind turbines, solar panels and 28,000 kilometres of transmission lines for a political target. My point is that this Prime Minister lacks the leadership to govern for all Australians and act in the national interest.

Antisemitism is inconsistent with Australian values and unthinkable in modern Australia. Australia must reject antisemitism as it must reject the persecution of any group on the basis of religion or race. Jewish people have been persecuted persistently over history, and the recent 80th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz on 27 January 2025 reminds us of the horrors of the Holocaust with deaths of some six million Jews—a circumstance that all agree must never be repeated.

Former Labor prime minister Julia Gillard told a Sky News documentary earlier this year:

Many of the anti-Israel demonstrations have been caused by a distortion of history … It's a misunderstanding about how Israel came into existence. It's a misunderstanding about the nature of the conflict … And because of that, I think particularly young people are developing views about this which are unbalanced and really not informed by the history in any way.

Ms Gillard went on to say, poignantly:

The Holocaust, of course, teaches us where antisemitism leads if it's not confronted. That is the history of Germany before the war. It didn't happen all at once … These things happened step at a time. So given we've seen that history, we're in a position when we see the first few steps to say: 'No. No more.' Let's start combating that now rather than watch this history just play out.

Bearing that in mind, what sort of lifestyle should Jewish Australians and those of any other religious or cultural group expect? Rights and freedoms for all individuals; freedom of thought, worship, speech and association; the rule of law, safety, justice; and equality of opportunity, reward for effort and a fair go—at least, that's what the coalition believes in. Yet Labor's inaction is tearing our social cohesion apart. Antisemitism is like a wound that festers within communities. Without appropriate treatment it grows and causes destruction of the surrounding tissue, eroding community connections, relationships, and values and pitting neighbours against each other.

While people in Mallee, my electorate, might think this is an urban issue, the reality is that I've been made aware of antisemitism in my own electorate. This is an issue not only in inner-city areas, where there are many Jewish people living in close proximity to each other, but also in rural and regional communities. In small rural and regional communities people often know each other and rely heavily on their social networks and connections, making festering antisemitism even more volatile. Jewish people in Mallee tell me they don't feel safe due to open antisemitism in the Australian community, including the display of blatantly antisemitic propaganda in public spaces within my rural and regional electorate. An Italian migrant complained to me recently that his family came to Australia in the 1950s and accepted Australian values, so why can't newer arrivals? The ability to understand and subscribe to Australian values is essential for social cohesion and maintaining our way of life.

I reiterate the concern expressed by Victoria Police about rising antisemitism in Victoria. The Victorian Chief Commissioner recently articulated this:

We've seen a significant rise in antisemitism … It remains our biggest concern.

Commissioner Patton said that, since the October 7 attack, more than 160 antisemitic incidents have been reported in Victoria. Accordingly, an increased police presence is now being deployed in Melbourne. Unfortunately, it does not seem this will extend to the regions.

Evil is always present, gently bubbling beneath the surface, and strong action must be taken to ensure it doesn't start to simmer, let alone boil. To further illustrate the fact that antisemitism is not just an issue in the cities, I highlight an instance of blatant public activity by a white supremacist group in Mallee in 2021. A group of about 30 men were seen performing Nazi salutes and chanting slogans such as 'white power' and 'heil Hitler' while camping and hiking in a national park—the mind boggles.

This bill is intended to help mitigate some of the government's failures. It modifies the existing offences in division 80 of the Criminal Code that should have been used to stop the spark of antisemitism in the first place. The existing offences in division 80 of the Criminal Code make it an offence to urge violence against individuals or groups on the basis of race, religion and the like. They make it an offence to advocate terrorism or genocide. For months, the coalition has been calling for the existing laws to be used. We have been saying that the existing offences should be tested and those preaching antisemitism should be put before a court. Why hasn't this happened?

Regardless, the changes made by these laws as introduced are welcome. I only hope they will be enough to start to stem the tide. Inaction is no longer acceptable. The scourge of antisemitism in this country must be stopped.

Andrew Wallace (Fisher, Liberal National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I congratulate the member for Mallee on the fine speech that she's just given. I support the remarks that she's made.

Both sides of this House agree that our country is facing significant challenges when it comes to antisemitism and the breakdown in social cohesion. The Director-General of Security, in his 2024 threat assessment, warned the country of this growing threat. The previous coalition government invested in efforts to counter violent extremism and address the root causes and vehicles of radicalisation with strong leadership on online safety, education and mental health care.

What was Labor's response? What has been this government's response? Their response has been a divisive, race based referendum, funding for divisive organisations and a systematic campaign against Israel and the Jewish people. They have, however, created a position of the Special Envoy for Social Cohesion. Now, I've got nothing against the member for Wills—the member for Wills is a good bloke—but, in this position, this is typical of what this Prime Minister does: a bit of wallpaper, a fresh coat of paint and there's nothing to see here. He does these things. He creates positions like the Special Envoy for Social Cohesion to make out as though he's actually doing something when he's doing nothing, or, worse, when he's actually making the problem worse by his actions and his inactions.

The Attorney-General said that this Labor government is committed to the safety and security of the community. Tell that to the people of Alice Springs; tell that to the Australian Border Force; tell that to victims of knife crime, child exploitation and domestic violence, who are paying the price for Labor's careless cuts and clueless government; tell that to Jewish students; tell that to the Jewish community who frequent synagogues; tell that to Jewish shopowners across the country.

In introducing this bill, the Criminal Code Amendment (Hate Crimes) Bill 2024, the member for Isaacs said:

No-one in Australia should be targeted because of who they are or what they believe.

That goes to the heart of this issue. The reality is that Australia is facing an antisemitism crisis in which Jewish people and the Israeli diaspora are targeted because of who they are. They are targeted online and in the street through doxxing and abuse simply because of where they come from or what they believe. This is Australia in 2025.

Mr Deputy Speaker Wilkie, I'm going to hazard a guess that neither you nor I—certainly not I—would have thought even two years ago that we would be here where we are today. Scratch that very thin veneer and what we are seeing today is the worst kind of racial vilification—the oldest kind of racial vilification. It is up to every member of this House and the Senate, all leaders in the community across the states and territories and, in fact, every single Australian to call out antisemitism when and as we see it.

Currently, the government is using the tactic that the opposition are somehow politicising this issue, but nothing could be further from the truth. What are the opposition to do when they see a total fundamental failure on the part of government in relation to its policies? Should the opposition just say: 'Well, we don't want to politicise this. We don't want to create an issue here. We don't want to draw any attention to the failure of government'? No. It's up to every single Australian to call out the failures of this government—and they are. This is not a Jewish problem; this is a problem that is impacting 27 million Australians.

I have a very small Jewish community in my electorate. Whilst the Jewish community is growing, the Sunshine Coast has reportedly around a thousand Jewish people. It's very small, but I have people—everyday ordinary Australians; non-Jewish people—coming to me, stopping me in the street and saying: 'What is happening to Jews in Australia is unforgiveable. This is not the Australia that we know and love.' The crazies on the far left and the crazies on the far right seem to have created this confluence of unforgiveable behaviour, and it is up to every single Australian to call it out as we see it.

This hate speech—this hate—has a new lick of paint and has rebranded, and it's a campaign that is called 'Zionism'. But, make no mistake, they are the same ancient tropes, lies and attitudes that have been repackaged to attack the Jewish people as they have for thousands of years. I think we need to be really clear about what Zionism is and give clarity to its definition, which this legislation is supposed to provide after all. UK TV personality and Holocaust educator Rachel Riley put it really well. She said:

Zionism is the belief that Jews have the right to self-determination in their own country.

She continued:

Anti-Zionism, in its proper def'n says that Jews, alone in the world, should not have their own nation state.

Let's look at what this anti-Jewish hate, by its many names, has led to in this country since the October 7 attacks. Stores run by Jewish people have been vandalised. Nazi symbols and antisemitic vandalism have been spray painted and carved into public spaces, including in Sippy Downs and Birtinya in my own community and right outside my office. Violent protests have spread from national monuments to regional towns, replete with terrorist slogans, the flags of hate groups and the portraits of dictators. School students, university students and academics have been targeted through protests, encampments, discrimination and hate filled conferences, including at local schools and at my own alma mater, QUT. I recently called on the education minister to stop funding QUT until an investigation was done on their actions in the most heinous conference, which was supposed to drive social cohesion—absolutely disgraceful. Not only should the people that ran and spoke at that conference be condemned; the leadership of QUT, where I did my law degree, should be condemned. This government needs to muscle up, put its money where its mouth is and start taking action against organisations that drive antisemitism, like the Queensland University of Technology.

Last year, we saw the Adass Israel synagogue firebombed in Melbourne, in scenes that were reminiscent of the Kristallnacht in November 1938. This year, unforgivably, a childcare centre in Sydney near a Jewish school and synagogue was torched. That childcare centre was not Jewish run. It just happened to be near a synagogue and a Jewish school. Thanks to the efforts of law enforcement and intelligence agencies, a catastrophic terror attack was prevented in Sydney last week. That terrorist attack had the potential to be the worst domestic terrorism event in Australian history. Reportedly, there were enough explosives for there to have been a 40-metre blast zone—almost the length of a 50-metre Olympic swimming pool. Inside that caravan was a list of Jewish synagogues and sites. I do congratulate Chris Minns and the New South Wales police force on their work in relation to this, but our political leadership and our senior police and law enforcement agencies' leadership has been left wanting. It has been left wanting since October 9, when we saw those disgraceful scenes on the steps of Sydney Opera House. Those scenes were left unchecked. And when these things are left unchecked, it becomes a progressive series of events where people think they can get away with something, and they'll keep pushing the envelope—pushing, pushing, pushing—until we start to see the firebombing of synagogues and childcare centres. There is a very real risk that someone will be killed as a result of these appalling antisemitic actions.

It's all very well and good for the Prime Minister to make mealy-mouthed comments, but what we have seen is a systemic attack on Israel and the Jewish people which has fuelled antisemitism in Australia. The government can't have it both ways. The Prime Minister can't stand up and say he's doing all these wonderful things and then lead the charge in the United Nations against Israel. That is unacceptable. Israel is our ally. It is the only democracy in the Middle East, and the Australian government has abandoned Israel. We are seeing insidious Neo-Nazi extremism moving from the dark recesses of the internet onto regularly used apps, web platforms and indeed our streets. I think that, above all things, this is a crisis in leadership from a government which has, as I said, systematically campaigned against Israel and the Jewish people.

Alongside the Leader of the Opposition, the shadow foreign minister and my good friend the member for Berowra, I outlined yesterday many of Labor's failures. I note that, in his second reading speech, the Attorney-General only referenced antisemitism once and only in tandem with Islamophobia. For many months Labor ministers have proved incapable of acknowledging the scourge of domestic antisemitism without mentioning Islamophobia, as if one somehow offsets the other. Yes, people of all faiths are contending with the rise in extremism. The Islamic community, the Christian community, Hindus, Sikhs and minority faith groups are all paying the price for Labor's social cohesion crisis. This legislation is an important step forward, but it is too little, too late. That should be the slogan of Labor's approach in office: too little, too late. (Time expired)

Kylea Tink (North Sydney, Independent) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I confess that, as a member of the 47th Parliament, I can't help but feel the incredible weight that comes with debating what is quite an extraordinary piece of legislation in our nation's history. That our society has reached a point where we must put in place laws to protect individuals and groups from hate speech is a very sad indictment on the direction in which we are headed. Yet here we are.

As the person the community of North Sydney sent to parliament to represent them during this term, I ask you to hear me when I say the people who surround me in my community every day share a common belief that all of us have the right to feel safe, to be treated with respect and to participate in our society without fear of vilification and discrimination based on our individual characteristics. If realising that ambition means we need to move laws like this, then we will support that legislation wholeheartedly.

At the end of the day, however, we will also ensure our day-to-day actions are driven by common values that are not just practised to ensure we stay within the boundaries of the law but are practically lived on a daily basis to ensure everyone feels included. We will also continue to work to bring those that are currently outliers to this ambition back into line, even as we are called 'woke'. Much to all our shame, there are people currently living in Australia who are subject to hate speech and vilification. To quote the Human Rights Law Centre:

Far right hate and extremism is on the rise. Women wearing the hijab have been assaulted by men in the street, while men wearing the kippah have been met with the white power salute. We have seen rallies held against trans rights, and neo-nazis intimidating refugee activists.

This cannot continue.

Most recently it has been heartbreaking to see so many disgusting instances of blatant antisemitism targeting Jewish businesses, individuals and places of worship. These acts are abhorrent, and there is absolutely no place for them in this country. In this context then, it's clear we need stronger measures to prevent and address hate crimes in Australia. While I can wish that it had not been necessary, I believe this legislation will certainly play a valuable role in our overall response to this challenge. But, as we've heard from human rights organisations and community groups, it cannot be our only response.

In addition to the changes to hate speech laws in the bill before us, there is also a clear need for measures that not only address actual violence but ultimately stop vilification of groups before it even begins. There's also a clear need for a long-term national antiracism framework in Australia, including a national hate crimes database and greater funding for the prevention of extremism, because, ultimately, if we can't name it and track it, we will never be able to adequately understand where it comes from or what is driving it. Informing all of these responses is a need for a national human rights framework that ensures hate speech and discrimination laws and policies are grounded in a common, irrefutable and legislated understanding of minimum human rights for all.

The bill before us broadens the offences for urging violence against either members of specific groups or entire groups themselves to include groups distinguished by sex, sexual orientation, gender identity and disability. It would also broaden this offence to capture recklessness, rather than just intent, and remove the availability of the good faith defence. The bill does this by creating a new offence for directly threatening force or violence towards a group or a group member. Finally the bill would expand the existing offences against the public display of Nazi or terrorist symbols used to humiliate or intimidate a group to include groups distinguished by sex, sexual orientation and gender identity. Many of these measures have been advocated for by a broad cross-section of our society for a very long time, including advocates for the LGBTQIA+ community and, more recently, the Jewish community. I thank the government for finally heeding that advocacy and bringing this reform into law.

At the same time, I'm concerned the bill doesn't do enough to adequately address the threats faced by a multitude of communities. Particular concern has been raised around the absence of an offence that specifically targets serious vilification of protected groups. As one North Sydney resident expressed to me: 'the current bill won't protect me, or other LGBTQIA+ people, against serious vilification—the promotion of hatred that can be the spark which leads to violence will not be stopped. We need stronger, broader protections that operate nationally to protect all of us, including other communities impacted by prejudice-motivated speech and violence.'

In this context, I will be supporting the amendments to be moved by the member for Wentworth that would create a new criminal offence for public acts performed with the intention and likely outcome of promoting hatred towards a targeted person or group. Her amendment would close a current potential loophole where a person hasn't explicitly urged violence but is nonetheless engaging in serious vilification. I recognise this as potentially quite an extraordinary inclusion in a piece of legislation. I think we're living in extraordinary times, in which extraordinary actions are required.

The amendment moved by the member for Wentworth has been advocated for strongly by Equality Australia and supported in principle by the Human Rights Commission. In considering all of these approaches to tackling hatred and discrimination, however, I share the caution of many human rights groups that legislation targeting hate crimes must be carefully calibrated to ensure we avoid over-policing and/or inadvertently capturing the legitimate exercise of freedom of expression. In the case of this legislation, we have heard criticism from certain groups that the legislation doesn't take enough care in weighing up competing human rights. For instance, the report of the Parliamentary Joint Committee on Human Rights, of which I'm a member, noted that it is currently unclear whether this bill's limitations on the rights to freedom of expression, religion and nondiscrimination would be proportionate in all circumstances. The committee further highlights the risk that in practice these offences could capture a range of conduct, the prohibition of which could constitute an unjustifiable limit on the rights to freedom of expression. These concerns extend to the removal of the good-faith defence, which would eliminate any legal recourse for individuals who fall foul of this law.

The Australian Human Rights Commission questions whether expressive speech during unpopular or divisive public protest could be viewed as incitement against protected groups. If so, legislation such as the disproportionally impact groups that engage in protest to have their voices heard, such as First Nations people. Given this concern, while I ultimately support this bill, I also believe it is imperative that we are able to answer these questions, as they are reflective of a recurring we have in Australian lawmaking as we struggle to weigh up freedom of expression against the right to safety, freedom from discrimination and other rights. While I acknowledge much of what is included here in the member for Wentworth's amendment is already in practice in WA, I would assert that applying this thinking from the federal level down warrants a degree of certainty for those whose primary concern is the protection of free speech.

Ultimately, I also can't help but take this opportunity to again assert that many of the concerns that have prompted the introduction of this legislation today would have been avoided if we had a federal human rights act. As one of the only developed nations in the world not to have a human rights act, we continue to be hamstrung by a piecemeal system that relies on applying bandaids to close gaps rather than being guided by a well-articulated framework that recognises our responsibilities and duties towards other people and our community as a whole. Ultimately, individuals bear the responsibility to ensure that they exercise their rights with due regard for the rights of others. For example, exercising freedom of speech should never infringe on somebody else's rights to privacy, nor should it infringe on their right to safety. Recognising and respecting fundamental human rights are a part of the context of people living together in societies. As part of this, there must be legal, social and international order for human rights to be realised effectively. As the Law Council of Australia notes in their submission:

… articulating … limitations on multiple rights could be navigated in a more coherent way through a federal Human Rights Act and Human Rights Framework. In the absence of a Human Rights Act … assessments for Bills … are being conducted in a legislative vacuum.

Another challenge we face is the lack of coherent national approach to tackling racism in Australia. Again, as the member of the Joint Parliamentary Committee on Human Rights I have recently had the privilege of being involved in public hearings looking at the prevalence and experience of antisemitism in our universities. This has involved listening directly to students as they've shared their experience of the rise in antisemitic sentiment on campuses and the fear and abuse they have experienced. In these hearings the committee has heard from many groups that there is an urgent need to address racism and religious discrimination more broadly in Australia.

The number of Australians reporting a negative attitude towards Jewish people rose by four per cent in the past year, and this is truly shocking. But further to that, negative attitudes towards Muslims have risen by seven per cent, leading the Scanlon Foundation Research Institute to report:

… while attitudes to Australia's Muslim and Jewish communities is a particular area of concern, relations towards and across all faiths appear to be under pressure.

We've also heard from the Australian Human Rights Commission's interim report on racism at Australian universities that Jewish students and staff cited a rise in antisemitism, including extremist propaganda and intimidation. At the same time First Nations students have reported enduring structural and interpersonal racism whilst Arab and African students reported frequently encountering severe racism, and Muslim students and staff described hostility, threats and discriminatory practices. Where are we going?

This message does not diminish the need to specifically call and address antisemitism, and nor should it, but it does add a sobering dynamic that makes it clear we need to tackle all forms of discrimination, racism and radicalisation in Australia. Ultimately the messages from the experts are clear: we need a holistic national approach to these challenges that tackles them from the ground up. In this vein the Federation of Ethnic Communities Councils of Australia called on the government to provide additional specific long-term funding for a national antiracism framework. A federal framework like this would allow us to look beyond one-off projects and reactive legislation and provide monitoring, evaluation and strategic planning to tackle racism.

A key part of this framework needs to be the establishment of a national hate crimes database, as recommended by the Senate Standing Committee on Legal and Constitutional Affairs. Currently, state and federal police, and by consequence policymakers in the wider community, don't have a shared resource to track and monitor hate crimes across the country. Australia is one of the few countries without a national database, with the USA, Canada and the UK all collecting hate motivated crime data. Without a complete understanding of these crimes and their prevalence, our attempts to address them are in danger of being misinformed and misdirected and fundamentally informed by poor media commentary rather than the facts. The National Cabinet's recent announcement of a national antisemitism database is an important first step, but I do encourage the government to consider the expansion of this program to capture all hate crimes.

Finally, it's apparent that even though this bill's measures to address hate symbols and incitements to violence are important, we need systems of early intervention to prevent radicalisation and extremism before they even take seed. Criminalisation is one lever we can use to address extremist views and behaviours, but it shouldn't be either the only one or, in my own personal opinion, the primary one. It's not enough to put out fires; we need to stop them from ever being lit.

One proposal is the national delivery of community based prevention and rehabilitation programs. These programs could identify at-risk or radicalised individuals and provide them with an off-ramp from extremism. Again, the Federation of Ethnic Communities Councils suggests schools are critical for educating and inoculating our young people from racism, yet where are the resources for them? Students need to be educated on racism and its harms, as well as diversity as a positive feature of Australian life.

In closing, I've not met a single person in my community who does not believe that all Australians deserve to live in a country where they don't have to fear discrimination, hatred or violence because of their identity, and who is not shocked by the direction our country seems to have been sliding towards over the course of the three years since this parliament first sat. But for us to realise that ambition, we're going to need to go further than penalties for hate crimes. We need a long-term national antiracism framework informed by robust debates and supported regardless of which side of politics you stand on. We need early interventions to prevent the spread of racism and the invoking of extremism, and we need a federal human rights framework to allow for a coherent approach to fairly balance competing rights and freedoms.

My community welcomes this bill, but it needs to be the beginning of a much larger movement to create an Australia that lives up to its values of tolerance, equality and respect for all.

Allegra Spender (Wentworth, Independent) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise today to speak in support of the Criminal Code Amendment (Hate Crimes) Bill 2024 but also to seek this parliament's support in passing my amendments to address some of the remaining deficiencies in the act. In recent weeks and months, my community of Wentworth has witnessed a horrifying increase in antisemitic incidences. These violent and destructive attacks have targeted houses, vehicles, places of worship and even a childcare centre. Almost daily, the Jewish community is being violently targeted by criminals. These attacks target Jewish Australians, but they have frightened my whole community; my whole community is frightened. People in Wentworth have been forced to install additional security cameras, dread going away or leaving their kids home alone and now live in a community patrolled 24/7 by police helicopters. A woman spoke to me recently, saying she was meant to be going overseas for a wedding—a very important, personal reason—but she was very afraid to leave her adult daughter at home because of what was happening. It is overwhelming.

This is not an Australia I recognise. Yesterday, I was very proud to put forward and get support from the entire parliament in the House and the Senate on a motion that unanimously acknowledged the insidious rise of antisemitism in Australia and condemned it unequivocally. I think that is absolutely critical. This is why, to be honest, I have been working hard in the parliament and in my community—to make a real difference on antisemitism. Some of the things I've been focused on include, firstly, getting the right people there. I'm lobbying very hard and delivering Australia's first antisemitism envoy. I'm calling to make sure that the laws are right. I called for, and we've successfully delivered in this parliament, strong anti-doxxing laws and the outlawing of Nazi symbols and gestures. I helped make sure security services are right both by ensuring we deliver tens of millions of dollars of enhanced security for the Jewish community and also by making sure that the policing is coordinated. I was calling for a national approach to policing, which the government announced before Christmas, and I meet every single week with Strike Force Pearl in Sydney, as well as with my local police, to understand what is happening in terms of policing and make sure the policing is right for the community that I'm facing.

We've also been pushing to make sure that education is right. There are two elements. One has been advocating for and seeing the success of $8.5 million given to the Sydney Jewish Museum, because that is a critical facility for educating people in this space. I have invited every single high school in my electorate to come together to talk about antisemitism and hear the testimonies of the Jewish schools about what they're doing and feeling and how we can better make sure the whole community and the young people in it are standing up against antisemitism. I also think a critical part has been around community cohesion. We have invited all the faith leaders of Wentworth together to talk about the mutual problems and challenges faced by faith leaders and to share some of those challenges with each other and build that community. Finally, I've worked very closely with the Australian Union of Jewish Students to put pressure specifically on university vice-chancellors to stamp out antisemitism at the university. I was doing that work before 7 October with my colleagues the co-chairs of the Parliamentary Friends of the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance, Josh Burns and Julian Leeser.

This work is ongoing and absolutely critical. It's a huge part of what I do in parliament, and that is because I'm really concerned about the rise in antisemitism. I was concerned before 7 October. And I can see the impact on my community every single day. This impact isn't just the violent occurrences. I've run student forums every single term and invite students from all my schools together. I always have two students from all my schools together to talk about issues. In one forum very recently, two students talked about their experience of antisemitism in the streets of my community. They were walking down the street. Someone saw that they had Jewish school uniforms. The car slowed down and did a heil Hitler sign and swore about the Jewish people. That's what the kids in my community are dealing with, and it is absolutely shocking. The day before yesterday I spoke to a friend of mine whose kids are a similar age—young primary school kids—and he said: 'It's getting really hard. We're trying to shield our kids from the antisemitism, but they don't understand why there are police constantly outside the schools, or why the guards have increased. They don't understand why they can't go on excursions anymore, why they're not playing sport with others, or why they're being told not to wear the school uniform in certain public places.' This is absolutely tragic. I am proud the parliament unified against yesterday to say that we condemn this antisemitism, but we need to collectively be taking strong action. This legislation is part of the strong action that we need to take, as well as stronger sentencing, stronger policing, education and making sure those who have perpetrated these crimes are actually prosecuted.

Let me come to the legislation. Whether we like it or not, the community is looking to us as lawmakers to draw a clear line in the sand. Australia has, for many decades, struggled with balancing freedom of speech and the protection of safety and civil liberties. Striking such a balance is no trivial issue. But today, overseas conflicts, polarising political debates and leaders, and tough economic conditions, mixed in with the apparently anonymous impunity of the internet and social media, have created an environment in which hate and division are festering. Australia's social cohesion is showing not only cracks but also chasms. While we have strict criminal laws against things like destruction of property and vandalism, and the perpetrators behind these crimes are being pursued by law enforcement, these incidents are not random. They're not isolated. They're the result of the festering hatred and animosity that is first allowed to germinate in dark corners of the internet and chat rooms, gradually manifesting in speeches, gestures and placards, until it ultimately spews out onto the streets in acts of violence. It is the cumulative impact of insidious, vitriolic statements, slogans and expressions that have absolutely nothing to do with robust debate, the exchange of ideas or the scrutiny of power.

Let me give you some examples. In March 2023, protesters at an anti-trans rally held signs calling to destroy 'paedo freaks'. The royal commission into disability outlined instances of people's photos being posted online for the purpose of drawing vile comments and public humiliation. In 2023, an online sermon called for the final solution in relation to the Jews, echoing the words of Hitler. These acts have a very human element to the people who they're targeted towards, and demonstrate a clear gap in our legal framework. As the director of security at ASIO, Mike Burgess, repeatedly said: words matter.

Let me move on to the changes and their deficiencies. Within this context it is commendable that legislation has been brought forward by the government. The current bill will modestly improve the existing federal Crimes Act by lowering the fault element for existing offences from intent to recklessness, as well as by introducing a new offence for threatening force or violence. But we should be listening more carefully when the people and groups that this legislation is designed to protect continue to protest its inadequacy. This was amply highlighted by the submissions to the Senate inquiry. The Executive Council of Australian Jewry highlighted in their submission that despite gradual changes over time to the Criminal Code:

… there remains an environment of relative impunity with respect to the promotion, advocacy or glorification of racial and religious hatred and violence …

Equality Australia and Rainbow Families, representing the LGBTQIA+ community, stated that, in addition to protections against targeted threats of violence, federal regulation needs to 'hold hate to account and prevent it spreading'. People with Disability Australia expressed disappointment that 'this bill does not criminalise serious forms of vilification perpetrated against targeted groups, as originally intended'.

For these communities and others, the amendments the government has put forward are positive, but they do not go to the heart of hate, the promotion of hate and the impact that it has on our society. They make illegal only the most extreme acts—if, indeed, they can ever be proven beyond reasonable doubt—but do nothing against the tidal wave of hatred, abuse and harassment that people in our community are subjected to daily. Incidents that make them feel insecure, unsafe and unwelcome in their own home, in their own country, and in the place they were born. Enough is enough.

Our federal law is inadequate and our state and racial vilification acts represent a hodgepodge of overlapping legislation that creates different classes of offences and different standards of proof depending on where you reside in Australia. In the internet age, when state borders are irrelevant to the flow of information, this just isn't going to cut it. Legal and human rights organisations have acknowledged that we have a gaping hole in our legal framework, and I and many others believe it's time for a nationally consistent approach. That is why I am moving an amendment to this bill that will create a new offence of serious vilification and promotion of hatred, and I urge this parliament to support my amendment. I'm also suggesting in the amendment that the term 'intersex status' be replaced with 'sex characteristics' to better reflect the preference of the LGBTIQ community and the direction of not only various state laws but also international human rights recommendations.

I acknowledge that this is a really difficult area to legislate, and I am not naive to the challenges. People are rightly concerned about the protection of freedom of speech in such a robust and flourishing democracy as we have here, and so am I. But let me make some reassurances. This amendment will not remove your right to speak freely or to protest. How do we have some certainty around this? The amendment is based on legislation that has been in WA for the last 20 years. In fact the Western Australian crimes act has had a similar offence for the last 21 years. It's these sections—sections 77 and 78 from chapter 11 of the WA Criminal Code—that are actually the inspiration for my amendment. The provisions in the WA Criminal Code have not resulted in the curtailing of free speech in WA. They have not led to censorship. But they have put behind bars people who would seek to stoke hatred. In 2011 a Western Australian man, Brendon O'Connell, was found guilty under the new section 77 of harassing a young Jewish man in 2009. But, to demonstrate the law's necessary limitations, there are also precedents where these sections have been rejected in instances of minor offensive slurs, because that is not the intention.

I want to talk about this point a bit further because this is really critical. The amendments I have put forward are designed to stop the promotion of hatred and the promotion of harassment—the people who are out there promoting it. To be convicted of this, it has to be proved beyond a reasonable doubt, which is our highest evidentiary proof, that you had the intention to promote hatred in the community. That is a really high bar, and I genuinely believe it is appropriately so. When people ask me about the concerns about free speech, which I acknowledge, I say, 'Look, do we want people who are intending to promote hatred?' That is their goal. Is that something that we should be protecting without any guardrails? Or should we also be considering what happens to vulnerable communities when people are promoting and really intending to increase hatred against a group and there is little recourse that these individuals have—certainly not under the criminal code? That is a real challenge and a real question. Australia has always had some appropriate restrictions on free speech. Defamation law is one of them. You can't defame somebody. There are all sorts of things. There are appropriate guardrails around this, and I think we need to be really clear on this.

I value our incredibly diverse community of people from all parts of the world. Fifty per cent of our country either was born overseas or had a parent born overseas. My family is half-half—half born here; half born overseas—when it comes to my parents. Australia has every religion, we have so many different languages spoken at home and we are welcoming of people of different sexualities and genders. This is the country that we're trying to protect, and I really question whether people trying to promote hatred in different groups in our community should go unfettered. I think there should be guardrails around this, and that is why I am seeking support from the parliament on this.

Finally, in our country we will often disagree vehemently. We will disagree over conflicts overseas. We're a multicultural nation and we will always have people on different sides of any conflict, but I do see that my community is unified in the sense that they do not stand for hate and intimidation of others based on their religion, sexuality, ethnic background or ability status. That cannot be tolerated in this society. (Time expired)

Monique Ryan (Kooyong, Independent) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

All democratic governments have to balance the freedom to express cultural and religious opinions with the competing need to ensure their citizens' freedom from discrimination. I'm concerned that, given the time pressures on this parliament, the Albanese government is rushing consideration of a really difficult and complex piece of legislation and, in doing so, has doomed this legislation to outlaw hate crimes in this country to failure. Between 2017 and 2021, under the previous government, we saw a series of inquiries and proposals to introduce protections against religious discrimination. That process ended with the unsuccessful Religious Discrimination Bill 2022.

At the last election, this government promised to introduce legal protections for religious beliefs but also to legislate to protect teachers and students from discrimination. Despite that promise, the Prime Minister indicated during this term that the government would not proceed with that religious discrimination reform without bipartisan support, and it has not done so. I felt that that was appropriate. I think that bipartisan support is really important for these important pieces of public policy, which brings us to this legislation, the Criminal Code Amendment (Hate Crimes) Bill 2024, aimed as it is at combating the increasing antisemitism and Islamophobia which have been evident in Australian society since 7 October 2023.

The last 16 months have been a time of untold tragedy in the Middle East. The actions of Hamas on 7 October 2023, and the subsequent response by the Israeli government, have resulted in enormous human loss and suffering in Israel, in Gaza and in the other occupied territories. Australia's Jewish community felt the loss, the shock and the horror of October 7 immediately and profoundly. For so many, these events have affected their family members, their friends and their loved ones in Australia but also in Israel. In recent months, the increasing wave of antisemitism in this country has compounded their trauma and their grief. Australian Jews have had to deal with racially based hatred of a degree and an extent previously unknown to them, although many have told me that antisemitism is, sadly, not new to them. The trauma of these last 16 months has exacerbated their received memory—the buried but ever-present intergenerational impact of the Holocaust on diasporic Jewish communities—while it has also created a new trauma in which they have seen an upending of the very reasonable assumption that the past is the past.

That new knowledge, that understanding that antisemitism is a real, present, confronting and constant issue in Australia today, has traumatised the Australian Jewish community. It has shocked those of us that are not Jewish but stand with those that are and reject and abhor this most ancient of hatreds. In many respects, it feels as though our society's capacity for respectful dialogue and empathy has been lost. Our understanding and tolerance, our support for other families in our communities and our gratitude for the many cultures and histories which contribute to our rich social fabric seem strained and difficult. It seems that we no longer have common ground where we have had it before. Our accepting communities seemed to have hardened. They've become less generous and less inclusive.

Sadly, rather than acting in a bipartisan and respectful way around these difficult times, many have chosen to politicise and weaponise the horrific events of October 7, the ongoing plight of the hostages and their families, the tragic impact of the Israeli government's response upon innocent Palestinian civilians and the ongoing grief and trauma of those who watch from afar. Politicisation of this tragedy has made no-one safer; rather, it has exacerbated the anxiety and the fear felt by so many. I therefore supported yesterday's motion in parliament to deplore the appalling and unacceptable rise in antisemitism in Australia, including attacks on synagogues, schools, homes and childcare centres. I unequivocally condemn and reject antisemitism and racism in all of their forms, as I condemn similar hate directed to any group in our community. Jewish Australians should not, and no Australians should, have to live with discrimination and vilification based on their religion. I call on all of my colleagues in this place to support this rejection of hatred and ignorance and to express solidarity with our Jewish Australian brothers and sisters.

Australia's Muslim community has also been affected by an increase in religious and culturally motivated hate speech. I think of the constituent who came to my office and told me that she cannot and will not speak of such things publicly because, on the only occasion that she did, she was labelled a terrorist by her friends. I think of the mum who brought her two small children to my electorate office not long after October 7. They told me that they were really worried for their cousins in Gaza. These small children were sad because they felt that this country didn't care about them or about their loss.

Australia's anti-islamophobia envoy, Aftab Malik, has already reported that Islam is associated in the media and in the majority of the public mind with radicalism, extremism and terrorism. He has reported that Islamophobia is normalised in Australia but that it is underreported, and that violence, hatred and discrimination against Muslims are widespread daily realities in this country. So I call on my colleagues in this place to also reject that hatred and that ignorance and to express solidarity with our Muslim Australian brothers and sisters.

The events of the last 16 months firstly led to the Counter-Terrorism Legislation Amendment (Prohibited Hate Symbols and Other Measures) Bill 2023, which I supported when we legislated it in 2023. The new and additional measures included in the bill now before the House are a further response to the increasing prevalence of hate speech and hateful conduct in our society. The bill extends protections to groups defined by race, religion, nationality, national or ethnic origin, or political opinion to add sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, intersex status—which is an outmoded terminology, and I agree with the member for Wentworth that it should be altered to 'sexual characteristics'—and disability.

The bill as presented to this parliament has actually stepped back from the government's initial plan, which was to criminalise religious hate speech; instead, conduct will be criminalised only where it involves threats of force or violence. We do have to maintain a balance between the freedom of expression and protecting the Australian community from discrimination and hate. We have to have carefully framed laws which proscribe speech and inciting radicalisation and violence. While protection of freedom of expression is crucial in certain circumstances, that right has to be subject to limitation, and that includes advocacy of hatred, which constitutes incitement to discrimination.

Many Kooyong constituents have described to me in recent months how they feel that the federal laws we have passed in this place are not being enforced in Melbourne and that they no longer feel safe in our city on weekends. I have responded by asking the federal and state attorneys-general to clarify their attitudes to these and to other concerns, including the ongoing protests in the city of Melbourne every weekend. It's frustrating that just this week in Victorian parliament the Liberal opposition has voted against legislation which is similar to that now before this house. The fact that we have a hodgepodge melange of ineffective state and federal legislations around these matters is frustrating for people who are most concerned by them. The public deserves to understand and feel protected by our laws. They need to know they will be enforced; otherwise, our actions here and those of our state governments are pointless. But our responsibility to the public is also to ensure that any limitations that we put on their ability to gather peacefully, and to express their ideas and opinions, are necessary, precise, and proportionate.

It's unclear to what extent this legislation currently in front of the House will be impactful. I note there have been no prosecutions or convictions in the 35 years since New South Wales criminalised vilification involving threats of physical harm or property damage. These new Commonwealth offences have complex definitions. It will be challenging to prove them beyond a reasonable doubt.

We also have a responsibility to identify and understand the drivers that are attracting people to the far right and to act in the ways we are attempting to address with the legislation currently before the House. The horrific firebombing of the Adass Israel synagogue in Ripponlea in Melbourne was a terrorist attack. So too were the two attacks on synagogues in Sydney and the horrifying recent attack on a childcare centre in Sydney. The finding of a caravan packed with explosives shocked the whole country.

Passing legislation of the sort currently before the House will not stop those sorts of activities. We have to do more to understand who is committing these crimes, what motivates them and how we can cut antisemitism and other forms of racism off at the roots. Passage of these laws in the House today will not stop those forms of mindless violence. We have to do better as a nation. We have to work to find what binds us and not what divides us. We have to say publicly and repeatedly, in the face of hate speech, 'No, never again.'

Michael McCormack (Riverina, National Party, Shadow Minister for International Development and the Pacific) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I am quite sad to be rising in the Federation Chamber to have to speak on a bill such as this. The Criminal Code Amendment (Hate Crimes) Bill 2024 is a necessary bill to come before this parliament, but it should be very unnecessary. In 2025 we shouldn't have to pass a bill such as this. We shouldn't have to be discussing this in parliament when there are so many other issues at hand which are placing such pressure on Australians. We should be discussing matters of the economy, matters of the environment and matters of defence, but instead we are here spending an inordinate amount of time discussing something that should not be necessary.

I came to parliament this morning and was stopped by a red light. Across the road, a woman walked, brandishing, rather proudly, a Palestinian flag. That is okay; she is free to do that. We live in a democracy. But the number of Palestinian flags that are being waved and the amount of hatred that is coming out across the nation are beyond belief. It's not just in capital cities. Just before the former Treasurer Josh Frydenberg presented his very good documentary last year, I spoke to him, as I do every week. I spoke to him about the fact that this isn't just something confined to Sydney and Melbourne. This is right across Australia.

Indeed, I'm sad to say that, in my hometown of Wagga Wagga, the antisemitism is rife. And it should not be so. We have a fellow who, in his Fitzmaurice Street shopfront window, displays words and images I would not repeat here. The constituents of my electorate and visitors to Wagga Wagga file daily into my electorate office on the same street—on the next block, just up the road from where this shopfront is—complaining every day. The same people go to our local police station just around the corner on Tarcutta Street and complain. Yet the police say there's nothing they can do given the laws that we have. It is apparently okay to display, in huge letters, four-letter words that should not be seen—not be seen by children with impressionable minds and not be seen by adults. Yet, every week, he comes up with a new image and a new form of words. If that isn't antisemitism, then I don't know what is. Yet our police are apparently powerless to stop this.

Constituents complain to me, and I have to say I'm probably the only community leader in Wagga who has been game enough and brave enough to say something about it. I have copped it. I have copped it from him. I have copped it on social media. I've got this group of people who call themselves 'Sundays for Peace', who up until just recently—indeed up until Australia Day—were meeting every Sunday. I won't say 'meeting'; I'll say 'protesting'. Admittedly, there have been gatherings where twice my office has been daubed with unnecessary posters and unnecessary images and artwork, which I'd call graffiti. I've gone to the police twice, and, again, the police say they're powerless because I'm a public figure. Yet, if I went round and daubed this person's shopfront window with slogans and material that he found offensive, I would be charged, and the police have told me that. The police have also told me, 'It would be best if you didn't go to your electorate office at the same time on a Sunday,' because of these people. I have spoken to the Prime Minister, and he has told me that he hasn't been able to go to his Newtown electorate office because of the same sort of situation, the same sorts of protestors.

They used to call themselves 'Fridays for Future'. When we were in government and I was the Deputy Prime Minister, they were protesting about the climate. But you know what? When Labor took over, apparently the climate altered for the better. Everything was good again, and then, of course, we had October 7 2023, that day of infamy. Not long after that, the protestors arrived. Initially, I went out to greet them, as I always would, to talk to them rationally and sensibly about what they were protesting. I always do that. I was shouted down. I was told that I was cheering on—and I stopped this fellow short before he could say 'the murder of children', but that was what they'd suggested a little prior to that. Then, when I arced up and said, 'That is not the case. I have said publicly that a Palestinian baby is every bit as innocent as an Israeli baby,' they weren't satisfied with that. When I was challenging them on that precept, they said, 'Well, the Prime Minister is cheering on the murders.' I said, 'No, no—the Prime Minister has not said that. He has not uttered those words and you should not say that.'

Then they found it necessary to go to an animal remembrance military commemoration in the Victory Memorial Gardens, of all things. They decided to take their protest there knowing that I was there and that there would be media. They were waving their Palestinian flags in front of the light horse re-enactment troop, getting in the way and getting up in people's faces with their mobile phones to take photos. Someone asked me to call the police, and I did. I wasn't the first one to call the police, but I did call the police, and the police came. As I was walking back through the park with my wife and family, I was yelled at. They said: 'Baby killer! Baby killer!' I won't cop that, but I had to. I turned and all I said was: 'I have not ever said that. I have only ever said in the parliament that an Israeli and Palestinian baby are both born innocent and that they deserve all the peace and freedom that children are entitled to.' That wasn't good enough. They still screamed at me. A couple of days later there was a letter to the editor of the Wagga Daily Advertiser saying that I had screamed at them, and they've continued this.

The next time I happened to be near my electorate office on a Sunday, again, they were yelling: 'Baby killer! Baby killer!' This is not Wagga Wagga, and yet, because I've objected, I'm somehow the subject of their remarks. I can cop that; I'm big enough. My shoulders are broad enough; it's water off a duck's back. But that should not be happening in Wagga Wagga. They've had marches down the main street where they've talked about the killing of babies, and they're only one sided. It is antisemitism. I don't care what anybody says. They'll probably read this speech in the Hansard and I'll be the subject of their derision again. Well, go your hardest, seriously!

The difficulty is that they do make such a protest, and we've got a fellow in the local paper, Ray Goodlass, who writes a weekly column—sometimes it's more than weekly—and only ever presents one side of the argument, the pro-Palestinian argument. Their columns are so biased. And that's all the Wagga Wagga people are subjected to. They don't hear the other side unless it comes from me. That is a problem because, if you keep chipping away, people start to think, 'Well, maybe they're right,' and they're not right. They are wrong. They are absolutely wrong because it is antisemitism, and these shopfront displays and flagrant displays of antisemitism ought to stop. The police ought to have powers to make that happen. I am a big believer in free speech, but this is out of control.

I made comments about Sheikh Abdulghani Albaf, the new principal of the New Madinah College at Young, in the South West Slopes in the Riverina electorate, who has made some highly inappropriate remarks on social media. He talked about when I first objected to his posts and a letter I had written to a constituent from Young. In the posts and in the comments on his social media, he described me as 'human look like animal' and invoked 'Allah the best disposer'. This is not Australia. Don't bring your problems to our country. We can't solve the Middle East crisis from Fitzmaurice Street in Wagga Wagga, the streets of Sydney or indeed the steps of the Opera House. We cannot. This country has a proud multicultural history.

The Riverina is, I believe, the cradle of multiculturalism. Heaven knows we brought so many people from so many disparate and desperate nations to turn a desert into a fertile Garden of Eden, which we now call the Murrumbidgee Irrigation Area. They worked together—people from all nations in Europe who had not that long before been fighting with weapons. These days some people fight with words, and they convince Australians to do so too. Sadly, that is why we need legislation such as this. It's so that we can combat words and we can right the wrongs.

We shouldn't have to pass legislation like this, but the words uttered on 9 October on the steps of the Opera House—I have to say, I felt sorry for the police. I know that they listened to the tapes and came out with a view that what was suggested was said against the Jews wasn't, but we all know it was. We all know that they hate the Jews. Why people hate Jewish people I can't comprehend. I just cannot comprehend it, and I can't comprehend it in a society such as Australia, where we welcome people from all nationalities, all faiths and all orientations. We do, we should and we will go on doing that, but the comments by the sheik, who is now the principal of New Madinah College at Young—he needs to turn his language down. I've said so and I've been castigated for it.

Sundays for Peace, who are now meeting only once a month, shouldn't be meeting at all. Heaven help us if they actually spent their time working for St Vincent de Paul, Anglicare or some other organisation. Their hours would be much better spent and the Wagga Wagga community would be far better off if they did that rather than wasting their time perhaps waiting for me to visit my electorate office on a Sunday so they can scream abuse at me. I won't cop people screaming abuse at my wife, Catherine. I will not do that. I come to this place willingly, and it's a great honour and a great privilege, but my family should not be subjected to the sort of abuse that they rain down upon us. She's big enough and tough enough to withstand that as well, but it is certainly so unnecessary. My staff shouldn't have to clean up the office when they decide to put their posters up with thick glue on the back. That shouldn't have to happen. Our police should have powers to tap them on the shoulder.

This fellow, Michael Agzarian, denied doing it, yet, when the police said, 'Is this is you on the CCTV?' he had to admit it was him. That is the sort of people they are. It has to stop, because Wagga Wagga is a wonderful community. I say it's the best place to live in all of Australia. Of course I would; I'm biased. I love the place. I was born there. I've lived in and around Wagga Wagga all my life. It should not be a place for antisemitic comments and a group, which meets only once a month on Sunday, that is quite frankly just another branch of the Greens. The Greens have a lot to answer for in this whole debate. The Greens have a lot to answer for regarding the divisive activities that have occurred right across our nation.

I feel sorry that the Prime Minister can't go to his electorate office because of these actions. I do believe that the Prime Minister should have been stronger earlier on this issue, but he wasn't. But he shouldn't be subjected to the sort of rubbish that he has been. Nor should it happen in Wagga Wagga. As I say, it's not just the capital cities; it is right across the nation. It has to stop. The Jews have actually done a lot for our nation. They are Australians, and we, and all Australians, should support them.

Barnaby Joyce (New England, National Party, Shadow Minister for Veterans' Affairs) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I concur with the remarks of the member for Riverina, especially about other people who have been taken, like Catherine, into the realm of a political life when they never bought a ticket. That's an absolute disgrace. When I was at the University of New England, my old alma mater, there was a quote by Caius Cornelius Tacitus, 'Ex sapientia modus,' which is, 'From wisdom comes moderation.' Moderation, of course, is an incredibly important thing. Why would Tacitus be so enthralled by moderation? Because moderation is what keeps people in harmonious relationships with one another. People don't get hurt when we have tolerance and when we rely on differences, but we don't take it to a point where we are prepared to do harm to another person—tolerance from moderation.

I come from a family who all served in the Defence Forces—both of my grandfathers and my father. Tragically my grandmother was English. We're not quite sure—they came from the Midlands, so it was a depressing process—but I think seven brothers were killed. They were all killed—all the boys. All gone. So impressed upon me from a young age was moderation.

There are evils of those who live in the shadows of the extremes on either side of the political fence, the Left and the Right, and the absolute horrendous mechanism of hate that they enthral the masses with for the destruction of people. We saw it in its most profound and evil form in the events that followed 1938 and probably started with the 1933 social service act of Germany, where they decided the path and that they were going to start with the exclusion of a certain race of people—Jewish people. What they worked on the back of was the political, social, economic and ethical malaise that was so evident in the Great Depression. With the promulgation of an ethos that worked on the back of that, they had the capacity to therefore target a certain group of people and place on their heads the profound problems that were there in Europe, especially the hyperinflation and economic destruction in Germany that followed the First World War.

Of course it was the art of evil. It wasn't a group of people that brought that about. You could probably go back to the economic circumstances of the armistice that brought that about. What was the purpose of this evil that came forward? How did it get to the point where we could believe that people stood by and watched people—and they knew about it—be put into the wholesale-factory-like incineration, destruction, starvation, belittlement and everything that went through the Holocaust?

I'm not Jewish, but I certainly did take—from stories that were conveyed to me by my father about my grandfather and the way they held the people who did that in absolute and utter contempt—that there was just this absolute, unbelievable disdain. Why would you do this?

The thing about Australia and, might I say, New Zealand is that we have an incredible egalitarian ethos that you don't understand until you go somewhere else. All the time in Australia, if you're too much on the edge, people tell you to tone it down. 'Take it down a cog. Take a pill.' We don't like extremism. Inherently in us, we see the evil that perpetrates that—the evil seed that grows in that garden that lives on the extreme of the Left and the Right. It's not just that we see it in antisemitism; that is the most profound thing, and I'll go to that, because that's what we're seeing now. But you saw it in Pol Pot and in the extreme of the Left. You could see it in Mao's China. It was wholesale destruction of people through the Cultural Revolution—just starving them to death. I did have family members on a side of the family who were Chinese that certainly did live that. Why? It was because they'd been to university. Apparently that was evil, so they were sent out to the countryside to die. The trees died because they ate the bark off them. That's what happens when you let this evil animal—this evil snake—have its head.

Our philosophical premise in being Australian and our duty is that, when we see this start to rise up, we don't wait until it comes to its horrific time on the throne. You deal with it immediately. That's what has gone wrong here. This thing has started. It's like a fire. When a fire gets out the tip of the filth and into the grass, you don't wait until it's halfway up the hill before you try to put it out. You put it out immediately. We haven't put this out. It has grown and followed exactly the same malaise as the absolute evil of Germany in the period of 1933 through to 1945. It starts innocuously. 'Oh, they're just a bunch of radicals. Don't worry about them. They're just in the corner. They'll never go anywhere.' No-one takes them seriously. Well, they didn't take them seriously in Germany, either, until they started mustering up people from the whole of Europe and murdering them. Even then, once they got to that point, let's be honest—most people just stood by and watched.

The premise of this is that we have a duty to jump on this, not just from the conservative side or the Labor side but from both sides. People of moderation are duty bound to deal with this and deal with it immediately. If we have respect for those who have fought for our nations, we will remember that tens of thousands of Australians died against the extreme regimes of the filth of fascism—that's what I call it—and its like-minded person in imperial Japan. It's the same thing. They were just wholesale murdering people. They didn't care. What happens if you let this get away is that a certain group of people determine that another group of people are merely animals, and they act like animals in how they deal with people. This is why it is not incumbent just on this parliament to deal with this issue but on all Australians. That ethos of egalitarianism and moderation says that, when you hear someone like the member for Riverina was talking about, you're actually duty bound to go up to them and say: 'Mate, tone it down. I don't find what you've said acceptable. You are not respecting the egalitarian nature of Australia. We know what you're doing; you're inciting hate. You're inciting a movement. You're basically working on the back of that.' I would say that they work on the back of issues pertinent to the Middle East, which we're seeing in Israel and Gaza. It's not for the betterment of the people of Gaza. They're not turning up there to say, 'We're going to build hospitals,' or to try to deal with the issues there. 'We're going to join a United Nations peacekeeping force!' They're using it in Australia for the incitement of a movement of the extreme. In the incitement of the movement of the extreme, once more in our nation—and I've never seen it, but for the first time, out of the tip of filth, the fire is in the grass. Now we've all got a job to put this fire out, and this bill is a part of that. It's a part of what we've done here.

I don't know how much is gained or added to by going through the history of the process, but it is a fact that on 7 October Israel was invaded. It's as simple as that. If Australia were invaded in the same way that Israel was invaded, you would expect a response from this parliament and our defence force that was absolutely profound and that dealt with it in such a form as to remove the threat. That would be the expectation if, let's pretend, some island we've never heard of manifested itself overnight and decided to attack Australia and do what happened on October 7 in Israel. The response of the Australian Army—led by Labor, Liberal, National, whatever you like—would be that they must deal with that immediately and in the most profound way.

But we all want peace there. There is no solace or solution in the loss of life for innocent people. Actually, that's the problem; some people do believe that's okay. In fascism, they did believe it was a-okay to murder innocent people. Under Pol Pot, they did believe it. In Stalinist Russia, they did believe it. In Mao's China they did believe it. The Hutus in Rwanda believed it. They did believe it was right to murder innocent people, throw them down toilets, or fill up football stadiums with them and just murder them outright. They did believe that—no doubt, it's happening right now.

But, when it comes to Australia, and when we see people pop up and start espousing their views on racial grounds, on religious grounds or on ethical grounds, it's always the same. They believe they are 100 per cent right and everybody else is 100 per cent wrong. On that premise, they believe they have the right to create harm, and it doesn't stop there; they ultimately believe they have the right to kill other humans because they believe the other humans are not human. They are less than human; they are subhuman.

Going back, in my family, we were not allowed to even draw a swastika, a symbol of hate. It was not allowed. If you draw a war plane, do not put a swastika on it. My father was from the right, he was a conservative, but he had a pathological dislike of fascism. It was a subject, an issue, that would be held in absolute disdain. There was nothing to be mentioned but that it was evil. There was nothing to be mentioned but any semblance of it, any sense of it, any sight of it was to be crushed. When my father's friends came round—ex-serviceman who served in New Guinea, in the Middle East, all round—they were from every side. They joked about my dad because he actually started in the left—he was a boilermaker, fitter and turner, and he actually met Chifley—but he was on the right when he finished. One of his mates who fought in Papua New Guinea, Jim Flower, was a pacifist. He demanded never to wear a firearm, but he was one of the bravest people there. He would go out in the scrub, find people screaming and get them back to the hospital. He did that, and when he was around his unit he was seen as one of the bravest men who had ever lived. He was from the left. He was definitely on the left. He drove my mother crazy, because she was on the right. But all these people had one thing in common: moderation. You have a beer together, you don't get too worked up about politics, you don't bang on too much about your religion—that's your business. Keep your business to yourself because this is how we get along in this nation.

These symbols of hate say that that ethos of Australia, that egalitarian ethos, is to be put aside for an alternative view. Now, it shouldn't be part of any part of the world, but most definitely it should never be part of Australia. It is just not who we are. With the filth that comes out of the tip and the fire that comes out of the tip and lands on the grass, what we immediately have to do on the Labor side, the Liberal side, the Nationals side and the crossbench side is find that fire, seek out and close in on that fire and put it out. Don't let them divide us up. Say, 'You've got no friends on the Labor side, you've got no friends on the crossbench side, you've got no friends anywhere.' This filth is going out. This filth is going back into the tip. We're going to find a backhoe and cover you up, and you can basically just lay dormant like a dinosaur.

Helen Haines (Indi, Independent) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise today to speak on this bill with deep sadness and deep concern about the state of our nation and with a deep sense of purpose. Our country is at a decisive point, and it's the role of this parliament to ensure that we set this nation on the right course and that we send a strong message and call out appalling behaviour and actions for what they are—criminal acts.

The Criminal Code Amendment (Hate Crimes) Bill 2024 aims to strengthen Australia's criminal laws to provide better protection against hate crimes. It does so in three main ways. First, the bill strengthens existing offences for urging the use of force or violence. It does so by widening their application so that they apply when someone urges force or violence against members of a group distinguished by sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, intersex status and disability. The offence currently protects groups distinguished by race, religion, nationality, national or ethnic origin or political opinion. The bill also strengthens the offence for urging the use of force or violence by removing the defence of good faith and changing the fault element that the prosecution must prove from intent to recklessness. These changes will make it easier to successfully prosecute this offence.

Second, the bill creates a new criminal offence for threatening force or violence against targeted groups and members of targeted groups I listed earlier. This will help fill a gap in the current laws to address conduct which involves a direct threat from one person to another rather than to a group or a member of a group.

Third, the bill strengthens the 'public display of prohibited hate symbols' offences—laws that were passed by this place last year. The bill does this by expanding the list of groups which these offences protect to include groups distinguished by sexual orientation, gender identity and intersex status.

We debate this bill at a time of grave risk and vulnerability for Australia's Jewish community. The level of antisemitism we have experienced in this country over recent months is unlike anything I've witnessed in my lifetime. I can't imagine the fear Jewish Australians are living with. Just last week we marked the 80th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz, and we know antisemitism is one of the oldest forms of hatred. It is a fear and a wound that is generations deep.

In Australia we are free to practice our faith but it's clear there are people out there who seek to intimidate, to terrorise and to hate, and to do this to people because of their Jewish faith, with graffiti on cars, homes, schools, childcare centres, workplaces and places of worship. The arson attack on the Adass Israel Synagogue of Melbourne, and the discovery in Sydney of a caravan packed with explosives and with the address of a Sydney synagogue on a piece of paper inside—these incidents are truly terrifying. Of course, that is their purpose—to incite terror, hatred and fear. We cannot allow these incidents to go by unremarked and unchecked. These incidents must not be normalised. They must never be excused. The perpetrators of these attacks must be held to the full force of the law. There must be consequences for these vile actions, which have no place in our society. They have no place in Australia.

This bill is just part of the ways in which government can and should respond to the hateful acts of violence and threats against the Australian Jewish community. More must be done as well. It's important to note that this bill is not exclusively about antisemitism but covers hate crimes against members of the community with protected attributes including sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, intersex status and disability. This is vital because there are many marginalised groups in our community who are also feeling vulnerable. There are people out there who wish them ill will, who wish to do them harm because of their faith, their sexuality, their gender, their identity, their disability. These fears are not unfounded as anti-Muslim graffiti and incidents are also increasing in our community. These incidents must be acknowledged, they must be counted, they must be stamped out.

I acknowledge the fear and unease in the LGBTIQ community, and we must be constantly alive to the discrimination and hatred members of this community experience as well. Acknowledging the hatred and the intimidation experienced by other members of the community does not seek to minimise the impact of the escalation in antisemitism on the Jewish community in Australia. We must call out all types of hatred, all efforts to threaten and intimidate people based on their faith, their sexuality, their gender, their disability because this is how we become a truly cohesive society. And I agree with the words of the member for New England and the member for Riverina who both spoke earlier that it's not just the parliament who is responsible here, as indeed we most certainly are, but it is every single Australian who must look into their own heart and into their own actions and never walk past or remain silent when they see this hatred in action.

I acknowledge the amendments put forward in good faith to this bill. The member for Wentworth has worked closely with Jewish leaders and equality advocates to draft amendments that expand the bill to cover serious vilification offences. The member for Wentworth's electorate has experienced horrific attacks over the last few months in particular, and we must listen to them to find the solution. The member for Wentworth's amendments to the bill would address gaps in legislation where the promotion of violence and hatred is not considered a crime because it does not meet the requirements of explicitly urging or threatening violence. The offence will focus on promotion of hatred and violence and draws upon existing laws in Western Australia that have been tested in the courts to ensure it achieves the right balance with free speech principles.

I support these amendments, and I urge the whole parliament to also support them. This is not about restricting freedom of speech; it's about proper consequences for threats and promoting violence against specific groups. And I also note the coalition's amendments to explicitly outlaw threats and attacks against places of worship. Again, I condemn the abhorrent attacks and threats against synagogues that have recently occurred. It's for this reason I support the coalition's amendments.

This bill is a crucial element of our nation's response to the rising antisemitism the Jewish community faces. It's an addition to our Criminal Code that, frankly, is overdue. But it's not the start and end of how we as a parliament, as legislators from across the political spectrum, should respond to the problems that we face. In their submission, the Law Council of Australia warned:

… there are significant limitations on the role of criminal law an instrument of social policy.

We should dwell on this point. How will the government, the parliament and we as legislators and leaders of this country influence our social fabric, our social cohesion? We must continue to act to combat hate, to build trust and safety and bonds across all the different communities that make up our great country of Australia because we will not prosecute our way to social cohesion. We won't. Social cohesion is something that is created, something that is tended and something that is protected. Tim Costello recently wrote for the Sydney Morning Herald and the Age:

Social cohesion is both a gift and a challenge. Building it requires risk, and maintaining it requires crossing lines.

He called out 'conflict entrepreneurs' who have politicised the conflict in Gaza and then decried the breakdown in social cohesion.

The terror attack on Israel on 7 October 2023 was abhorrent. The destruction and loss of life in Gaza in the time since then has been devastating. The current ceasefire is fragile. There are those in Australia who have sought to capitalise on these events to drive division, to widen the cracks into a fissure that cannot be crossed. And they have done so through threats, through violence, through intimidation. We must not stand for it. We must stand for peace.

Paul Fletcher (Bradfield, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Government Services and the Digital Economy) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I'm pleased to rise to speak on the Criminal Code Amendment (Hate Crimes) Bill 2024. This is an issue—the challenge of antisemitism and how we respond to it as a nation—which is of great concern to many, many Australians. It is certainly an issue of very considerable concern in the electorate of Bradfield, which has the second-largest Jewish community of any federal electorate in New South Wales. It has four synagogues and a Jewish school, Masada College. Just last Friday, I was at a service at one of those four synagogues, North Shore Synagogue in Lindfield, at the invitation of Rabbi Lewin. I was joined by the mayor of Ku-ring-gai, Christine Kay; the state member for Davidson, Matt Cross; and the Liberal candidate for Bradfield, Gisele Kapterian. We were there along with other local dignitaries and leaders to express our concern for our local Jewish community and for the Jewish community of Australia. I know our local Jewish community, along with the Jewish community all across Australia, is rightly enormously concerned about the shocking upsurge in antisemitism that we have seen throughout Australia since the 7 October 2023 Hamas terrorist attack in Israel.

Indeed I've attended numerous events in my electorate over the last year and a half in response to the enormous and entirely justifiable and understandable concerns of my Jewish constituents and, I might say, of the broader body of my constituents in Bradfield. In Bradfield, as around Australia, alarm and concern about the outbreak of antisemitism in Australia is certainly felt by Jewish Australians, but it is also felt by Australians of goodwill of all faiths and none, because it is a threat to social cohesion, it is a threat to social order and it is a threat to civilisation and to the values which underpin our modern Australian nation.

In October 2023, shortly after the appalling 7 October terrorist attack, I attended a moving service at Kehillat Masada synagogue in St Ives. Several North Shore synagogues came together at that service; it was physically held at Masada, as I mentioned. A significant number of dignitaries and leaders joined that event. It was an opportunity for the Bradfield Jewish community and the North Shore Jewish community to come together in mutual support and to express their support for the victims of the appalling terrorist attack, their loved ones, their families and indeed all who were rightly concerned about that appalling event.

In June last year, I spoke about antisemitism at a community forum at North Shore Synagogue. In August 2024, there was another event at the North Shore Synagogue with a focus on Jewish teenagers and young people. In November 2024, I spoke about antisemitism at Chabad North Shore, one of our other synagogues in St Ives. I spoke to a group of about 120 people and answered questions for quite a considerable period of time, which is evidence of the enormous degree of concern amongst our Jewish community in Bradfield, as there is enormous concern amongst Jews, their friends and supporters all across Australia. I visited the homes of Jewish constituents in St Ives, where I heard from several families—parents, teenagers and young adult children—about the antisemitism and bullying that those Jewish young people had been experiencing.

I rise, therefore, to speak on this bill with a very considerable interest in the issues it seeks to address and a clear recognition of its importance to social cohesion in our nation but also of its particular importance to the community that I represent in Bradfield. Sadly, we have seen from the present government a lamentable failure to engage in a determined and effective way with the rise of antisemitism. The fact is that Australia is one of the world's great multi-ethnic, multiracial, multicultural, multireligious nations. That is something in which we should all take enormous pride. Our success in this regard is built on core Australian values of mutual tolerance, respect and understanding. The shocking incidents of antisemitism that we have seen across Australia, and their violent manifestations, are entirely at odds with the values of mutual tolerance, respect and understanding which underpin Australia's success as a multi-ethnic, multiracial, multicultural and multireligious nation. These outbreaks of antisemitism are to be condemned for a whole host of reasons. One of the reasons they are to be condemned is because they are wholly at odds with the values which underpin our modern Australian nation. The sad fact is that the appalling terrorist attack in Israel on 7 October 2023 has energised and unleashed Hamas sympathisers in Australia. That is something to be absolutely regretted, condemned, and accurately recognised and described as entirely at odds with Australian values.

It is disappointing that we have not seen a stronger, clearer, more courageous response from the Prime Minister and from the Albanese Labor government. It is mystifying that the Prime Minister and other senior Labor figures find it impossible, evidently, to speak about antisemitism without, in the very same sentence, using the word 'Islamophobia'. Let's be clear: hatred directed at Jews must be condemned. Hatred directed at Muslims must be condemned. But they do not need to be endlessly linked in a rhetorical formula used by self-declared 'progressives' as some kind of designated form of moral equivalence. We need to recognise that there is a particular and serious problem with antisemitism, and we need to have a clear and strong policy response.

That being said, the changes made by the laws that are proposed before the House today are changes that the coalition welcomes and supports. We regret that it has taken so long to get to this point, given that the bill was introduced in the last sitting week in September 2024. We've made efforts to encourage the government to speed it up. It's good that we have this bill before us. There should be no doubt in the minds of anybody engaging in the kind of violent antisemitic conduct that we have seen, sadly, over the last year and a half, that they face serious jail time. The measures in this bill are strong but they are necessary. The scourge of antisemitism is something that we must be resolute in opposing. It is fundamentally at odds with the values which underpin the modern Australian nation, one of the world's great multiracial, multi-ethnic, multicultural and multireligious nations, and that is why strong action is necessary.

Pat Conaghan (Cowper, National Party, Shadow Assistant Minister for Social Services) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I'm saddened to rise to speak on the Criminal Code Amendment (Hate Crimes) Bill 2024. I never thought I would come to this place and talk about antisemitism and the rise that we've seen over the past 18 months.

In 1947 a ship loaded with Hungarian migrants came to Australia. Most of them, but not all of them, were Jews, but they were all fleeing the persecution they'd seen during the Second World War from the fascist regime of the Nazis. Two of those on board were Joszef Kovach and Stephan Katerinka. They'd never met each other. Joszef Kovach was lucky; his parents were educated—they were teachers—and he was educated, and he'd learned to speak English at a young age. His whole family was wiped out by the Nazis. Similarly, Stephan Katerinka was from a poor family. His whole family was wiped out by the Nazis. That would have been the same story for most of those people on that boat.

They came to Australia and went to the migrant camp in Cowra, and then, when they were able to, they moved to Sydney, and they stayed friends. They set up a tea house in Paddington, and anybody who knows Paddington knows it is right in the centre of an area which has a large Jewish settlement today. They then went on to open a small goods shop, and they both prospered in Australia. Joe went on to work 30-odd years with Qantas, and Stephan had a very large chicken supply business down on the South Coast. One thing they had in common, apart from the persecution and the loss of their families, was a love of Australia. They loved the freedom in Australia and the democracy they had in Australia, and the fact that they could walk through the streets of Paddington without being persecuted for being a minority group. With what we have seen over the past 12 months, both Joe and Steve would be rolling in their graves.

I fear that this bill is too little, too late. The cynic in me says it's come about because we have an election coming up; I hope to God that is not true. What we've seen over the past 12 months is disgusting. It is disgusting to see in Australia. After the October 7 attacks, which can only be described as pure evil, we saw people standing on a world-renowned monument, the Opera House, chanting antisemitic slogans. That should have been stopped there and then. But the response from this government has been equivocal. Despite, time and time again, Peter Dutton, David Littleproud and the coalition putting forward motions to suspend standing orders to talk about this, to do something about this, they have been knocked down and silenced by Labor, or Labor has been equivocal. Worse still, some of the Independents and the Greens have been pouring fuel on the fire. That is making things even worse. Things have escalated from the Opera House to graffiti, firebombings and a thankfully-thwarted terrorist attack with a caravan full of explosives. This evil has been propagated by the fact that the Prime Minister of this country has been equivocal, that we haven't stood up and said, 'We will not put up with this.'

Recently in my electorate, on 1 June, I got a phone call to say that my office had been graffitied with 'eye on Rafah'. There was big red paint splashed everywhere in Coffs Harbour. It was the same red paint that had been used on my office only the year before saying 'koala killer'. These ideologues wouldn't know which river to which sea. It's just something shiny and new for them to get on. They're the same extremists who used to abuse me about the climate, which apparently was all fixed when Labor got in.

Dave Sharma came up to my electorate to speak to some of the Liberal Party members who are up in my electorate, and one of them asked a question about the antisemitic behaviour that had been occurring in Coffs Harbour. You don't have to go to Melbourne or Sydney for it to happen. Jewish members of my community are being abused. Jewish members of my community are having their businesses boycotted. One of them asked me, 'What can we do?' My response was, 'Why should you be doing anything when our leaders aren't?' The standard you walk past is the standard that you accept. Our leaders—the police commissioner in New South Wales, the Prime Minister, the commissioners in every state and territory—should be getting their troops together and saying, 'If you see this, if you hear antisemitic slogans, if you see people carrying flags from terrorist organisations, then you lock them up.' Have we seen that? How can we expect our community to stand up against these lunatics? That's what they are: lunatics with evil intentions. How can we ask our people, whether they're in the city or they're in the regions, to stand up against these evil actors, as they're called, when our leaders won't?

Only last week, I was waiting to do an interview on 2GB with Mark Levy about the crime that's happening in regional and rural Australia. The police commissioner, Karen Webb, was being interviewed by Mark Levy, who's doing his best to call out this antisemitic behaviour across the country. He asked why these people weren't being locked up for chanting 'from the river to the sea'. That chant is part of Hamas's charter from 2017—from the river to the sea—and it talks about the ethnic cleansing of Jews and getting rid of Jews. That's from their charter; that's not me saying that. This is a listed terrorist organisation. Mark Levy said to the commissioner, 'Why can't you lock them up for saying this?' Her response was, 'In my view, it doesn't amount to breaching section 93Z of the Crimes Act in New South Wales. Section 93Z says:

93Z Offence of publicly threatening or inciting violence on grounds of race, religion, sexual orientation, gender identity or intersex or HIV/AIDS status

(1) A person who, by a public act, intentionally or recklessly threatens or incites violence towards another person or a group of persons on any of the following grounds is guilty of an offence—

(a) the race of the other person or one or more of the members of the group,

(b) that the other person has, or one or more of the members of the group have, a specific religious belief or affiliation …

'From the river to the sea' talks about the ethnic cleansing of Jews. How is that not a breach of section 93Z? The commissioner's response was: 'In my view, I don't see it as a breach.' Well, Commissioner, where is your advice from the Director of Public Prosecutions? You're not the judge, jury and executioner; you are the police commissioner. Go and get advice from the DPP. Or have you asked the court for a guideline judgment? They do it all the time. They make guideline judgments about drink driving; they make guideline judgments about all areas of law. It is not your call to say, 'I don't think it amounts to a breach.' It is up to the judiciary.

If any young police officer out there listens to this or sees this, I urge you: if you see antisemitic behaviour on the street, don't worry about what your commissioner says. Go and lock the offender up. Be brave. Have the courage of your convictions. Have the courage to be an Australian and act for all Australians. Take it to court. Make it a test case. Go to the High Court. Be a hero. Be a hero for the Australian people. Be a hero for the Jewish community because, if you don't, we know the commissioner won't. The commissioner won't stand up and enforce these laws. I've spoken to magistrates. I've spoken to judges and I've spoken to police. They are waiting for the imprimatur for those in charge to do something about this, but their hands are tied.

Commissioner, have some courage. Stand in front of your troops and say, 'We will not stand for this.' Mr Albanese, it's too late—and I think this bill is too late—but get on the front foot, election or not, and represent our Jewish communities, our Australian people. That's who they are. They are Australians, and anyone who propagates this evil violence or these evil words needs to be locked up for a very long time. If you're not a citizen, away you go. See you later. You're gone. You don't deserve the benefit of what Australia has. Do not bring your vile, evil ideology to our country and expect to get away with it, because you won't.

As a government, we need to be united. We know we won't get it from the Greens and some of the Independents because of their lunacy, but we need to be united as the coalition and Labor. We need to be strong, to show these people—show these vile creatures—who we are and how tough we can be and to get back to the country that Steve and Joe loved.

Zoe McKenzie (Flinders, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The Criminal Code Amendment (Hate Crimes) Bill 2024 amends the Criminal Code Act 1995 to strengthen existing offences for urging force or violence and the display of hate symbols and to introduce new offences for threatening force or violence against targeted groups and their members. The fault aspect for the existing offences of urging force or violence is also to be reduced from 'intent' to 'recklessness'. The bill also proposes to remove an existing good faith defence for offences of urging force or violence and for the proposed offences of threatening force or violence. The groups against whom it would be an offence to threaten force or violence would be distinguished by race, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, intersex status, disability, nationality, national or ethnic origin, or political opinion.

When this bill was introduced in September last year, the coalition offered to pass the bill with haste, but the government refused. Perhaps if it hadn't we would not have seen the horror we have seen over summer.

I am nevertheless relieved it is happening in this sitting fortnight, which is most likely the last sitting fortnight of the 47th Parliament. This is a serious piece of legislation which responds to abhorrent behaviours by evil actors—behaviours which we have seen growing in incidents in Australia since the atrocities of October 7. On that October 7, Hamas, a recognised terrorist organisation, attacked Israel. Two days later we saw the first instance of what, at least to me, seemed to be a fundamental breach of the Australian ethos of equality, acceptance and tolerance; our celebration of our diversity and our heritage; and our proud boast of being one of the best multicultural countries in the world.

The Sydney Opera House sails were lit up with blue and white in recognition of the atrocities Israel had just suffered. Yet there was a protest beneath those sails, and antisemitic chants were heard. There is debate about what occurred that night, but the images speak for themselves. Watching them, you see an anti-Israel mob setting off flares and chanting death wishes to Jewish Australians. That protest was advertised by the Palestine Action Group on that day, while the murder of Jewish people along the Gaza Strip was still ongoing and as the 251 hostages of Hamas began what has become for so many more than a year in captivity.

A day later, Sheikh Ibrahim Daoud addressed a large protest in Lakemba in Western Sydney, and he cried to the crowd:

I'm elated. It's a day of courage, it's a day of resistance, it's a day of pride, it's a day of victory.

That was the beginning. Since then there has been a more than 700 per cent increase in antisemitic attacks and antisemitic behaviour in this country.

As we in the coalition have raised elsewhere, time and time again, the Prime Minister stands condemned for failing to address these matters as and when they occur. He has been vastly outshone by the New South Wales Premier, whose forcefulness of word and belief demonstrates what could and should be done with a moral compass.

Shortly after the October 7 attacks, I travelled to Israel on what I think remains the only bipartisan trip to Israel since the atrocities of that day. The members for Macnamara and Higgins attended, along with the member for Fisher and Senators Birmingham and Fawcett. We went to Tel Aviv in Jerusalem as well as Sderot on the Gaza border, a town that, at the time, had a population of 3,000 down from 37,000 before the attacks. We visited the kibbutz Kfar Aza to see where the terror of October 7 and the days that followed had begun. We listened to soldiers, parliamentarians, local MPs, people who run civil services for residents, families of hostages and locals grieving their lost ones. We also met with the Palestinian Authority. I have never encountered so many shades of grief as I saw in that week.

There was an overarching desire for peace on all sides but a recognition that that cannot happen without the disablement of Hamas, a terrorist organisation that is roughly 70 kilometres from the towns of Tel Aviv and Jerusalem. It's extremely close; you can get there in less than a couple of hours. It's extremely present. It's a terrorist organisation, which, short and simple, will accept nothing less than the eradication of Israel and her people. It was that week while I was in Israel that we saw the Albanese government sending horrendous mixed messages regarding Israel's right to defend herself. While we were there, the Albanese government joined others at the UN General Assembly calling for a ceasefire, along with—almost as an afterthought—the immediate release of hostages.

I was with the member for Macnamara on the bus late at night, travelling from Jerusalem to Tel Aviv, I think. We had just missed rocket alerts and shelter commands in Jerusalem. Josh was on the bus; he took a call, and his face went grey. May I say it takes a lot to turn the member for Macnamara's face grey; he is one of the most jovial and optimistic blokes in this place—full of grace and often full of giggle. He doesn't do grey well. 'Are you okay, buddy?' I asked him. 'Hmm,' came the stony response. He put up a good front the next day. He did a fair swathe of media, and he was clear and compelling in his description of what we were seeing in Israel: 200,000 people displaced from their homes and the stories of 1,200 people slaughtered over that weekend of 7 and 8 October.

As I have said elsewhere, I commend the member for Macnamara's moral clarity and his constant voice for Jewish Australians. Together with the efforts of the member for Berowra, they have made this place and this country a better place, reminding us of our better selves, living in not just a tolerant but a safe and welcoming country for people of all faiths and backgrounds. But their grace has failed to stem the tide of antisemitic acts which have blighted our beautiful country over the last 15 months: the member for Macnamara's office was graffitied and burned in June 2024, putting at risk the lives and wellbeing of his staff and other residents of that building; the Adass Israel Synagogue was burned to the ground in December 2024; a car in Woollahra was set alight and anti-Israel graffiti littered the suburb in November 2024; the same again happened in Woollahra a month later; in January of this year, two more synagogues were vandalised with swastikas; a childcare centre was set alight, topped off with more graffiti; the former home of the co-chief executive officer of the Executive Council of Australian Jewry was vandalised with red paint; more cars and more graffiti; a school was vandalised with antisemitic graffiti; a caravan with explosives was discovered alongside an antisemitic note; earlier this week, eggs were thrown at women in Bondi in Sydney, with the Strike Force Pearl's commander treating the matter as an antisemitic attack owing to the women's clothes potentially identifying them as targets of that nature; and, in recent nights, a home in Middle Park in Melbourne has been defaced with antisemitic graffiti.

I thank the Executive Council for Australian Jewry for their work tracking and reporting anti-Jewish incidents in Australia in 2024. Their report—theECAJ Report on Anti-Jewish Incidents in Australia 2024—makes for harrowing reading. Reading it, you will see the incidents I listed above; they don't even scratch the surface of what has been happening in our country. The language used in some of the other incidents described in this report is deeply distressing, like a graffito of supposed 'Zionists': a caricature of a man with big ears, a big nose, horns and long, witch-like fingers. There have been physical assaults on Jewish Australians walking in a public park and going to a 7-Eleven, and there have been rocks thrown, spitting and Red Bull cans thrown out of cars at gatherers around a synagogue. It's endless, harrowing and compulsory reading. And while I'm grateful for organisations like the Executive Council of Australian Jewry and the Australia/Israel and Jewish Affairs Council, who have worked for decades to build awareness of Israel in this place and on collaboration and affection between our two countries, I do not necessarily need these reports to know something terrible is happening in this country.

In my own electorate of Flinders on 12 November 2023—the day after Remembrance Day—a statue of a World War I soldier which had been carved into a tree stump was vandalised with a swastika. The RSL cleaned it up, cut it down and put the statue behind the walls of the RSL garden where it would be safe. In November 2024 swastikas were spray-painted across the main road of the Flinders township and upon the I Am sculpture which sits beautifully in the centre of town. At various points, swastikas have been painted on the roads or on our 'welcome to township' signs. I was even told recently on a visit to the Rosebud Country Club that someone had carved swastikas into the sand bunkers. It's bizarre and it's sick.

But beyond the evidence of the electorate is the evidence of my friends.

A division having been called in the House of Representatives—

Sitting suspended from 12:33 to 12:53

Beyond the evidence of antisemitism in my electorate is the evidence of my friends. One of my dearest friends lives in Dover Heights, down the road from the attack on the former home of Jewish leader Alex Ryvchin. If you need reminding, on 17 January emergency services were called to Dover Heights when four cars were damaged and one was graffitied with the words 'F*** Israel', and another vehicle with 'F*** Jews', which was also set alight. At the time, out of concern for my friend, I suggested she come and stay with me for a few days, maybe with some sun on the Mornington Peninsula, to get away from it all. Her response was ferocious:

Thanks Z. But what I really need is some law enforcement to create a deterrent. The fact that this happened the day after a ceasefire agreement was announced shows this has little to do with the Middle East and is anti-semitism pure and simple. I am not hiding. I am angry.

After the attacks in Kingsford last weekend I checked in with her again, and she replied:

My family member goes to school there and is already terrified. Last night another family member called in a panic to check we were ok, as she saw a whole lot of police and ambulances heading in the direction of Dover Heights.

At other times she has told me of sleepless nights punctured by the sounds of helicopters overhead. This is Australia. This night terror has no place here.

The Prime Minister has chopped and changed his language about the stark antisemitism we have been seeing over the last 15 months, and last week we had an astonishing statement by the Treasurer in response to the discovery of a caravan laden with explosives alongside a list of addresses of Jewish organisations, businesses and homes. On the Today show last week the Treasurer said:

What it shows is that the fears that a lot of Australians in the Jewish community have are not always unfounded.

Not always unfounded! I know he apologised afterwards—and what a relief that he did—but it hints to you the mistrust this government has towards Australia's Jewish community and the belittling of its well-founded fear of violence.

This bill is unfortunately necessary because of the mixed messages from this government, which has allowed hate free rein. But it's not just the provisions of the bill which matter; it's the use of them, as my friend so rightly pointed out. Antisemitic displays must be prosecuted and antisemitic protests must be stopped. Existing laws have not been used. Protests in our street in which antisemitic displays have been paraded have dragged on for months. Universities have set up antisemitic camps. While this bill will mitigate some of the government's failures, we can only hope the provisions will be used. Existing provisions of the Criminal Code have not been used—like division 80, which makes it an offence to urge violence against individuals or groups on the basis of race, religion and the like.

The coalition has been calling for action for months. The Executive Council of Australian Jewry has been calling for action for months. The Australia Israel and Jewish Affairs Council has been calling for action for months. Jewish places of worship and scholarship, Jewish businesses and Jewish schools have been calling for action for months. Jewish families, their friends and my friend have been calling for action for months. This week we have spent some time in contemplation of the antisemitic blight brought upon this beautiful country. Maybe now action will follow.

Sitting suspended from 12:57 to 1 5:5 9

Scott Buchholz (Wright, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

BUCHHOLZ () (): It's a sad day when we have a bill such as the Criminal Code Amendment (Hate Crimes) Bill 2024 being debated in the parliament. I will start off with a comment that speaks to this bill. It's about the hate crimes and antisemitic behaviour we're seeing in Australia at the moment, and, predominantly, our lack of leadership in addressing these hate crimes. This has been going on for years, as Martin Niemoller first penned when he said:

First they came for the socialists, and I did not speak out—because I was not a socialist.

Then they came for the trade unionists, and I did not speak out—because I was not a trade unionist.

Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out—because I was not a Jew.

Then they came for me—and there was no one left to speak for me.

Those were controversial comments at the time. That quotation expresses Niemoller's belief that Germans had been complicit, through their silence, in the Nazi imprisonment, prosecution and murder of millions of people, including Jews. We need to change the behaviour which is sneaking into the Australian psyche and landscape.

I have been the beneficiary of a bipartisan visit to Israel and Palestine to see things firsthand, and what I witnessed was quite extraordinary—the vehement hatred that exists from one culture to the next, the generational bile that exists. It's indoctrinated into children. When in Palestine, I saw memorials similar to our Anzac memorials, where we honour and remember those fallen servicemen and women, in pretty much every regional town in Australia. They have similar memorials, but the names that are remembered are of children or people who have strapped on a suicide vest with the sole intent of killing as many Jews as possible. It's called 'pay for slay'—the more people you kill, the greater the stipend your family is given. Those funds are generated through the United Nations. The storybooks in the schools in some of the Palestinian communities depict Walt Disney characters like Mickey Mouse with suicide vests on, as though this is the pathway for these children.

The majority of the places we visited in Palestine seemed to be more welfare reliant—more reliant on handouts. The best-paying jobs were those in the construction sector beyond the wall, in Israel in the building sector. Those who did work were paid well; it was unskilled labour but they were paid well, I'm led to believe, and the jobs were well sought after.

I had the opportunity to catch up with the Palestinian Prime Minister. I said, 'I don't know why, and I don't pretend to know why, the hate exists and the many years that it's existed for, and I don't pretend to have an answer for you. We're only a small country in Australia, and it'd just be really handy for us if you guys stopped bombing each other for about six months because we're trying to help another country who's in a spot of bother'—and that was Ukraine. He put his hand on my hand and said, 'You speak the truth.'

It was a confronting visit and it was one that allows me to make a contribution today because, once you see the impacts and once you live for a number of weeks with the Israeli community who go to sleep every night under a dome to counter the regular bomb attacks—when they go to sleep each night knowing that 32 per cent of Israel's GDP is going to that offence budget—you see that it's another world that we take for granted.

When you see the antisemitic attacks that we're seeing now across the country that came with the October 7 terrorist attacks on Israel by Hamas, I think there can be no equivocation or denial that the October 7 attacks were the single greatest loss of Jewish lives on any day since the Holocaust. October 7 was a day of brutal murder, torture, kidnapping and sexual violence perpetrated by Hamas against Jews in Israel. The attacks were deliberate, cruel and barbaric. We don't need to repeat the heinous acts in this chamber, but there's no doubt that they were designed with the purpose of maximising pain and sorrow amongst the Jewish community.

I would've thought that the Jewish community had probably suffered enough. Last year, I was in France when the Rugby World Cup was on and I took the opportunity with my wife to swing past Germany. We went to Dachau, one of the detention camps, and it gets real as soon as you walk into those buildings and you see the furnaces, the conditions and the museum. You see the way that humans treated other humans and you feel physically ill. As legislators, we should be doing everything in our power to make sure those same mistakes are never repeated and that we stop them when we see them in our universities and in our streets. Hopefully, this bill goes some way to stopping them.

Our speaking points talk about the role of our prime minister, and Australians looked to the Prime Minister to set the tone for the national response to that crisis. He could've made it clear through his actions from the very beginning that those who sought to spread antisemitic attacks would feel the full force of the law, but it wasn't the case. He should've been clear from the very beginning about the scale of the horror inflicted by Hamas and that Australia stands with its long-term friend and ally Israel, a democratically elected government in the Middle East. He should've used our laws and the police forces to clamp down on those who sought to weaponise the Hamas attacks for their own hateful purposes here at home. The Prime Minister failed the test of leadership, and he has failed the Jewish community.

I don't know which emotion I felt when I saw the protests at the universities and on campuses around Australia. There was the presumption that these students, who had the right to protest, had some academic context or some knowledge and historical context because they were on university campuses. But the emotion that I was left with was that, when they were asked by journalists while they were chanting the Hamas-indoctrinated 'river to the sea' chant, the bulk of them could not tell the journalists which river or which sea and had no depth or sense of the cruelty and the absolute annihilation that that chant speaks to. Then they gave megaphones to Australian children with no concept or sense of the impact that it would have across the country. And then, as if that wasn't enough, these people who protested came after our veterans in the way that they vandalised war memorials across the country, particularly here. There was one in Canberra where they splashed paint all over it. That's an absolutely appalling, abhorrent reflection on the honourable servicemen and women who left their families, went overseas and put their lives on the line. Some never returned, and you've got a group of people here in Australia, that live under the freedom that those very men and women provided them, denigrating their contributions to this country by vandalising memorials.

I fear what this country's future is with a lack of leadership. There have been consequences for the inaction under the PM's watch. The consequences of this government's indifference to domestic antisemitism has been stark. There have been months of protests in our capital cities and the occupations of our universities. We've seen doxxing of Jewish businesses and the harassment of Jewish students and academics. Buildings have been vandalised, homes defaced and cars torched. We saw the attempted arsons of synagogues in Sydney and the burning of a daycare centre in Maroubra. We saw the terrorist firebombing of the Adass Israel synagogue in Melbourne. We have seen now, extraordinarily, a caravan packed with explosives apparently targeting Jewish addresses, and have a Prime Minister who, as a result of question time today, was in the dark that any of this was happening—completely oblivious. It was an extraordinary failure by a weak Prime Minister as he stood by and allowed the strain of antisemitism to spread. It's making our nation's character poorer. It's an indictment on the leadership. I'm sorry that this bill is before the House, and I'm sorry that we're not joined in condemning this behaviour by those who sit on the other side of the chamber.

Colin Boyce (Flynn, Liberal National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise to speak on the Criminal Code Amendment (Hate Crimes) Bill 2024. It is beyond disappointing that the rise of antisemitism in this country has gotten to a point where we have to introduce legislation to counter it. This is a bill that is, sadly, necessary because of the repeated failures of the Albanese Labor government to prevent this sadly predictable spread of antisemitism. This all stems from weak leadership from the Prime Minister and by the Labor government in general. Attacks on Jewish Australians are attacks on every Australian. Today, it's the Jews, but who's next? Will it be the Hindus, or the Christians, or the Muslims, or the atheists? Attacking people because of their Jewish faith and ancestry is un-Australian. We are a country that prides itself on treating people equally, whatever their faith or their background is. It is a core national value, and antisemitism is a direct rejection of that value.

Jewish businesses, homes, cars and synagogues have all been targeted in attempts to spread antisemitism in Australia since the 7 October attacks in Israel. These are not the only places that have been targeted. Pro-Palestinian slogans and vandalism have covered war memorials all over the country, including Anzac Parade, just down the road from Parliament House here in Canberra. The Australian National Korean War Memorial, the Australian Vietnam Forces National Memorial and the Australian Army National Memorial were graffitied with pro-Palestine messages in June last year. One message of vandalism said, 'Blood on your hands, Anthony, Peter, Penny.' The Returned Services League of Australia, the RSL, condemned the vandalism, with national president Greg Melick describing the damage as 'deplorable'. Those war memorials honour those who have sacrificed to protect and preserve all the freedoms that all Australians enjoy. The dabbing of protest slogans is 'nothing short of despicable', he said. It is dishonourable in the extreme to use war memorials as a platform for a protest. I completely agree with Greg, and I believe that hate speech laws should include the vandalism of war memorials. I believe that, for men and women who have sacrificed their lives in the defence of freedom for this nation, the least we can do is honour their legacy and the contribution to this nation they all made.

As many would be aware, the initial spark of the antisemitic attacks we are now seeing across the country came with the 7 October terrorist attacks on Israel by the terrorist group Hamas. There can be no equivocation or denial of this. The 7 October attacks saw the single greatest loss of Jewish lives on any day since the Holocaust in the Second World War; 7 October was a day of murder, torture, kidnapping and brutal sexual violence perpetrated by Hamas against Jews in Israel. The attack was deliberately cruel and barbaric. We don't need to repeat these heinous acts in this chamber, but there is no doubt they were designed for the purpose of maximising pain and sorrow amongst Jewish people. It is both desperately sad and utterly predictable that, on learning of these horrific attacks on Jewish people in their own homeland, malicious actors here in Australia would draw inspiration from this. These bad actors here in Australia rejoiced in a day that was marked by the murder, torture, sexual assault and kidnapping of innocent people in Israel. And this is not exaggerated. In the words of one hate preacher, 7 October was 'a day of courage, a day of pride' and 'a day of victory'. And this is shameful. It was obvious that they would see those attacks as giving license to spread the same vile antisemitic hate here, targeting Jewish Australians and seeking to spread fear. They have used our streets and our university campuses to call for the destruction of the Jewish state and spread old antisemitic tropes. Often they are hiding behind weak academic pretence that somehow what they were doing was anti-Israel, not antisemitic. Preventing this should have been the government's focus, and this is where they have failed.

Now let's look at the difference in leadership between the Prime Minister, Mr Albanese, and the leader of the coalition, Peter Dutton, on antisemitism and terrorism. Australians look at the Prime Minister to set the tone of national response to a crisis, and he could have and should have made clear through his actions from the very beginning that those who sought to spread antisemitic attacks would feel the full force of the law. He could have and should have been clear right from the very beginning about the scale of the horror inflicted by Hamas and that Australia stands with its long-term friend and ally, Israel. He could and should have used our laws and our police forces to clamp down on those who sought to weaponise the Hamas attacks for their own hateful purposes here in Australia. Instead of decisive action, we saw a false equivalence from the Prime Minister and from the Australian Labor Party. For months we had Labor ministers who couldn't acknowledge domestic antisemitism without mentioning Islamophobia, as if one would offset the other. This was at a time when we had a nationally unprecedented rise in antisemitism. We had angry mobs standing outside the Opera House chanting, 'Death to the Jews.' We saw Jewish shops being vandalised, Jewish students being harassed and gangs roaming in places like Caulfield, hunting for Jews. The Prime Minister could only talk about antisemitism and Islamophobia together, almost as if acknowledging antisemitism here at home would somehow diminish the experience of Australian Muslims. Acknowledging Jewish Australians experiences of antisemitism does not diminish the experiences of Muslims here in Australia. Neither antisemitism nor Islamophobia has a place in our country and both should be condemned.

At the same time we are responding to an unprecedented wave of antisemitism in our country. However, when we are seeing armed guards outside Jewish schools, it is appropriate to focus on antisemitism. The Prime Minister did not do that, and his failure to do so was an indication that he did not take the threat of antisemitism seriously. It was a green light for those in Australia who wanted to take things further. We also saw the rolling failure to take decisive action here at home. Antisemitic displays were not prosecuted. Antisemitic protests were not stopped and so antisemitic sentiment was allowed to fester.

There are existing criminal laws, like division 80 of the Criminal Code, that are meant to deal with things like urging of violence against groups defined by race or religion. These laws were not used. Protests in our streets in which antisemitic displays abounded were permitted to drag on for months and months. Universities were permitted to be used as encampments that served as a hot-bed for antisemitic action. Our human rights institutions were not given focus or direction, nor called to account when they abandoned the Jewish community. The Prime Minister's response was drowsy and disinterested. Through his actions he sent a very clear message that despite what he might say, there would be no real consequences for those who target and attack Jewish Australians. This was the second green light for antisemites.

Let's now look at the leader of the coalition, Peter Dutton, and how he has made announcements to combat antisemitism. The list includes taking a national leadership role expected of the Commonwealth government, including convening a national cabinet to combat antisemitism and extremism. He will strengthen the sentencing regime for terrorism by legislating for a mandatory minimum term of six years imprisonment for all acts of terrorism under Commonwealth law. He want to amend draft laws currently before the parliament to make it a hate crime to urge or threaten violence towards a place of worship, punishable by imprisonment for five to seven years, in the case of an aggravated offence. He would introduce mandatory minimum sentences of 12 months imprisonment for the display of prohibited antisemitic terrorist organisation symbols and related behaviour in public and increase the maximum penalty to five years in prison. He'd create a new dedicated antisemitic taskforce led by the Australian Federal Police and incorporating the Australian Security Intelligence Organisation, the Australian Criminal Intelligence Commission and the Australian Transaction Reports and Analyst Centre, the Australian Border Force and the state police. He wants to issue a new ministerial direction to the AFP to direct them to prioritise and address antisemitism, including any unsolved crimes against the Jewish community such as doxxing, public display of terrorist symbols, incitement, harassment and other offences. He would direct the antisemitism taskforce to refer any visa holders involved in acts of antisemitism for immediate cancellation and deportation. If necessary, he would amend section 501's character provisions of the Migration Act to ensure this antisemitic conduct is captured by the law and applies retrospectively for all acts of hatred towards the Jewish community since 7 October 2023 and the terrorist acts against Israel. He will also deliver $32.5 million in security funding packages requested by the Executive Council of Australian Jewry without any strings attached, including funding armed guards at schools and synagogues. Unlike the Albanese government, which has restricted funding to armed guards only, Mr Dutton would commit $8.5 million to see a centre of Jewish life and tolerance become a reality and provide $7.5 million over three years in additional funding to Crime Stoppers to enable this. This is what leadership looks like. Peter Dutton and the coalition are committed to stamping out antisemitism, and that's what we intend to do should we become the government at the next federal election.

Rowan Ramsey (Grey, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Who would have thought that here in post World War II Australia—where the Jews came, following the Holocaust and the extermination of six million Jews in Hitler's death camps, a well educated and by those days a modern and Christian nation—we would now see at least the beginnings of that behaviour in Australia. Australia had provided a safe haven for 70-plus years since that time, and now those sentiments of early 1930s Germany seem to have taken root here. It is the thin veneer of civilisation.

I reflect that perhaps the right history isn't being taught to our children at school. But then, when I think about it, I don't think the history of the Holocaust was taught to me at school, either. I was an avid reader as a young man—novels, whatever—and many of the novels of the time were based in the roots of World War II, so we accumulated knowledge about what those death camps were like. I think that's missing from modern culture at the moment. Perhaps this nation needs to turn itself to making sure that our young people know what occurred at that time, and why they should always be on their guard against it. I did wonder, through those years, what was so different to our civilisation compared to that of Germany's—just given a different time and a different place. Don't think for one moment that the terrible outcomes of the Holocaust started at that level. It started at a local level with people taking action against local Jews. It was on a low scale, and then it just grew and became a monster.

It seems that we have now imported the enmities from another hemisphere, but it needs to stop and it needs to stop now. Perhaps there has been an undercurrent of antisemitism in Australia for some time but, prior to 7 October 2023, it was well suppressed. Yet within two days—well before Israel had responded—we saw people demonstrating on the steps of the Opera House, some chanting 'Where are the Jews?', others chanting, 'Gas the Jews'. 'Where are the Jews?' seems like a pretty nonsensical thing to say. But for such a thing to form so quickly and be so ugly, whatever they were chanting, you can be sure it was not complimentary. It is the seed. It's more than the seed; it's the beginnings of rabid antisemitism, and it needs to be stamped out.

Since then, every week we have had demonstrations in the streets and on university campuses. Universities have been an absolute disgrace through this period, seemingly totally incapable of standing up to the hate being preached on their campuses. We've seen security at Jewish schools and members' offices being attacked. This is a democracy—that is simply not permissible. We've seen Jewish property being defaced, Jewish businesses being attacked and the firebombing of a synagogue—what could be a bigger afront to the Jewish community? Then there was the caravan packed with explosives that we still don't know enough about. It's hard not to make those links to 1930s Germany.

This should have been jumped on from week one, and my colleagues have stated the case. We should have had a far stronger reaction to this in Australia in terms of leadership. As the Prime Minister has pointed out, the legal system is taking action against those people who've been perpetrating these views, but we've seen precious little for it. Whether or not the Criminal Code Amendment (Hate Crimes) Bill is appropriate and whether or not it is the courts that are refusing to actually reach out and reach the kinds of penalties that I think the good people in the street are expecting, I'm not so sure, but that's what is behind the coalition's push to put in mandatory sentencing for acts of terrorism which are characterised under these things.

So, where are the consequences? Last week, I put out an e-newsletter, and one of the things I talked about in the e-newsletter was antisemitism in Australia at the moment. I had a response from woman that was very polite and to the point. She challenged my views on Palestine, and I cannot find myself talking about the subject and these new hate laws without actually making the link between antisemitism and what has been happening with those supporters of Palestine and what's been happening with the Gaza Strip. This is what I responded. I don't normally read my speeches, but I'm sure you'll forgive me for actually going through this letter that sets out what I think:

Bob Hawke is remembered as the one who said "If the bell tolls for Israel, it tolls for all mankind.

I don't profess to be a qualified historian, but generally my reading has led me to conclude the history of Judah and Israel long pre-dates the advent of Islam. For millennia pre-dating Mohammad, Jews, predominated in the area and were dispersed around the world through the later days of the Roman Empire and by local attacks through the middle-ages. In their place Arab tribes became the predominate culture even though a significant Jewish population remained.

The world was collectively horrified by the unbelievable murder of six million Jews under Hitler in WW2 and its aftermath decided to partition British administered Palestine (a consequence of WW1) into two independent states, one Jewish, one Arab. Israel proclaimed its independence under this authority and was immediately attacked by its Arab neighbours and in response expanded its land base to develop buffers.

Other wars have followed, and Israel has always prevailed. I make the point; as long as its neighbours (Hamas, Hezbollah, Iran, Syria)—

let's hope things have changed in Syria—

deny its right to exist, the first war Israel loses will be its last.

More wars and interactions have followed, and Israel had taken to developing Jewish settlements in Gaza. In 2005, under a negotiated settlement they completely withdrew and handed control to Fatah. It was all to no avail! Fatah was subsequently defeated by Hamas in an election, a civil war broke out which resulted in Hamas becoming the governing force in Gaza. There has not been an election since!

There hasn't been an election in 20 years.

Hamas totally denies Israel's right to exist and over the next 16 years built a military machine designed to eliminate Israel.

On Oct 7th 2023, Hamas launched a surprise attack on Israel, not on the military establishment, but specifically targeting defenceless civilians at a music festival. Hamas soldiers butchered 1200 civilians including children, they committed despicable crimes of torture, rape and abuse, they then abducted a further 240 defenceless civilians and took them hostage. This was an inhuman act, and they should not have been surprised at Israel's response. What would we expect our government to do if we were attacked in a similar manner?

It is my opinion Hamas wanted a strong response from Israel holding the view they could escalate their action into a wider regional war against Israel. They hold their own people in contempt by hiding their military and its firepower within civilian infrastructure like schools and hospitals. If the completely one-sided votes supported by the Australian government in the UN, calling for an immediate cease-fire and conditional release of hostages and with no guarantees for Israel had been observed, as they called for, Israel would not have incapacitated Hezbollah over the northern border in Lebanon.

Perhaps this time it will allow the Lebanese to take control of their country, not Iran. That would be an excellent outcome and we should all applaud.

During the conflict Iran attacked Israel with 3000 missiles in a day. Israel's response was largely to destroy Iran's air force—that can only be a good thing. Along with the depleting of Hamas these three events led to Iran's inability to protect the murderous Assad regime in Syria and again there, we can only hope his removal will allow for a proper and compassionate government to form, one that does not use chemical and biological weapons against its own people. Once again, we should all applaud.

None of this would have been possible if the Albanese Government had its way in the UN.

And, I add, if we had had an immediate ceasefire with no conditions in favour of Israel. It was a disgraceful position for the government to take.

These changes put forward in this legislation are a step in the right direction. They lower the threshold for criminality. They remove the defence of acting in good faith. They introduce threatening behaviour as an offence. This bill was introduced in September. We are now in February. We have had numerous demonstrations and numerous acts against the Jewish community in that time. What have the government been waiting for? They introduced this legislation in September and knew we would support it, yet here we are debating it in this Chamber five months later.

What counts at the end of the day is that we not only make the changes but also require our courts to give appropriate sentencing. At this stage, I'm not aware of a court in Australia giving the kind of penalty for the behaviour we have seen—I'm not aware of any outcome that would meet my threshold. That's why it's important that we move to mandatory sentencing in this area, because it seems that the judiciary are not up to the fight—or they don't realise the gravity of what is happening here, don't think what is happening in Australia today is so different to what was happening in 1932 and 1933 in Germany or don't think that that thin veneer of civilisation can be stripped away from the most urbane of us. If it could happen there, it can virtually happen anywhere. We need to be on our guard right from the first step and stamp out that kind of behaviour. The legislation is good, although it doesn't go far enough, and, of course, I will support it.

Adam Bandt (Melbourne, Australian Greens) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The Greens support this legislation, the Criminal Code Amendment (Hate Crimes) Bill 2024. It will mean that a number of people in our community who in many instances are currently, tragically, targeted by violence will gain some extra protections. People in the LGBTQIA+ community, disabled people and many others who are the subject of violence and threats of violence far too often will now be better protected under this legislation and new offences will be put in place. The expanded list of protected attributes is welcome recognition and a strengthening of our laws to protect these communities. The addition of disability as a protected attribute is long overdue and a much-needed step to combating the ableism and discrimination experienced by disabled people, and, in too many instances, tragically, as the disability royal commission exposed, violence.

Criminal law alone will not stop hate. Indeed, many experts tell us—and the Greens agree—that if that is all you do, and if you simply do things like attack the rule of law and introduce minimum mandatory sentencing, as the coalition wants to do, you don't make society safer. What we do need is a national human rights act that extends these protections, and we also need the government to urgently fully fund the implementation of the National Anti-Racism Framework to tackle all forms of racism and to invest in responses to hate that are grassroots and community led.

We have seen—not just in recent times but going back over many years, including into the previous government—the rise of white supremacists and the far right in this country, Neo-Nazis, and disturbingly that has been happening for a number of years. We are now seeing antisemitic attacks in Australia, which are to be condemned. We also know that over many years there has been widespread, and continues to be widespread, Islamophobia in our country, including leading up to the attacks. Racism and violence have no place in our country. They have no place in our country, and we as politicians need to call out that hatred and racism and do what we can to stop it.

Indeed, as I mentioned before, going back a few years, I remember during the pandemic we saw Neo-Nazis marching and gathering in the Grampians in Victoria, seeking to feed off and encourage fear in our society. It was something that we called out at the time. There was a parliamentary inquiry, and, sadly, that parliamentary inquiry in Victoria found that there had been a rise in right-wing extremism and, indeed, that it was something that ASIO and our security agencies had been warning previous governments to take seriously for some time. We do need to work out how we can get to the root of hate in our society and stop the rise of these elements that aren't just simply about promoting fear online and in words but, in many instances, threatening violence or tragically committing violence.

When you are extending criminal law, you must always be careful that you get it right because, when you try and legislate criminal law in haste, there is room for error and unintended consequences. We believe the bill as it stands at the moment has got the balance right, and it's been through an extensive and exhaustive Senate inquiry process. There have been people who have looked at it from the perspective of both ensuring that it doesn't attack the rule of law but also ensuring that it targets that hate that we all want to target, so the Greens support this bill as it's presented here in the House.

I watch with some concern the opposition, especially as we head towards an election, use every opportunity they can to seek to divide and whip up fear. As they have done for many, many years, the opposition are out there with their attack on judges and the judiciary, calling for mandatory minimum sentencing and to take away the power of judges and the power of the judiciary that is long established in our rule of law and in the separation of powers. The coalition seems to believe that the parliament is in a better position than judges to hear and decide cases. The separation of powers is there for a very real reason, and it's about understanding and respecting the independence of the judiciary and saying to the judiciary, 'Together with juries, your job is to find out whether someone is guilty and then to work out, in those instances, what is the best kind of sentencing to apply.' The coalition attacks the rule of law. They do it regularly. They always do it. I've been in this place long enough now to know the coalition tries to gain votes by punching down all the time. That is what they do. They punch down, they seek to whip up fear, they seek to divide and they seek to attack the rule of law time and time again. That makes society less safe.

I hope that, with the Greens' support, together with, as I understand it, the support of other members of the crossbench, this bill could pass as is. Perhaps it could have some other minor amendments to fine-tune it, but the bill could essentially pass as is. I urge the government, especially as we head towards an election, not to go and work with the coalition to alter the balance of this bill but to stick with this bill that has got the balance right and to pass it because there are the numbers there in parliament to pass it.

I also urge the government to look seriously at having a human rights act in this country and to look at the national antiracism framework. The government was provided with a very good and clear blueprint for how we can combat racism in this country in all its forms. It's got the backing of the commission and it sets out in a lot of detail what it would take to actually start to get to the root of some of this to try to stop this kind of hate—stop the antisemitism and stop the Islamophobia—at its source. It's about what we need to do to get to the bottom of that. The framework, in many respects, and the report that led to it pull no punches. They talk about the injustices that exist in this country, and the violence and the dispossession, and they say, 'Here's what needs to be done to address it.' We haven't yet heard a full response from the government or a commitment to fully implementing that framework. Together with legislation like this, that has to be part of tackling hate in this country. I urge the government to seize this opportunity—not to go and do what the Leader of the Opposition wants to do, which will ultimately make us less safe and not tackle the root causes, but instead to pass this bill basically as is and to then commit to fully funding and implementing the framework.

I'll end where I started: the Greens support this bill and the protections that it gives to those who have been the target of hate crimes and acts of violence. There is no room for violence in our society. Over the last few days and weeks I've been reading the accounts of young men, for example, who get an invitation to go and meet what they think is another man only to be lured into a situation where a number of people descend on them and beat them. For many in our community and for many in the LGBTIQ+ community, that has echoes of violence that has been received in the past, and it's something they had hoped might have been prominent decades ago but was on the decline. There are now many who are feeling fearful about acts and threats of violence. It's not just amongst the queer community, of course; it's amongst First Nations communities as well. We've heard reports from members of the Jewish communities about feeling the fears of threat and violence. We hear from members of the Islamic communities as well. We hear it from members of many communities, but everyone should have the right to feel safe in our society.

Parliament should come together and pass this legislation. We should not have amendments on the run that could potentially have unintended consequences that haven't been through the Senate inquiry process, like substantial amendments that talk about expanding, for example, the scope to include minimum mandatory sentencing. I hope the government sticks to what is said to be Labor Party policy, which is to oppose minimum mandatory sentencing. We've seen them walk away from that once before in this parliament. I hope they don't do it this time. We should pass this legislation essentially as is and then commit ourselves to coming together as a parliament to stamp out all forms of racism through a fully funded and implemented antiracism strategy, as has been recommended to the government.

Jason Wood (La Trobe, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Community Safety, Migrant Services and Multicultural Affairs) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

First of all, I must take up the Greens leader and member for Melbourne when it comes to some of his colleagues who've been really revving up the crowds and going to violent protests in Melbourne, which, sadly, have been very much against the Jewish community. They are now basically calling for peace and harmony when the Greens leader himself and his Greens colleagues voted so many times against motions supporting the Jewish people in Australia and condemning Hamas. All of a sudden—I think because of election results in Queensland and also some council results—the Greens have realised, 'We might just want to get out there and support the Jewish community a tiny bit.'

The Criminal Code Amendment (Hate Crimes) Bill 2024 is necessary because of repeated failures of the Albanese government—in particular when it comes to the Prime Minister. Rather than stamping out antisemitism right from the start and really showing strong leadership in calling it out, especially when it started at the Opera House in New South Wales—sadly, that hasn't taken place. We're a country that prides itself on treating people equally regardless of faith or background, which is so important. It's a core national value. Antisemitism is a direct rejection of that value and of being Australian.

Hamas is a Palestinian armed group and political movement in the Gaza Strip. We should never forget—and again, I didn't hear the Greens leader say this—why this awful situation has happened. It goes back to 7 October 2023, when Israel was attacked, with Hamas killing around 1,200 people and taking over 250 hostages, of which we're now seeing some of the remainder being released. The 7 October attacks are the single greatest loss of Jewish lives on any day since the Holocaust. Jewish businesses, homes, cars and synagogues in Australia have been targeted, and the spread of antisemitism in Australia after 7 October has just been relentless, especially in recent months. It started with those demonstrations. Can I say not everyone's attending those demonstrations for violent means, but sadly they attracted a number of people who were motivated in that way.

Obviously, when we've got these violent protests and we have Greens members of parliament attending those—why on earth would you go to a violent demonstration in Melbourne with this awful behaviour? It goes back, again, to Prime Minister Albanese, the leader of the Labor Party. He didn't take decisive action right from the start. He didn't condemn the antisemitic attacks and ensure that offenders faced legal consequences for saying the most awful things about the Jewish community just days after the awful terrorist attack, and we'll call it that, in Israel. There are laws in Australia that he could have directed the AFP and law enforcement agencies to use. The Prime Minister has failed to acknowledge how serious the situation was. He could have used existing laws under division 80 of the Criminal Code against urging violence against groups defined by race or religion, but they weren't used.

As I mentioned, two days after this awful attack in Israel, on 9 October, there was a pro-Palestinian protest march from the Sydney Town Hall to the Sydney Opera House. This is where the awful chanting against the Jews happened. I obviously won't repeat what was said. Basically, as Israeli Australians were mourning, they were getting racially abused in our streets outside our famous Sydney Opera House. It then went on to universities, where we had protestors take over campuses. In May 2024, students staged protests at Deakin University, Monash University and the University of Melbourne calling for universities to cut ties with companies linked to Israel, and they sat there. Can I just say, I spoke to a number of Muslim students who were very much intimidated themselves because they felt that the university protests had been infiltrated by others with the view of spreading hatred against the Jewish community.

The following are some of the antisemitic attacks in Sydney and Melbourne since October 2024. On 25 May 2024, Mount Scopus Memorial College in Melbourne, Australia's largest Jewish school, was graffitied. On 13 October, there was antisemitic graffiti on a Jewish bakery in Sydney, with a note left for the owners reading, 'Be careful.' On 21 November, cars were torched—and this is where the violence really started to happen—and buildings were vandalised in Sydney's east, an area with a large Jewish population. On 6 December, Adass Israel Synagogue was firebombed in Melbourne. This was obviously a terrorist attack. This has now got to the stage of causing mass fear in the Jewish community, where they're targeting their faith and going right after them.

On 5 January 2025, a man was charged for allegedly threatening worshippers near the Chabad North Shore synagogue in northern Sydney. We've just had this roll-on of awful attacks against the Jewish people. On 10 January, Allawah synagogue in Sydney's south-west was graffitied with the Nazi hakenkreuz symbol. On 11 January, there was the graffitiing and attempted arson of Newtown Synagogue in Sydney's west. On 11 January, cars were vandalised and graffitied in Sydney. On 16 January, a federal taskforce made its first arrest, charging a man for allegedly making death threats and vandalism. On 17 January, cars were torched and a building formerly owned by a Jewish community leader was vandalised. I'm a former police officer, and it is clear that these attacks are rolling on every couple of days now.

The big one was on 19 January 2025. A caravan containing explosives was found in Dural, Sydney. Questions were raised to the Prime Minister about whether he was briefed by ASIO and law enforcement and on what day, or whether he did not want to know about it. This is an exceptionally serious matter which could have ended up as Australia's worst terrorist attack. On 21 January, a childcare centre was set alight and graffitied in Sydney's west. On 29 January, a home next to Mount Sinai College in Maroubra, Sydney, was sprayed with antisemitic graffiti. These incidents have caused significant concern and distress for all of our Jewish community. Can I say again, the Prime Minister should have been very strong on this right from very the start, instead of trying to walk on two sides of the road at the same time.

The one point I want to make is that the Nazi symbol targeting the Jewish community has been misconceived as the swastika. As the shadow minister for multicultural affairs, I want to point out that the swastika is actually an ancient and sacred symbol of peace and good fortune for Buddhist, Hindu, Jain and other faith communities. The Nazi symbol targeting the Jewish community is the Nazi symbol of hatred, the hakenkreuz. We have to be very clear about that. The hakenkreuz is a symbol of the Nazi Party, which committed, as we know, the most heinous crimes against humanity, particularly against the Jewish people. Using this hate symbol to intimidate and spread messages of antisemitism and intolerance towards a community in Australia is totally unacceptable and must be prosecuted.

This bill is intended to help mitigate some of the government's failures. We have existing offences in division 80 of the Criminal Code that should have been used to stop the spark of antisemitism. Existing offences in division 80 of the Criminal Code make it an offence to urge violence against an individual or group on the basis of race, religion and the like. They make it an offence to advocate terrorism or genocide. For months, the coalition has been calling for these laws to be used, especially the opposition leader, who has been so strong in his support of the Jewish community. We, on this side, have been saying that the existing offences should be tested and those preaching antisemitism should be taken before the courts. Let the courts decide it, and, if there is an issue with the legislation, we can change or amend the legislation in parliament.

We welcome the belated changes. These changes seek to lower the threshold for criminality for those who urge violence against individuals or groups. Instead of proving that a person 'intended' for violence occur, police now only need to prove that the person was 'reckless'. Can I just say, as a former police officer, that words are key when you have 'must' and 'shall' and 'could'. It is a much higher threshold for the police to prove that the person actually intended for the violence to occur. Now it will be 'reckless'—whether they knew their actions could lead to violence—which obviously makes it a lot easier for police to prosecute. These laws, as currently drafted, remove the good faith defence for those urging violence. This too is a welcome move because you cannot urge someone to engage in acts of violence in good faith. These laws introduce new offences for threatening force or violence.

Again, in finishing, my heart goes out to the Jewish community, which has been targeted. Hopefully these laws will go smoothly through parliament and police will actually use them to prosecute those people who are committing crimes against the Jewish community.

David Gillespie (Lyne, National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

This Criminal Code Amendment (Hate Crimes) Bill is a really important bill because it's addressing a fatal and disappointing development in Australian society. That is the rise of antisemitism, which has grown exponentially since the Hamas terrorist invasion of Israel and the kidnapping and killing of many innocent people. That was a day of murder, torture, kidnapping, brutal sexual violence and the massacring of children and innocents. It was cruel, it was barbaric and it was unbelievable.

Yet in Australia we saw, on the steps of the Opera House no less, in the middle of Australia at one of Australia's iconic landmarks, ranting and chanting by supporters of Hamas that went unpunished. The law was not enforced by the New South Wales police. I could not believe it at the time. It is an offence to incite people to violence, let alone to give aid to declared terrorist organisations. Then, this acceptance or turning of a blind eye—

A division having been called in the House of Representatives—

Sitting suspended from 17:02 to 17:21

As I was saying, there was a failure to enforce the law in failing to prosecute and in attempting to arrest people who were inciting violence based on the criteria of religious belief. Blatant antisemitism has been uncovered. I'm a big believer in free speech and the right to protest but it's not legal to incite people to violence or to spray-paint businesses' cars and torch them, attack places of religious worship, firebomb children's daycare centres or vandalise people's houses. That is not legitimate political expression; that is illegality.

The current government have been asleep at the wheel. They have failed to prosecute or—not necessarily the act of arresting; that would be up to state police. But they have failed to condemn. They have failed to condemn universities tolerating the occupy movements plastering universities with antisemitic graffiti, allowing discrimination and the ostracising of both academics and students in universities, doxxing people and actually arguing for the actions of Hamas and Hezbollah.

Supporting a registered terrorist organisation by physical or other means is illegal in this country. But these laws have been left unapplied, and that is why antisemitism has grown. On a diplomatic and international scale, the current government has made moral equivalence a justification for not doing anything because of stuff it feels is Islamophobic. But it's just not realistic. On the international stage we have abandoned our support for Israel. We have voted against Israel, the one democracy in the Middle East that has the rule of law and lets people vote. It's a shame that Australia has really let its standards drop in supporting any of those things I've mentioned.

This bill, in putting some teeth behind applying the law, is a little bit too late. We need strong leadership from this government and also from state governments, who should have had their police forces enforcing this. The fact that our security agencies were not engaging with the current federal government tells you enough about their opinion of what's going on in this government. In question time today, we saw the Prime Minister obfuscate. He wouldn't admit that the security agencies didn't want to brief him because they were worried about his administration leaking any information, which would hinder them identifying the perpetrators.

And the caravan packed with explosives. My goodness! That was just an abject failure of our intelligence capability, when local neighbours identified the caravan. It goes on and on. Vandalising synagogues and trying to torch them in Sydney, and then the Adass synagogue in Melbourne, were just absolute shocks. I cannot believe that Australia has let down the standards of applying the rule of law and having a tight, well-connected intelligence network. It really is a cause for concern.

These proposed changes seek to lower the threshold for criminality for those that urge violence against individuals or groups. Instead of intending that violence occur, police now only need to prove that the person was reckless as to whether violence would occur. These laws also propose removing the good faith defence for those urging violence. It is really appropriate, because how can you urge someone to engage in acts of violence in good faith. I mean, it's really, totally unrealistic. It's long overdue that the Criminal Code Amendment (Hate Crimes) Bill has finally been introduced for us to discuss. The coalition did write to the government about it before parliament resumed in October. It's been to a committee and was examined carefully. The recommendation from the review was that this should come before the parliament.

The bill also needs to be a bit stronger to cover attacks on places of worship. It needs to be blindingly clear that any antisemitic action is not acceptable in Australia. As I have said, the consequences of us being ambiguous about what is tolerable under the law are really important. I do not want to stifle free speech, but free speech doesn't mean you can incite people to violence or say 'kill Jews' or 'kill anyone'. That is a different matter; that is not free speech. That is against the law. I commend these amendments to the House.

I hope that our security agencies do get to the bottom of who has initiated the caravan full of high explosives, and who the people are that are paying some of our gangs—not necessarily people from overseas, but getting local criminals and gangsters to do this for a fee because they need to face the full force of the law as well. There must be jail time for any of this behaviour, otherwise, people will do what they have been doing. They feel like their weird, twisted version of what should be done is being tolerated because silence from the authorities and inaction by the bodies that enforce the law have emboldened them. As I've said, universities have questions to answer about them tolerating support of terrorist organisations in their own institutions and having academics and students afraid to move freely in their own institutions. It really is a wake-up call for Australia.

This bill is long overdue, and I support it. Let's hope that Australia gets its strength back and supports Israel. They have an existential question of survival. That's why they went to war against Hamas and Hezbollah. People don't realise that it's not just about the land and occupying areas on the West Bank. There is an administration called Hamas, and there is Hezbollah, which are backed by Iran. Their whole plan is not to just get back a bit of land. They want Israel wiped off the map, and we can't let that happen. What we can do in this country, though, is make it crystal clear that the behaviour we've seen should never have been tolerated and should've been called out when it happened, and then we wouldn't have let this monster out of the bag. We need to put it back in. Antisemitism has been through the ages: the pogroms in the Middle Ages, the pogroms in the Russian Revolution in and after World War I and then again with the Nazi Holocaust. The rest of the world, including Australia, supported the creation of the State of Israel at the United Nations. It has a right to exist, and we in Australia should be supporting that right. We shouldn't be tolerating any more of this horrible behaviour that we've seen in our own country.

Sam Birrell (Nicholls, National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise to speak on the very important Criminal Code Amendment (Hate Crimes) Bill 2024. I'd like to talk a bit about how we got into this situation, what has happened in Australia, what the response has been, antisemitism in general—because as horrific, distasteful and as outrageous as it is, we need to talk about it—this bill and how the coalition think that it could be made stronger. How did we get here? Well, it's interesting. Antisemitism is one of the oldest hatreds in the world—something we thought probably wasn't under the surface in Australia but that, to our horror, we discovered was there after the horrific acts of October 7. Everyone was shocked that Israel was attacked by Hamas in the way it was. Everyone was shocked the day after that Sunday when we all awoke and saw the news that paragliders, four-wheel-drive utes and all sorts of vehicles with murderous terrorists had gone into these peaceful kibbutzes and communities in southern Israel and committed the most horrific crimes. And the more the week went on, and as footage was released—it was impossible to watch, but you had to watch it to understand exactly what had happened.

It affected many people in this place very personally for their own reasons. In my case, before coming to parliament I had worked as an agricultural scientist for an Israeli water technology company called Netafim. I was very proud to work for that company, because that company developed water-saving technology that brought agricultural prosperity to many parts of the world—yes, in Australia, where we use it to grow tomatoes and almonds, but also in Third World countries and developing countries. That is Israeli technology that they developed out of necessity. The people who set up the kibbutz that started Netafim in Hatzerim, down in the south of Israel, were working with the government to do what the inventor of drip irrigation, Simcha Blass, said: 'Make the desert bloom.' They could make the desert bloom as long as they could use the very small amount of water they had efficiently, so they developed this technology, which is now used around the world. It brings life to people. At the time, I spoke about my visits to those Israeli communities. Many of them are in the south and many of them are very close to that border. Netafim is the company that makes the drip irrigation equipment, but there are other companies that make the valves, the filters—everything that gets water to agricultural crops, as the member for Braddon and the member for Forrest as farmers well know. It's all technology that's created in these communities, so they're bringing life to the world by making agricultural produce easier to grow. I said at the time that they were obsessed with life. What they were met with was people who were obsessed with death, people who have impossible to understand hatreds—irrational, insane hatreds—to think that they could cross the border and do those things to people. It's one thing in a war zone to attack one another's soldiers, and often, in war, there are civilian casualties that happen because of the nature of conflict, but these were people deliberately going and murdering civilians.

That they'd suffered should've sparked a great deal of sympathy for the Israeli people, instead, in some quarters in Australia, it unleashed burgeoning antisemitism. We saw that with the way that people gathered at the opera house and with the chants they were making. We've seen it since. A lot of that happened before Israel's military response, and people said: 'This isn't antisemitism. We're just against what Israel is doing in their attempts to defend themselves.' A lot of these protests happened before those military operations started—let's not deny that. But, since then, Israel launched some military actions.

A debate about what Israel is doing is legitimate. Targeting Australian Jewish people because of it is not, and that's what's been happening. It's happened at the opera house, at MPs offices and at my office in a small way. I mention this because I've had experience of 'Free Palestine' stickers being put and texter drawn all over my office. But I was disgusted with what happened to my friend, a person on the other side of the chamber that I met since I came to this place, the member for Macnamara. I play sport with him of a morning up here, and it's been my great honour to get to know him. For him and his staff to go through what they did at his office is against the foundations of democracy, and it's against a member. The member for Macnamara and I disagree on policy, but we are friends, as I am with the member for Hunter, and I felt that personally.

Obviously there's been a great deal of debate about the response since. I thought that the Leader of the Opposition's response had a real moral clarity to it. He spoke in parliament about what was chanted at the opera house, and that was really uncomfortable for all of us. He didn't use the exact words, but he alluded to them. I saw a lot of people around the House being critical of the opposition leader bringing them up, but you have to say this stuff to face the evil of it. He did that and he's been steadfast since. I think that he's shown real leadership on this issue even when it's got pretty difficult, and I commend him for that. There are people in the Australian Labor Party who have shown some leadership, but, overall, I would say that the response has been too equivocal and the Jewish community has felt that the response hasn't been strong enough. It hasn't had that moral clarity that we need to face this evil.

I just want to talk a little bit about antisemitism as one of the world's oldest hatreds. In my experience, you go back in your own mind and try to think about what you know, what you understand and what forms your view. I've talked a bit about my experiences in Israel, but, even before that, I remember my experience in the late eighties when I would've been in my early- to mid-teens. As I've said in this place, in the country you only had two channels, but I was allowed to watch the late movies sometimes when my parents didn't know that I was up watching the late movie. There was a TV movie on called Escape from Sobibor, and it showed, in graphic terms, what the Nazis were doing to the Jewish population in Europe in the late 1930s and 1940s and why the West had the moral clarity to wage war against that evil regime and to stop antisemitism in its tracks. I mention that because what we saw in the 1940s is what this sort of thinking and this sort of evil, when it gets going, can lead to.

As I said, the response from the opposition leader has had a moral clarity, and his writing to the Prime Minister to convene the National Cabinet on this was the right move. To push for this sort of thing and to keep the pressure on—which is what oppositions do—was the right move. Government take credit for coming out and saying, 'We're going to do something,' but often they do something because of the pressure the opposition puts on them. This bill is an example of that. This bill has come about because of the pressure applied by the opposition. I want to give a shout out to the member for Berowra, who's also shown equal moral clarity based on his own experiences.

The bill itself—the changes are welcome. I think they're too late, but we have to do this. We should have done it a long time ago, but we are doing it now. That's a good thing. There are some simple straightforward steps that the government are proposing to take. Those steps lower the threshold for criminality, particularly for those who urge violence against individuals or groups. Instead of proving that the person intended that the violence occur, the police now only need to prove that the person was reckless as to whether the violence would occur, and that is a welcome change. These laws remove the good faith defence for those urging violence. As the previous speaker, the member for Lynes, said, you can't urge violence in good faith, not in this situation. It's a welcome change. There's also some expansion of the offences that relate to the urging of violence in relation to a range of personal characteristics on the basis of which a person or a group is targeted.

I talked about what's happened to MPs' offices, what happened at the Opera House, the spray painting of cars and the targeting of people because of what they were wearing. All of this is anathema to what modern Australian values should be. But the worst thing happened late last year. Ironically for me, I was at the Israeli Embassy. I was there that day with the Israeli and German ambassadors. They're neighbours in Canberra; the German and Israeli embassies are next door to each other. The two ambassadors came together to commemorate a person from my electorate—an Indigenous Yorta Yorta man called William Cooper—who, in the 1930s, took a petition to the German consulate in Melbourne on behalf of the Jewish people and was turned away. There was a plaque to commemorate him. We celebrated that plaque the very day that there was a synagogue firebombing in Melbourne. If you didn't understand the necessity for these laws and the fact that they need to go further to protect places of worship, then that was your answer of what there needed to be.

That synagogue bombing was an outrage, and it's really rocked—everyone is experiencing that. But there are those of us who are from Victoria and understand those parts of Melbourne, like Caulfield and Brighton, where Jewish people, who make such a contribution to our region, have congregated and live in Melbourne. What a contribution they've made, through business and arts, to our community. For one of their places of worship to be firebombed by some coward or cowards is an outrage. It goes against everything we believe and everything all of us want Australia to be.

What we do in this place and the messages we send matter. I hope people get prosecuted. I hope people get caught. I hope they get prosecuted by these laws. I hope that this makes the prosecution of them easier. I hope that this makes the capture of them easier. I hope that this means the punishment can be harsher, but, even if it doesn't, the fact that we're passing this legislation is a message from this place to say that antisemitism will not be tolerated in Australia. Antisemitism is an outrage. It's a hatred that should have died in ashes of 1945 in World War II, when many of our brave Australian servicepeople and, indeed, many from the United States and the United Kingdom fought against that evil regime to put a stop to antisemitism once and for all.

We're seeing it rear its head again here. This parliament needs to send a very strong message that this is not tolerated. This bill's a start, but it needs to go further. We've got some amendments that take this further that I hope the government will consider. We should not only be passing legislation; we've all got to be really strong in our statements about this scourge. I urge the Prime Minister and anyone in a position of leadership to look at the way that the opposition leader acted in the days when this was getting a foothold, and to use that moral clarity to guide them in their attack on antisemitism.

Gavin Pearce (Braddon, Liberal Party, Shadow Assistant Minister for Health, Aged Care and Indigenous Health Services) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It saddens me today and it's with a very heavy heart that I rise to speak on the second reading of the Criminal Code Amendment (Hate Crimes) Bill 2024. It saddens me because, whilst this is necessary at this point in time in Australia's history, the way I and most Australians view it, it should never be necessary. It should have been stamped out from the very start. It shouldn't have been allowed to escalate to the levels, the hurt and evil, that it has got to at this point in time. It's for that very reason that it saddens me that the leadership has been lacking for so long.

I come from the profession of arms, and I have spent the majority of my life being deployed to all sorts of places for that very reason—to combat evil. Mostlywe stand in front of those being persecuted with a weapons system, and we protect them from that evil. I know a little bit about wiping evil out and eliminating evil from the earth. There's an old saying that goes right back to the Romans; it's in Latin, and it's the phrase, 'Si vis pacem, para bellum.' That means, 'In strength, comes peace.' Unless you have strength and unless you have the leadership that demonstrates that, you will never have peace. Unfortunately, that's what we have gotten to. That lack of leadership has allowed this festering serpent to develop and grow to the point that it is spitting venom at those most vulnerable. I think the actions of this government have lacked that leadership, that strength, that power and that force in stamping this out, and that's why that escalation has taken place.

I actually visited Israel last year at the request of my good friend the ambassador, Amir Maimon. Amir served a life in the Israeli special forces, Mossad. He was an electronic warfare special forces operator working for the Israeli Army around the same time as I was posted in the Middle East. We have a kinship there, and we have become very close. I saw a very hardened man, a tough man, a strong man, a man with conviction and leadership, a man that deeply loves his country and was in another country representing the interests of Israel and the relationship between Australia and our friends in Israel, that great democracy.

I saw him heartbroken. I saw him bent over heartbroken because of what was happening to his beautiful country and his beautiful people. Unprovoked, a listed terrorist organisation—the head of evil—attacked their precious country, leaving 1,200 people dead. I visited the kibbutz Kfar Aza down south. You could see the photos. They had photos up outside the kibbutz. You could see the bloodstains and the bullet chips inside. You could smell after they had been there—these horrible, evil creatures—and burnt the place. This evil was committed in places that were supposed to be secure. There was no warning. Those hostages that were taken—can you imagine what that would be like in your town or suburb where you live today? Can you imagine what it would be like if 240 people were taken hostage, sexually abused and mutilated?

There's a thing called the '46 minutes', and it's chest cam footage which they captured of Hamas operatives. They were proud and boasting of killing, beheading, mutilating and raping. There were dead bodies of innocent Israelis. You imagine what would happen if that happened here. In retaliation and in trying to get those hostages back, we went on a world quest on who was right and who was wrong. And so the chants began. And so the hitchhikers jumped onto this thing that got a few headlines. If you ask those people chanting 'from the river to the sea' what river and what sea, they wouldn't have a clue about that, what it means or the destruction that I've just described. They wouldn't have a clue. They were just there for the headline, for the footage and to get on television. And that's when the government should have stepped in and been strong, and that's when that head should have been cut from that evil snake. Now that snake has bred, and there are many serpents all over the place, conducting evil on our beautiful country. It should have been stomped out and wiped out a long time ago.

That's why it's with a heavy heart that I have to talk about this. My good friend—he's been like a brother to me—Josh Frydenberg has been on the offensive on the reactive trail, trying to get the message across about how important it was for the government to step up. He turned himself inside out to get this message across. Whilst he's done a fantastic job, and I congratulate my brother in doing that, it fell on deaf ears. It has not been until now, when that evil has been allowed to escalate, develop and dig in, that we've decided to finally do something about it. I worry that this measure is all happening far too late.

The other issue that I want to raise is in relation to this bill. Whilst it's all well and good to have a criminal code amendment to this bill so that we can prosecute evildoers, this is a cultural act, and this cultural act needs to be cut off at the knees. It's up to every leader at every level—at state level, local government level and community group level. It's up to every person on the street to condemn this as strongly as possible. I'm not talking about vigilante action, but what I am talking about is that, if they know that everybody condemns this in such a bitter way then they might cease and desist a little. If we don't give them the air they so desperately need, and the fanfare and the headlines, then maybe they mightn't be so keen to recommit the same offence.

My Jewish brothers and sisters—and I mentioned this in my valedictory speech when I was describing Peter Dutton, and I meant it from the bottom of my heart when I said it: I have faith in him, I see a strength in him and I see moral courage in him. I know that you, Peter Dutton, will protect that little girl that is too frightened to go to school because she is Jewish. That's not the Australia I grew up in, and that's not the Australia he believes in either. That's the sort of leadership we should have had 12 months ago on this. That's the sort of leadership Australia really needed. That's the sort of leadership that will return Australia back to the great country it's always been.

The actual bill itself amends many things. Apart from a deterrent, it also gives the ability to remove the offender from the ability to recommit the same offence. While that's a good thing, that needs to be strengthened. I don't feel this bill is anywhere near strong enough. As far as I'm concerned, if you are going to commit such an evil act that is so against Australian values, Australian culture and traditions and the very essence of what we stand for as a country, the very accepting non-racist country that we stand for—if you are going to act and carry on like that, then there's no place for you here as far as I'm concerned. They're the sorts of measures that I think need to be looked at when we start being serious about developing this particular legislation.

I think after this episode, and with some strong leadership and some strong guidance in stamping this out, we can return to that country that I'm so proud of—a country that accepts people from all over the world irrespective of their race, their religion, the colour of their skin or anything else for that matter. We value you as a human being, the very essence of your soul, your heart. That's what it means to be an Australian. To be an Australian in relation to the matters I'm talking about today means joining with our Jewish friends, supporting them and espousing this terrible, heinous crime we're talking about.

The problem doesn't necessarily stop with this particular issue, the antisemitism issue that I'm talking about. I'm concerned about where this starts and stops; where does this end up? It's very similar to any action. If you allow one little thing to happen, then it will escalate and something else will happen. So what next? Does that then lead to attacks on the Catholic Church or the Anglican Church? Does it stop with childcare centres? Where does this stop? That's what I'm getting back to. If we don't apply that age-old theory of 'in strength comes peace', if we don't apply enough strength, then that serpent will continually strike, and it will come back, it will return, in even stronger forms. That's what I fear.

Whilst we're sitting here debating this particular amendment bill, I wonder whether it's simply something we have to have to keep the masses quiet. If it had come 12 months ago, maybe it would have come as a normal means of governance, good leadership and applying strength. The weakness has let in evil. That evil has developed. Innocent people are being hurt. Innocent people, their hopes and dreams, their security, are being crushed. Not many people in this place and not many people watching this particular show on television today know what it's like to have your life in the wind, where it's here one second and gone the next. That's what those Jewish people in those communities feel. They're wondering whether they're going to make it home. Imagine your own children. They're our brothers and sisters. Israel is our friend. They still haven't got their people home. They still haven't got their daughters and sons home. There's still damage there. Those bullet holes and that bloodstained wall that I talked about are still there. Those scars will never leave. They will never heal. But the last thing we need is more damage and more evil because we simply aren't applying enough strength. And that's all I say today. Si vis pacem, para bellum; in peace, we need strength.

David Smith (Bean, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Just yesterday, before the commencement of the parliamentary year here in 2025, many members from right across parliament came together at St Christopher's Cathedral for what I see as almost a traditional display of unity and togetherness—a reminder that, often, there are many things that bring us together and less that keeps us apart. That ecumenical prayer service, which has been going for more than 50 years now, is something which is a reminder for each and every one of us that the words that we say in this parliament matter. It is critical that we should be working for the common good. And, really, that's the frame for this legislation. It comes also a week after I was at the National Jewish Memorial Centre in Forrest—which is only really a stone's throw from St Christopher's Cathedral—to announce the investment by the Albanese government of $4 million for a Holocaust education resource to ensure that, for generations to come, they continue to know the story about the absolute horror of the Holocaust. We can't neglect the importance of education in this space.

But, getting to this legislation, this bill, of course, creates new criminal offences and strengthens existing offences against hate speech. That's the key and heart of this. The amendments in this proposed legislation protect groups distinguished by their race, religion, nationality, national or ethnic origin, political opinion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity and disability and members of those groups. This bill would strengthen existing offences relating to urging violence against a group or a member of a group. They apply where a person urges others to use violence against a group or a member of a group and is reckless as to whether the violence urged will occur. This bill will also create a new criminal offence for threatening force or violence against a group or members of a group to cover conduct involving a direct threat from one person to another. And it amends the existing offences of publicly displaying prohibited hate symbols, specifically to cover targeted groups distinguished by those factors that I outlined but, in particular, by existing attributes of race, colour, sex, language, religion, political or other opinion or national or social origin.

This bill sends a clear and unambiguous message that urging or threatening violence and advocating acts of hatred are not acceptable in our country. It is criminal behaviour and will be treated as such. This should be a unity ticket for this parliament. This is something that should bring together people from across the aisle and across all different political groupings in the parliament. It's important. The Australian people are looking to us to show that sense of unity and to show that sense of togetherness that, as I outlined, was pretty clearly present at that prayer service before we commenced parliament this year. Often, the challenge with such services is to ensure the messages that we hear there actually get past question time on the first day.

As I said, this bill sends a clear and unambiguous message that urging or threatening violence and advocating acts of hatred are not acceptable in our country. It is criminal behaviour and it will be treated as such. There is clear concern from key parts of our community, quite understandably, about such actions occurring right across our community. The criminal offences that are outlined in this bill will support law enforcement's ability to disrupt, investigate and protect against the activities of those who foster hatred and incite violence, discrimination and other serious damage. The offences in this bill complement existing Commonwealth, state and territory civil and criminal protections against hate speech. The offences in this bill have been carefully crafted to target the most serious forms of harmful hate speech—namely the urging and threatening of force or violence.

The robust expression of diverse opinions is an important feature of our democracy, and the measures in this bill respect the need for vibrant public debate. The offences are not intended to criminalise mere expressions of belief or opinion. But what we're seeing in Sydney, in particular, is not expressions of robust, diverse opinions. They have been expressions of hatred and they have been designed to incite racial hatred. It's important that, where we can, we send the message that we are working together and that this is a shared mission of this parliament. Wherever there's a sense that there is division or dissent on these matters, it's fodder for those who are trying to foment this hatred across our communities. It certainly doesn't reflect the concerns that have been raised by local communities in my electorate of Bean and across the Canberra community.

It's important that this parliament passes legislation like this before we depart this fortnight. It's critical that this federal parliament is seen to act and actually get through key changes because this is the sort of leadership that our communities are looking for. They see it as our responsibility. Whether you're coming from the regions or from the cities, whatever state or territory you might come from, these are issues that should be bringing us together. We have a responsibility to act together, and I support the resolution.

Michelle Ananda-Rajah (Higgins, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise to speak in support of Criminal Code Amendment (Hate Crimes) Bill 2024. I speak as, and I am putting on my hat as, someone who came to this country as a 12-year-old child in 1984. I grew up here as an 'other'—a child of migrants. During my childhood and my adolescence, I did, from time to time, encounter racism. There's no question about that. It sort of comes with the territory, if you like.

Initially, it was overt, and then, as I grew older and became an adult and started seeking job opportunities, it was probably more covert. However, at no time did I have to encounter the kind of systemic and degrading hate that my Jewish community are now experiencing. I didn't wake up to street corners being defaced. I didn't wake up to schools turning into battlegrounds. I didn't wake up to entire communities feeling like they were under threat. In fact, my experience was quite the opposite; there were intermittent episodes of racism but, because it was not systemic, I still felt and was able to build a sense of belonging in this country. It was not robbed from me in the way my Jewish community are currently experiencing. At no time did I feel like I was an alien in my own country. In fact, it was quite the contrary; I grew up and I thrived, thanks to the welcoming nature of my fellow Australians. It was a nation that changed with me and became far more diverse as I grew.

I'm now standing here as a parliamentarian in a country that I don't recognise. I don't understand what is going on in this country that is making it acceptable for some people—and they are a minority—to walk around spreading hate against a community of fellow Australians. I just don't understand it. My Jewish community, for context, is large. I have around 6,500 Australians who have a Jewish heritage. This community are highly active. They are contributors. Many of them have been here for multiple generations. They are overwhelmingly descendants of Holocaust survivors. In fact, the largest community of Jews who are descended from those who survived the Holocaust live in Melbourne. This is baked into their DNA, and it is spread from one generation to another. They're acutely attuned to the vibrations that can tear at our social fabric and can lead to the Shoah, the Holocaust.

My community are active in every single domain right across the economy, from business to professionals to creatives. They are also philanthropists—some of the most generous people who have decided that they want to give back to our country. They have prospered through their work ethic, and they have contributed back to every domain, whether it be in the arts community, business, health or research—particularly in medical research. These people are contributors to our country, yet they now feel like they are aliens in their own land, vilified and made to feel 'other'—isolated. To be honest, they are frightened. Their livelihoods and their lives feel like they are under threat.

I call out special thanks and tribute to my Chabad centre in Malvern. I spoke of people who contribute—these are people who contribute. They run an early childhood education and care centre which employs non-Jewish childcare workers who choose to work there because of the culture of the place. It is so welcoming and warm and it is a proud institution that champions the Jewish faith and inculcates it in small children. I want to also pay special thanks to Rabbi Velly from Chabad Malvern who, of his own accord and with minimal training, set up a mental health group for men. As you all know, I am chair of the Parliamentary Friends of Men's Health. He did this because he found that there was a need for men in the shadows—not just in the Jewish community but also outside that community—to speak about their lived experience, particularly with respect to addiction: a taboo within a taboo. He runs, on a regular basis, a small community group of men who come together to talk about addiction. He links this program of care with the spiritual journey of what it is to be a Jew, because that is how he expresses his Jewish faith—as service unto others. The group is attended by Jewish men as well as non-Jewish men. That tells you something about the sense of giving that the Jewish community has towards the wider community.

In my own community, I also want to call out and pay tribute to King David School. This a truly wonderful school that sits on the more progressive end of the Jewish spectrum. It is a heterogenous group of people, like everyone else in Australia; you can't just dump us all into buckets. There is a mosaic within communities and within minorities. This school links antiquity to modernity. It bakes in at every level—from the early learning centre all the way to year 12—the importance of the Jewish faith, Judaism and linkages to Israel. I had the honour of opening one of the rooms in their early childhood education centre which is named after a particular type of wheat that is regarded as a staple in the Jewish faith and has sustained the people of Israel. The King David School, while embedding the Jewish faith and pride in their students, very much promotes a perspective that is outward looking in their students. The students are not sheltered and are not taught to become insular—quite the opposite. In year 9, they send these students out to engage with the rest of the community. Right now, it's pretty hard for those kids. Do they feel safe entering the wider, mainstream community as young Jewish kids? Do they even wear their uniforms? Occasionally, they don't. Do they wear their jewellery that declares that they are Jewish? They often conceal it, because right now things are not safe. This is a country I do not recognise.

Because of this Jewish community that I got to know and learned so much from, I went to Israel twice. I'm the only parliamentarian who visited Israel twice last year. The first visit was in July, by invitation from the speaker of the parliament, to visit the Knesset. It was extraordinary. I went with a multipartisan group of other parliament members. We had the honour of visiting many, many sights in Israel—Jerusalem, Tel Aviv and Be'er Sheva where the ANZACs fought. We also had the opportunity to visit the Palestinian Authority and engage with the then Palestinian leadership in Ramallah. It was an eye-opener. At the time, Israel was gripped by protests over the proposed changes to the judicial system. It was really hot, and in the heat—40-degree days—you could see thousands of people, sometimes young families with children strapped to their backs, holding the Israeli flag and marching. Thousands and thousands of people would do that. You could not miss these protests. It showed me how passionate Israelis are about their country, their system of government and their democracy.

My second visit was in December in the aftermath of October 7. I was offered this trip to go on. It was sponsored by AIJAC. My colleague Josh Burns, the member for Macnamara, and other members from the coalition attended. I didn't hesitate when given the opportunity. Why? Because I wanted to see for myself what had happened. Until then I had read about it in the media, but I wanted to remove that filter of the media and those biases; there always are biases when you read or consume media. I wanted to see it for myself, and I wanted to go in support of, and show my support in a very tangible way to, my Jewish community. There are things I saw which I cannot unsee. There are smells that I smelt which I cannot forget. I remember there was a moment when I stood at a site in Sderot, a town that had its police station demolished. It took a bulldozer, and it took gunships dropping bombs for about 17 hours to demolish this police station, with terrorists, policemen and service personnel inside because the walls were fortified. I stood on that site, which was basically levelled, with a few bits of concrete and debris, and gave a TV interview. I could smell death rising up from the earth. I'm a doctor; I've smelt death before. It's not something that I will ever forget.

What I did not expect, though, was to see the level of antisemitism unleashed against Jewish Australians here when I returned. My community warned me from the very beginning that this would escalate, and that if you give antisemitism a foothold, give it an inch, it will accelerate. That is exactly what has happened. That is exactly what has played out, because the Jews are the canaries in the coalmine. We have absolutely seen that happen in 2025, where this has become a daily occurrence in this country. It's completely unacceptable. But I knew this, because I'd also had the opportunity in July last year to visit Yad Vashem, the Holocaust memorial. For those of you who cannot get there in person, I suggest you educate yourselves by jumping online and having a look at the Yad Vashem website or visiting one of your local Holocaust museums in your major cities. Soon there will be a national museum built here in Canberra with funding we have provided. But it shows how antisemitism, once it takes hold, can lead to the worst possible outcome: mass murder on a scale humanity has never seen—systematised, calculating and highly effective. It happened because of dehumanisation of the Jews. It happened because of centralisation of power. It happened because of propaganda. It happened because of demagoguery.

My fellow Australians, those elements are universal; they can happen again and again. So to think this will never happen again is a delusion. It can absolutely happen again if the circumstances are right and if those ingredients are allowed to take a foothold and thrive. It starts with dehumanising the 'other'. In some cases it's racism against people like me or people who look like me or people who are First Nations Australians. In other cases it's antisemitism. It starts with microaggressions. It starts with hate. It starts with language that makes the other feel like they don't belong there, and it robs them of their identity. Hence, I support this bill, which builds upon all the other measures this Albanese government has delivered, from outlawing the Nazi salute to the trade of Nazi symbols to anti-doxxing laws—which, unfortunately, happened again in the aftermath of Jewish creatives being doxxed but will also benefit others, particularly women, because women are the ones who get doxxed.

That brings me to my final point that although these laws are occurring in the context of unacceptable, virulent and rising antisemitism in this country, these laws will actually benefit everyone in this country. That, if there is a silver lining to this horror, is the gift of this moment. I thank the House.

I was lucky enough to be able to be in Gawler to help swear in a new raft of Australian citizens, and the joy on their faces to finally be able to say that they're Australian—there was nothing that was going to upset their day. That was replicated right across my a electorate in Playford and the City of Salisbury, and beyond my boundaries as well, in South Australia and across the country. It's a really important point to make because, at the same time we were all coming together to celebrate who we are as Australian, we had a group of people that were trying to drive a wedge of division between our communities, a group who have tried to prey on individuals who are susceptible to impressionism. When I think about this group—and there are not a lot of things that I have to say about them that are nice—they prey on young individuals within our communities who are disenfranchised, hoping they can create a sense of faux outrage and turn that into a tool to assist in their desire to drive a wedge between communities like mine. I'm talking about the National Socialist Network.

On Australia Day, they used that day of all days to march down North Terrace in Adelaide chanting, 'Australia for the white man!', wearing their black cladding and clothing and carrying on in front of our war memorial, displaying their symbols of hatred, trying to strike fear and division in my community and the community of South Australia, which is really disappointing. It's disappointing for a couple of reasons. When I got elected to this place in May 2022, I did so on the basis that I saw myself as a leader in my community. I was very privileged to have the opportunity to get the confidence of my community to represent them in this place. It makes me think about what good leadership is about, and since my election to this place, I have had the good opportunity to be part of the Defence Force parliamentary programme. I had the opportunity to go on HMAS Rankin. It's pertinent when I think about this bill and what this bill does because the motto of that vessel is 'defend the weak'. When you look up the definition of 'defend' in the dictionary it says it's 'to resist an attack made on someone or something, to protect from harm or danger'. The definition of weak is 'liable to break or give way under pressure'. Defend the weak—that's what good leaders do and that's what this bill does.

This bill enables leadership to stamp out hate and hate crimes. It's about making sure that those who have ill-will towards others in our community are held to the highest standards of our laws, as they should be. If you want to urge violence and encourage others to engage in your activities, there will be repercussions. That's exactly what needs to happen. It's not good enough to have people sitting on YouTube or at kickboxing events in the northern suburbs, walking down the main street letterboxing and doorknocking in my electorate, and inciting hatred to persecute your desire to have a white society and drive out the best thing that makes my community so fantastic—that is, the multicultural aspect. It's the bringing together of different cultures harmoniously and creating a society that is interconnected and so much better for it because we get to share everybody's experiences.

We shouldn't have to live in fear. We shouldn't have to worry about elements of our community applying pressure and trying to break the weak. That's why it's up to leaders like myself and others in this chamber today to ensure that we do defend the weak and that we stand up and call out the actions of those like the National Socialist Network, an extremist group that is trying to drive fear into the very hearts of our communities and trying to create a us-versus-them mentality that looks to ostracise anybody that they can for the purposes of their own gain.

I'm extremely proud of this legislation. I think that the minister has done a great job in bringing this forward. It's much needed, unfortunately. It shouldn't be needed. Much like the member for Higgins said, when I came to this place, the last thing I thought that we would be debating is this type of legislation because I just didn't think that we were at this point in our communities. I thought we were well past this. This is a thing of yesteryear. I thought we'd learnt from our mistakes, but, clearly, that's not the case.

We need to do better. We must do better, and that's what this bill seeks to do.

Julian Hill (Bruce, Australian Labor Party, Assistant Minister for Citizenship and Multicultural Affairs) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

From the outset, I really want to pick up where the previous speech left off. I commend the Attorney-General for bringing this bill to the House. It hasn't been a quick thing. I know, from hearing the Attorney-General report to the government caucus room and to caucus committees and from talking with colleagues about the development of this bill, which was introduced last year and extensively considered through the proper parliamentary processes, that this is something that he is rightly personally proud of and has put a lot of careful intellectual thought into with extensive consultation.

These are complex areas of legislation, as we know, because they intersect with state and territory regimes and balance competing rights. These are always, rightly so, contested bills in a democracy because, when you're measuring one set of rights—and some would rightly say freedom of speech is of critical value in our society, but freedom of speech is not unlimited. It never has been. You can't incite people to violence. You can't defame people. You can't breach national security classifications. In any decent society, there have always been some limits to freedom of speech, and, in this case, there are a complex set of things that we balance. But it is a significant piece of legislation.

Let there be no doubt at the outset that the government is committed to protecting the community from those amongst us who would promote extremism, violence or hatred or seek to incite violence. That's a values based commitment. No Australian should be targeted because of who they are or what they believe, and the government has worked diligently to introduce this legislation to create new criminal offences and to also strengthen the protections against hate crimes within existing criminal offences. The bill will create new criminal offences for directly threatening the use of force or violence against a group or a member of a group. I've had a lot of emails from people who are a bit confused asking, 'Does it protect this characteristic or this group?' Importantly, these offences will protect groups or members of groups distinguished by race, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, intersex status, disability, nationality, national or ethnic origin, or political opinion. They will provide protection to Australians right across the community from hate speech and from those who would urge violence.

I'll make a couple of contextual remarks though. I believe we're the world's most successful multicultural society—one of the most diverse societies on the planet. We can run a bit of a book with Canada, but I'll claim we're the most successful! But just being a diverse society is not the same thing as being a successful multicultural society. We can all think of countries that are diverse that are not successful. Indeed, the member for Wentworth recommended a book when we caught up for a cup of tea last year, and, I will admit, I didn't finish it over the summer, as I promised—I'll give you this confession now!—but I did get through another couple of chapters. Part of the thesis of that book was observing that, if you look through history, most diverse societies—the Ottoman Empire and other places we could mention—were actually run by authoritarian rulers. The notion of a modern liberal democratic polity existing with the level of human diversity that we have—be it faith, linguistic, cultural or ethnic—is actually a very new notion; it is, some would say, only decades old in the whole of human history. So the jury's out. People in 200 years will look back and see how we did. Hopefully there'll still be a peaceful, democratic, diverse society that we've bequeathed to them, to those who come after us. But we can't take our success for granted.

Success, in my view, has three key attributes. First is legal foundations and political intent. This year we celebrate the 50th anniversary of the Whitlam Labor government's introduction of the Racial Discrimination Act, having abolished the last vestiges of the old racist White Australia policy. That act has stood the test of time laying the legal foundations but it alone has not been enough; there are other things that we've had to layer on in that task of trying to maintain a cohesive society in the face of all this diversity and these conflicting views.

Second, as you would know, Deputy Speaker Payne, is investment. Often that's helping new people settle in. The member for Banks over there also represents a diverse electorate. You have to sometimes give some people a bit more help than others to get on their feet and set up life here and succeed. It is investing to allow people to celebrate and cherish their cultural traditions, to pass them on, and, importantly, to share them with the broader community. Again, that takes investment.

But in my view, the magic ingredient, the secret sauce, of success is leadership at all levels—political leadership, faith leadership, interfaith work and community leadership. Day in, day out, it's the community leaders, the volunteers and the people on committees and organisations who do that work of building our social cohesion and maintaining it. Social cohesion is not an end state; it's inherent in the word 'cohesion'. 'To cohere' means to come together. Social cohesion is a dynamic process. We can't take it for granted. When we face stresses and strains on our social cohesion, which I'll touch on in a moment, as we are at this time in our history, we've got to look at all aspects of that formula. Where do we need to strengthen our legal regimes and our protections? This is a good example, where the government is of the view that we need to strengthen the legal protections and the regimes which exist to protect people from hate speech and to allow people to be themselves, whatever that means, and to be safe in the community. It means investing, as the government is, but it also means thinking about leadership.

I learnt a really important lesson in my first six months here, in 2016. I arrived in Canberra bright-eyed, bushy-tailed and full of good ideas, and I was shocked to discover that the then government's main legislative priority—which consumed the then government party room, with Peter Dutton and Scott Morrison and the whole rotten cabal of the IPA—was to weaken the Racial Discrimination Act. That's what they came to Canberra to do. They don't like to talk about that now because the Labor Party worked with the Jewish community and the multicultural communities of this country to fight and stop the then Liberal government weakening the Racial Discrimination Act. It's a shameful moment in our history, and the leadership lesson I learnt then was that the words that are said in this parliament and the things that leaders do in this country have real-world impacts. What we saw with that rotten government—and the now opposition leader was right at the heart of this nasty little tawdry campaign—was a spike in racism. People with black skin got abused on public transport. In my community, Muslim women had headscarves ripped off. Sikh guys had their turbans ripped off. Jewish people were bagged in the street for showing the articles of their faith. The leadership lesson I took was: 'Don't be like the Liberal Party. Don't try to divide the community and chase votes based on dog whistling.' Sadly, that's what we're seeing. The Attorney-General rightly described the Leader of the Opposition's disgusting attempts to politicise antisemitism and chase votes as grotesque.

It's a serious issue, and I know the member for Wentworth and the member for Macnamara over there feel this as much as or more than anyone in this parliament, given what you two have experienced in your community. It's a serious issue, and it shouldn't be politicised. They call for laws on doxxing. They don't like to talk about the fact they voted against the laws on doxxing last year, despite calling for them. Despite the fact they're still trying to claim credit for them, they actually voted against them. So let's see where their vote lands this time. They weren't in favour of this legislation late last year. Let's see how they vote now. The strains on our social cohesion are real. The horrific series of antisemitic incidents in capital cities is probably the most visible sign of that. But there are other forms of discrimination.

There's racism. The Anti-Racism Framework released by the Human Rights Commission last year called that out. In my community, I don't have a large Jewish community, though I was mayor of a council, I think in the member for Macnamara's electorate, which has the largest Jewish community. We have old and close connections with the conservative and the progressive elements of the Jewish community, if you want to call it that, despite some of the rubbish that gets written in certain media outlets. But in my community, it's Islamophobia. We've seen, since the conflict in the Middle East, more public abuse and personal intimidation of mainly Muslim women going about their business. They'll be shopping with their kids and get abused in the street. There's homophobia. It's all the forms of discrimination that this bill seeks to address. The government is committed to protecting the entire community from those who want to promote extremism or hatred or incite violence. There's no place for that stuff in our diverse society—none whatsoever.

As I said, I decry the politicisation of this. I'll touch on some aspects of the bill. Actually, no, I just want to say a little more on that point on social cohesion. The Scanlon Foundation's work is actually the longest-running longitudinal study examining social cohesion that we've found anywhere in the world. It's not perfect—people can critique the methodology, and that's perfectly legitimate—but the fact that it's longitudinal, even if you want to argue about the questions, means it does give you a year-on-year comparison to see how things are going. To be glass-half-full, what it showed last year was actually no change in the headline measure of social cohesion. Pleasingly, despite all of the strains on society, the percentage of Australians who support our multicultural society, support its character and celebrate their identity as Australians didn't show a major change. I think it went from about 85 to 81. That's a canary in the coalmine. You don't want to see that stuff go down.

But what we did see was a significant rise in the number of Australians holding antisemitic views, and, actually, an even more significant rise in the number of Australians holding Islamophobic views. That's what the data said. They're two particular indices that, for obvious reasons, they've measured for some years. We saw a correlating rise in negative attitudes towards people of faith generally. We've unpicked that a bit. We did it informally. I've talked a bit about this in speeches. The reality of life in modern Australia is that global conflicts and global events do impact daily life here. We're a globally connected society. What happens in the world impacts our communities, be it through family, friends, loved ones, social media, care for homelands and so on. That said the vast majority of Australians don't want global conflicts to rip apart our society. I've called out repeatedly what the Greens political party have done, spreading lies and active disinformation. Again, at the other side of the political spectrum, they've trying to profit electorally, harvest a few votes—it has been a difficult time to govern. We're standing in the centre of that and trying to, I think, do what the vast majority of Australians want, which is not to divide our society and not to see our workplaces, schools, sporting clubs, public transport and public events divided by a global conflict because people in the Liberal Party on the one hand and the Greens political party on the other want to try and chase a few votes by weaponising this conflict here. The vast majority of Australians sit in the middle.

It's also true, I think, that most Australians think: 'Not my cup of tea, mate. You do your thing; I'll do mine.' But they don't like to see faith groups fighting. That's not part of our tradition. I think some of that rise in negative attitudes is actually explained by what is a pretty benign and decent response: 'Just don't bring that stuff here. We don't want to see the fight. You have your view; I'll have mine. We can talk about it.' We need to rediscover the art, in our diverse society, of disagreeing agreeably. I pay tribute to those interfaith leaders who are quietly looking at ways to start to bridge those gaps and restart some dialogue. It's been one of the saddest things to see—the breakdown of decades-old interfaith relationships over this conflict.

As Minister Burke has said, if ever there were a time for the Muslim incantation—inshallah or God willing—it would be in response to the ceasefire and the current cessation of overt hostilities in the Middle East. Let's hope, for the sake of people in Israel, the occupied Palestinian territories and Lebanon who are affected by this conflict, as well as Australians, that that holds. That's a bit of context.

I think this is a really important bill. I think it goes to that first part of the success ingredient for a multicultural society—that we need to constantly review and, where necessary, strengthen the legal foundations and the protections for Australians whatever their background. To me, the great promise of Australian multiculturalism is that great Australian promise of a fair go —that everyone gets a chance to fulfil their human potential and live their life in our country free from discrimination no matter their faith, their ethnicity, their circumstances, how long they've been here or their identity. That's what this bill is about—protecting Australians. I commend it to the House, and I hope, as the ASIO boss said, we can lower the temperature.

Josh Burns (Macnamara, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I remember where I was on 7 October when the news came in of the potential terrorist attacks in Israel. No-one really had any sense of what was going on at the time; no-one understood the scale. It was only as the hours unfolded that we started to understand exactly what had happened. I don't want to focus this speech on the Middle East, but I do think it's important to start there because that was the turning point of things changing here in Australia. I do think that was a turning point where tensions were heightened in Australia and where people started to judge each other and to turn on each other based on what their views were on this particular conflict. I think that we didn't see the human sides of each other and that we took sides against each other. We saw it on our streets. We saw it in the heightened sense of conflict and the heightened sense of division within Australian society.

Unfortunately, what we have seen not only in Australia but in other Western countries around the world is that, as a repercussion of those tensions and of those legitimate anxieties people are feeling being played out in illegitimate ways, the Jewish community of Australia has been the target of a rise in antisemitism that has frankly rocked my community to its core. It has rocked the Jewish people of Australia to their core.

This country is a country that has built so much confidence, prosperity, freedom and opportunity and has enabled people to contribute to this wonderful country of ours. But it is not possible to do that when there is vilification. It is not possible to do that when there is hate. It is not possible to do that when people are afraid in the ways I have seen of late. We need to fix this.

I said in the other chamber that we need to fix this, and this bill, the Criminal Code Amendment (Hate Crimes) Bill 2024, is an important step forward in saying what is acceptable by law in this country and what is not. As it stands, this bill is an important step forward that says: 'If you want to create violence and attack someone on the basis of a component of their identity, that is against the law. That will be against the law, and there will be a criminal penalty that will be attached to that act.' That does not exist in Australia right now—that, if you want to incite violence against particular groups, you could be charged by the police and put in prison. Right now, a lot of the potential harm that is done is done under civil legislation. This is a significant step forward towards criminal penalties. I understand there are discussions going on across the parliament around the final formation of this bill. I would make the point that, with this bill, we want to make sure we are doing a couple of things. One is that whatever we agree to as a parliament, it sticks—that the legislation is not one that is repealed from government to government but that all sides of politics are committed to upholding a standard of stamping out hatred and division in our society, together for the future. We don't want this to be a political contest. I know the Attorney-General is leading those negotiations at this current moment with the coalition and with the crossbench. I want to also mention the member for Wentworth, who has put forward an amendment that I think is absolutely worthy of consideration. I understand these are complicated negotiations and that there are a range of considerations that we do and do not have control over as backbenchers in the parliament, but I wanted to put it on record that I know the member for Wentworth has witnessed the community that she is the representative of—and the community that is the sister community to mine—go under such intolerable pain and hurt and fear. She has come to this place with a suggestion around how to ensure we lift the standards of how we talk to each other and how we show the standards of hate, discrimination and vilification are removed. Whether we end up supporting that amendment or not will be a collective decision, but, personally, I wanted to say that—though I will accept the collective decision of the government—here and now, I think the amendments moved by the member for Wentworth show a real dedication to representing her community. It is what her community wants, and they can rightly be grateful for her efforts in this.

I wish we weren't here, in this place, talking about vilification and hate speech. I can't even begin to tell you that that is the last thing I wanted to do when coming into this place. I feel a deep sense of responsibility to my community. I feel a deep sense of responsibility to the people who have seen the most unimaginable pain over the last 15 months. But when I came into this place, I had visions on policies around housing, climate change and energy. I want to see mental health support for people in this country improved. They are the passions that I have, as well as ensuring that opportunity is spread across this country for migrant families just like mine who came to this country. It wasn't to be facing the rise in antisemitism like we have. I would also make this point—and I know this has been a point of great contention and sadness and frustration for some people—vilification is not a competition. Hatred is not a competition. If there's any form of hatred, we all lose. I know there are people who will be protected by this legislation who have not had as much media attention but still are extremely fearful at the moment, including the LGBTIQ community. I've spoken to the Special Envoy to Combat Islamophobia, and he has spoken to me and advised me about the sort of work he's doing to try and support his community as well. I think that is an important objective. I fully support that as well. It is not a competition, and we want to stamp out all forms of hate. But that's not why I came to this place. I want to see Australia restored, so we're not talking about the division in our society, and we're not talking about how people are being targeted—we're certainly not talking about childcare services being burnt down. We're not talking about schools being spray-painted with graffiti. We're not talking about cars and caravans being found with explosives in them. We're not talking about synagogues in my electorate being burnt down. We're not talking about my electorate office being targeted and my staff's place of work being completely smashed in, vandalised and made uninhabitable for months. I don't want to be talking about any of that. I want us to come into this place and show unity and resolve so that we in this country target the acts of hate and violence, stamp it out, set the standards of what is and isn't acceptable in this country and show that Australia is a united force and is not going to accept what is going on in our streets right now because that's what this ultimately is about.

We have seen throughout history these dark corners of the community come into the mainstream. Antisemitism has existed in Australia since its inception, since there were Jews here. Antisemitism has existed in golf clubs, in theatres and in a range of institutions where Jews were excluded from even participating. The whole reason the Cranbourne Golf Club was set up was because Jewish people in Melbourne were not allowed to join Royal Melbourne Golf Club. Thankfully, that's changed. I'm not a member of Royal Melbourne and not a good enough golfer to ever expect to be one, but the point is that throughout the history of the Jewish community post Holocaust, there have been places where the Jewish community has not been able to fully participate. But on the whole Jews have been safe in Australia.

Unfortunately, what we have seen since 7 October 2023 is a rise in community anger and in community dissent and division, which has created a perfect cover and smokescreen for the sorts of people who want to see antisemitism brought to the mainstream. We have seen neo-Nazis marching in the middle of Melbourne, marching in South Australia and marching on the streets outside our parliaments. People who are espousing white supremacy are outside our place of proud multicultural democracy. It is an affront to what we are as a country, and we have seen these sorts of hate-fuelled ideologies and inciteful and discriminatory ideas being brought into the mainstream of society before. That is where we are right now.

The question isn't whether or not we stand idly by and what our country does. The question we must confront is: what are we going to do about it? How firmly will we stand together to say this is not going to happen in our name? We cannot stamp this out completely. I wish we could, and we should definitely aim for that, but what we can do is ensure that together, in this place as leaders of our country in this moment, we stand up proudly for what Australia stands for. We are a multicultural country. We are a migrant country. We are a place where we spread opportunity and we spread equality amongst all our citizens equally. We say that everyone is equal before Australian law, that everyone deserves to be in this country free from discrimination and vilification and hatred, that every single person has a right to practice their faith and religion free from persecution and vilification, that every single person has a right to return to their homes safely without it being spray-painted or vilified in the way in which we have seen and that every single Australian has the right to participate fully in Australian life without the fear of being targeted for being who they are. That is the Australia that I signed up to. That is the Australia that gave my family and my grandparents a home after they were kicked out of their previous homes in Europe. That is the Australia that I believe in. That is the Australia that makes me proud to be a representative in this incredible house of democracy.

This bill is not one I wanted to ever conceive of, but it is an important step forward to meet this moment and to set the standards of what is and is not acceptable in this country. No person of any race, religion, nationality, national or ethnic origin, political opinion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, intersex status or disability should feel anything other than equality before the law, and that is what this bill does. If you are going to try to incite hatred and violence against those people, you will be charged and potentially convicted under our criminal law. We might not be able to stamp out every discussion and conversation in this country. We might not be able to restore everything overnight. But what we can say is that, in the mainstream of our society, in the suburbs that we are all proud to represent, we will not tolerate this.

I love this country. I love Australia. I love the fact that I am a proud Australian, and I am also a proud Jewish Australian. I'm proud of my community. I understand how much they are hurting right now. I understand that we have not yet confronted this in my lifetime. I understand that people want to see action, and that is exactly what this bill is. I understand that the Jewish community is not asking for special treatment; they are asking for safety. They are asking for the exact same treatment that they used to have and to be the same as every other member of the Australian community. They want to ensure that their kids can go to school, that their littlest kids can go to child care, that they can go to synagogue and that they can worship and practise their faith in exactly the way that they have been doing for hundreds of years. This bill is a step forward in ensuring that we as a parliament take the clearest of stances to make sure that we respond to the moment, respond to the vilification and hate and say, 'Not in our name.' We say, 'Not in Australia's name.' We say that this is not the Australia that we support, that this has no place in Australia and that, in Australia, if you want to incite violence against another group, then you will face the full force of the law.

Josh Wilson (Fremantle, Australian Labor Party, Assistant Minister for Climate Change and Energy) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I'm glad to speak on the Criminal Code Amendment (Hate Crimes) Bill 2024 and to follow such a great contribution from my friend, the member for Macnamara, and before him the members for Bruce and Spence. As the member for Macnamara said—I think quite rightly—none of us, as legislators, particularly want to spend time focused on legislation like this, because legislation like this is responding to something that we don't want to see in Australia. We don't want to see division. We don't want to see discrimination and bigotry. And we certainly don't want to see the things that can flow from that way of thinking and that kind of behaviour, which is violence and making people fear violence. That's unacceptable.

At the outset, I'd make the point—I think it's an obvious point—that the greatest protection against violence and other hateful conduct that can flow from particular kinds of extreme bigotry and prejudice will not be legislative. The greatest protection will be cultural. The greatest protection is all of us working all the time—every member of the community—to foster, build, maintain and enhance the qualities that have generally prevailed in Australia: tolerance, inclusion, multicultural acceptance and diversity, care for one another and care for broader, shared wellbeing. Those cultural elements and values of Australia are the most potent protections against discrimination and bigotry and the things that flow from them. But we nevertheless need protections—legislative and through law enforcement, which is Australia's capacity to follow and enforce those legislative precepts—to guarantee the safety of the community and, in some ways, to reinforce what I said about the importance of culture to set those normative standards. What this bill does is take those standards and that capacity for law enforcement to provide further protection in response to the circumstances that have arisen in recent times.

Those circumstances have been extremely concerning. As almost everyone who has contributed to this debate has acknowledged, no-one in Australia should face the fear of violence or be on the receiving end of other kinds of hateful conduct because of their race, religion, nationality or national ethnic origin, political opinion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, intersex status or disability. Nobody should face the most harmful and extreme kinds of discrimination because of their identity, because of who they are. When we see examples of hateful conduct and violence that has antisemitism at its root cause, we should be gravely concerned. Antisemitism is one of the oldest and most harmful kinds of prejudice that human beings have ever fallen prey to. We've seen that in this country and we've seen it more particularly elsewhere, particularly in the 20th century in the form of the Holocaust. We need to be mindful that that kind of discrimination will never entirely disappear, and when it manifests, when it appears, we need to be clear-eyed about it and respond to it. Jewish people in Australia should not feel unsafe or threatened—and nor should anyone—as a result of their membership of a group defined by all those characteristics I just mentioned.

If we are genuine in this place, and if we are genuine in our roles as representatives and, frankly, as community leaders, we have to make sure that our conduct and our words are consistent with what I said about that broader cultural peace when it comes to peacefulness, non-violence, social inclusion and tolerance. That hasn't always been the case. It concerns me that, when the events on October 7 commenced—the terrible conflict in the Middle East that went on far too long and harmed far too many people unnecessarily—at the outset of that conflict, when people stood up and called for restraint there were other people, including other people in this place, who said that calling for restraint was wrong. As if there can ever be a time when someone speaking up against violence and someone speaking up for a greater and faster move towards a cessation of violence and a return to peacefulness—as if there can ever be a wrong time for that sentiment to be expressed.

While we make these new strengthened arrangements, which are entirely consistent with the approach the government's taken—we have been moving very quickly to provide funding for social cohesion, to make sure that places of worship are properly protected, to create the envoys on antisemitism and Islamophobia, to bring in the legislation that we did earlier in the parliament in relation to hate symbology, which was a first, and now to bring along these further strengthened measures—we should remember that what we are trying to combat in general terms is not new. We should remember that we've seen at various times in Australia's history conduct that is similarly hateful and similarly prejudicial. I think that, as we deal with this particular issue, it pays to reflect on other kinds of discrimination that have been present and continue to be present, and to make sure that we're going to be consistent about those things.

The reality is that we have seen violence and relatively large-scale social unrest in this country in this century focused on people because of their faith or their national identity; the Cronulla riots in 2005 come to mind. This was an instance where we saw wide-scale violence and wide-scale hateful targeting of people based on the perception that they were from the Middle East or that they might be of the Islamic faith. As far as I can recall—and if someone has another example, they can make that part of the debate—that would be the most serious kind of prejudicially based violence and civil disorder we've seen in the 21st century. At the time there were people who didn't think that was a particular problem. I think Prime Minister Howard said at the time that he didn't think that there was any reason to be concerned about the racialism and the prejudice that was involved in those terrible events.

As we bring in an arrangement that will make sure that hatefulness, the advocacy of violence and the threatening of violence through prejudicial hatefulness against people for a range of general characteristics—race, religion, nationality, political opinion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity and so on—I think it's worth remembering and having the courage to be honest enough with ourselves to acknowledge that the most harmful form of that in Australia's history is prejudice against First Nations people. There's just no question whatsoever that the history of Australia involves more harm, violence and hateful conduct towards First Nations people than towards any other group. We should be able to be honest about that and apply ourselves to making sure that that kind of prejudice is called out and combatted at every opportunity.

While I support moves to strengthen the ability of law enforcement to combat the most dangerous form of bigotry—bigotry that leads to violence or threats of violence towards people based on their identity—I acknowledge that we should always make these kinds of changes carefully. When responding, as we should, to discrimination and hateful conduct, there will always be a risk that, in seeking to combat a particular problem, we create other issues. It goes to the point that my friend the member for Bruce was making earlier about the balance of things like freedom of speech on the one hand and people's right to live free from fear on the other hand. It's perhaps easy in these circumstances for everyone to lean in to the part of this kind of undertaking that is about stopping kinds of conduct and enabling law enforcement to focus on people who present harm. But I think it's responsible to remember that what is almost always involved in these kinds of measures has the potential to infringe on other freedoms that we regard, rightly, as being very precious.

We have had laws in the past that were, for instance, around the threat of terrorism, and it's quite right that we took those measures. But when we did them, we often said, 'This is starting to move the line when it comes to people's right to have access to legal advice or to not be searched without a warrant,' and a whole range of other things that are core to our civil liberties and core to the basic freedoms that we have in Australia. We should transgress into those areas very, very cautiously and give ourselves the opportunity to look carefully at how they work in operation. We obviously want them to be effective when it comes to combating hatefulness, the risk of violence and the application of that kind of prejudice. But, if we find that there are these other consequences with respect to people's freedoms and civil liberties, we should reflect and make adjustments as appropriate. That's why, often when we've made these changes, there've been aspects that have involved a review. There've been aspects that have given us the chance, as a parliament and as a community, to say, 'Is that, first and foremost, doing the job that we need it to do to protect Australians from hatefulness, violence and prejudice, but, on the other hand, are there aspects of it that are, in an unhelpful way, starting to transgress on other important freedoms and liberties that are core to what it means to be an Australian?'

Fundamentally, at a difficult time, when the temperature is high as far as division, a lack of cohesion and a sense that there's this febrile atmosphere that puts people under threat and at risk—particularly, recently, members of the Jewish community but not just members of the Jewish community—it's right that government and parliament take responsible action. As I said, we have done that in a very timely and responsive way at every opportunity over the last 18 months, and we're doing that again now.

There have been people who have been part of this conversation who I think, frankly, at times have not been so much focused on the reality of the problem and the reality of the solution but have, sadly, sought to fan the flames of division, turn up the heat and create a more febrile atmosphere and a sense of argy-bargy, including political argy-bargy, because they think that that suits them. They think it suits them to create that sense of 'us and them', that sense of chaos. I hope that people who have engaged in that or might engage in that in the future reflect carefully because the truth is that, when there is a lot of intemperate, divisive, extreme, aggressive, adversarial language, accusations and behaviour thrown around, it actually produces exactly the kind of thing that we're trying to stop. It's incumbent on everyone who is a representative, a legislator and a leader in the community to practise peacefulness, tolerance, cohesion, engagement and civil respect. The more that we see that, the less we will need these kinds of changes.

Shayne Neumann (Blair, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

In the 1970s and 1980s, great Labor figures like Gough Whitlam, Bill Hayden, Lionel Murphy, Don Dunstan and Susan Ryan led the charge for tolerance and acceptance of people of different genders, sexualities, races and ethnicities. We saw incredible pieces of legislation come in during the Whitlam era and the Hawke era. One of those pieces of legislation, which dates back to 1975, is the Racial Discrimination Act. Section 18C makes it unlawful for someone to do an act that is reasonably likely to offend, insult, humiliate or intimidate someone because of their race or ethnicity. But, as previous speakers have talked about, there's always a balance, and we've got section 18D of that particular piece of legislation containing exemptions for the protection of freedom of speech. I thought that we'd gone through those kinds of debates in Australia in the last half a decade. There were a lot of debates about the right to be a bigot, so to speak, and I thought we had progressed as a country in a more tolerant, accepting and loving way.

In my faith tradition as a Christian, the second greatest commandment is to love your neighbour as yourself, and that's a positive thing. It doesn't matter if you're a Catholic, a Protestant or a Pentecostal; it's to love your neighbour as yourself. That kind of provision in Scripture is found in all the major monotheistic religions and so many others. It is incumbent on those of us of faith and of no faith to think about the fact that we have a common humanity. Faith is expressed in many different ways. I'm reading a book at the moment by Peter Ackroyd called The English Soul. It's about the growth of the Christian church in the United Kingdom. But what really strikes me in the history is how, in that period of time, we had a greater understanding of tolerance. It wasn't always the case back in the days of Henry VIII, Elizabeth I, the Reformation and the like, but I thought we had progressed in Australia. I thought we had got through a lot of this.

It is sad that we've got this legislation, the Criminal Code Amendment (Hate Crimes) Bill 2024, before us. I applauded the Attorney-General in 2023, when the government introduced the Counter-Terrorism Legislation Amendment (Prohibited Hate Symbols and Other Measures) Bill 2023, which passed after some amendments. I was pleased that we made amendments to the Criminal Code. We introduced offences related to displaying or trading in hate symbols such as Nazi symbols. I know the Attorney-General, when introducing this particular bill, talked about that tolerant society to which I referred. He talked about the new and expanded offences introduced in this bill as a response:

… to the increasing prevalence of hate speech and hateful conduct in our society—

particularly in light of recent global events.

In my home state of Queensland, the Jewish community has made an enormous contribution. It's a lot smaller in Brisbane than it is in Sydney and Melbourne, but its contribution to business, to law, to academia, to sport and to cultural life, to the arts and to community is immense. I'm so proud to have stood on numerous occasions with the Jewish community in Queensland to oppose intolerance and antisemitism.

The legislation that we have before the chamber today is an unfortunate necessity. There is always a balance between prescriptive conduct, proscribing conduct and freedom of speech. Before I talk specifically on this particular bill, I remember an unforgettable experience I had some years ago. My family came to Australia in the 1880s from Germany with the surname Neumann. They came here fleeing persecution. They were poor. They were religious. They were a minority. They came here and settled in Ipswich, in the Lockyer Valley. That's on my dad's side. My mother's side came from poor people who were virtually Levellers, as they used to call them, in England and from the McLeods in the Highlands of Scotland. They were persecuted people. I thought my generation would never see this sort of persecution of other people. I never thought we would. I never thought it would happen. My ancestors made lives for themselves, they did okay and they prospered. One of their descendants is even a federal MP!

But I remember being in Yad Vashem in Jerusalem, in the Holocaust museum, some years ago. I happened to be in a party and I was separated from them. I was there with my German surname, there by myself really, when I wandered into a group of Israeli conscripts. All these people were young enough to be my children. There they were, being taught about the historical experience of the Holocaust and what they had gone through. For them it was a real life-living experience. For me it was a shock. And it's one of those experiences I'll never forget because I thought if my ancestors had not come from various parts of Prussia and Berlin and Hamburg and the like, where would I have been? What would have happened? Would I have been caught up in that conflict with my parents and my grandparents? It was a really pivotal moment in my personal and political and even spiritual experience.

We must never ever forget the Holocaust. We must never ever forget the six million Jewish people who were slaughtered by the Nazis. And there were other minority groups as well—Gypsies, homosexuals and so many other groups. And let's not forget all those people who bravely stood up against militarism, against fascism and, of course, against Nazism.

I remember being in Trafalgar Square as part of a parliamentary delegation to London last year. There were huge demonstrations outside of where we were staying. I remember seeing Nazi symbols amongst so many of the demonstrators. I remember seeing them and being shocked that antisemitism was there on display—shocked! We have seen those types of Nazi symbols and that type of antisemitism expressed not just overseas in the United Kingdom and other countries like ours but also in our universities, schools and workplaces, on the sporting field and elsewhere. These are places where people, because of their Jewish faith, background and belief system, have been persecuted, abused and the recipients of violence—all because of their faith and ethnicity. It is a disgrace and abhorrence that Australia in the 21st century should have this occurring.

It is just terrible—and I use the word terrible in inverted commas—that we must do this legislation, but we need to set very firm guidelines. Legislative changes are not just to be implemented; they have a moral force and efficacy like that legislation I talked about—the Racial Discrimination Act—and those giants of the Labor movement I referred to before. This legislation is a statement about what we believe and what we will not accept in this country against any group, Jewish or otherwise. So I want to express my fulsome support for the legislation and go on record to say exactly what this legislation will do in the remaining five minutes of my speech.

The bill creates a new criminal offence or offences, strengthening the Criminal Code—which already has some things in there—and extending specific protections to persons who are targeted due to their race, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, intersex status, disability, nationality, ethnic origin or political opinion. These are called protective attributes in the legislation. The bill also goes on to strengthen existing offences for urging the use of force, and it takes away that, can I say, intentionality, and brings in an offence of recklessness with respect to the criminal activity. What I mean by that is it provides for an offence that is committed where a person is reckless as to whether the violence urged will occur, lowered from the existing requirement that the person intended for the violence urged to occur. It removes the application of the defence of good faith—how can defence of good faith be there when you're actually urging violence? It extends protections to persons distinguished by sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, intersex status or disability, and this is in addition to those protected attributes I referred to before. It creates a new criminal offence for threatening the use of force or violence against a group or a member of a group distinguished by protected attributes. It also amends the existing offences for the public display of prohibited hate symbols in the Criminal Code, which I referred to earlier, and the provisions make it an offence to publicly display prohibitive hate symbols or make the Nazi gesture in public, including where the display of the symbol or use of the gesture is likely to offend, insult, humiliate or intimidate a member of a group distinguished by protected attributes.

I say that members of the Jewish community and, indeed, members of other communities living in the Middle East including people who are Palestinian and people of an Arab background should not be discriminated against and have violence inflicted on them on the basis of their faith, whether they're Christian or Islamic or Jewish or any faith whatsoever. That is intolerable and unacceptable.

The legislation here makes a difference. It shows what we believe as parliamentarians and as a parliament. I hope it is passed in a bipartisan way and the crossbench fully support it. I hope it gets through, because it will say something. It's not just a legislative change; it will have that moral force behind it. We cannot allow people to claim not just that they're bigots—the so-called right to be a bigot—but that they have a right to perpetrate and perpetuate hate in our community and express that in a violent way on schools and synagogues, on mosques and temples or on churches and other places of faith just because they disagree with those persons.

One of the greatest men in history is Dietrich Bonhoeffer, who stood up against Nazism. He went back to America, then from America back to Germany. He could have stayed in academia and pastoral care but he went back to Germany to stand up for his faith, and he died near the end of World War II as a symbol of what it means to be a true Christian: a man of peace, a man of tolerance, a man of charity, a man of love. Dietrich Bonhoffer stood against this kind of intolerance because, as he said on numerous occasions: 'If they come first for the Jewish community, they'll come for then the Christians. And they'll come then for the trade unions and the politicians.'

If you go to the German parliament, you will see in the German parliament a book. If you open that book—and on the wall are bullet holes from the Russian bullets—there are the names of Christian Democrats and Social Democrats—politicians—all who died at the hands of the Nazis. They were either killed or put in gulags—concentration camps—and killed within the first few years of Hitler's abolishment of their parliament. The Christian Democrats are the equivalent of the LNP. The Social Democrats are the equivalent of the Labor Party.

This is not some academic exercise. This is about standing against extremism in any form of all, and a demonstration that legislation can be passed not just to say, 'We're going to protect our community,' but to show that the opposite of hate is love, and that we should love one another as our faith demands—whether we're Christians, Jewish, or Islamic. I commend this legislation to the chamber.

The Federation Chamber transcript was published up to 19:32. The remainder of the transcript will be published on Thursday 6 February 2025.