Jacqui Lambie (Tasmania, Independent) Share this | Hansard source

I move:

That the Senate take note of the answer given by the Attorney-General (Senator Brandis) to a question without notice asked by Senator Lambie today relating to the provision of assistance to terrorist organisations by Australian citizens.

The Attorney-General, in answering my question without notice today regarding the laying of treason and sedition charges against Australian citizens who have clearly assisted or fought for Islamic State, shows that this Liberal-National government has gone soft on Australian citizens who choose to assist or fight for our enemy, an organisation that calls itself Islamic State, or ISIS. If the Liberal and National parties were fair dinkum about addressing the growing threat of Islamic Australian citizens who clearly are assisting the Islamic State organisation, then the Attorney-General and Australian law enforcement agencies would have laid the serious charges of sedition or treason against any Australian citizen who assists, as the legislation reads, 'by any means whatever'—and I will repeat that: 'by any means whatever'—an organisation that is engaged in armed hostilities against the Australian Defence Force.

The government are quick to say to the Australian people that we need to introduce new laws which take away and undermine basic civil rights to privacy because we need to crack down on Australian citizens who fight for or support the Islamic terrorists who want to kill us. But the government, by the Attorney-General's reply to my questions today, have shown that they are too lazy and stupid, or are trying to win political favour with the Australian Islamic community, by not laying the high-crime charges of treason and sedition against the hundreds, probably thousands, of Islamic Australian citizens who assist or have fought for the butchers of Islamic State.

The law which served previous generations of Australians who fought killers who wanted to impose by force a brutal dictatorship on our nation is clear. Division 80 of the Commonwealth Criminal Code Act 1995 states that any Australian who engages in conduct that assists by any means whatsoever, with intent to assist, another country or an organisation that is engaged in armed hostilities against the Australian Defence Force is guilty of treason and/or sedition and should face seven years to life in jail.

The key question Prime Minister Abbott and Attorney-General Brandis must answer before any new anti-terror laws which take away or undermine basic civil democratic rights pass this Senate is this: why have you failed to use tried and tested existing laws which came into being to protect the majority of law-abiding, proud Australians from these exact circumstances, which are coordinated attacks from a group of dirty, savage, filthy traitors?

The Islamic State supporter who carried out the Sydney siege and brutal killing, as well as being a criminal, was an Australian citizen and clearly an Australian traitor. Man Haron Monis's actions were designed to assist the organisation Islamic State. I would like the people of Tasmania and Australia to consider this set of circumstances that could happen in the future. What if a traitorous Australian citizen like Monis survived a siege after killing Australian citizens? Should that person face a maximum penalty of life in jail or should an Australian jury have the option of imposing the death sentence on a killer, traitor and terrorist supporter? While I normally oppose the death penalty, I say yes to the death penalty for only these circumstances.

In closing: as many will know, I have received a letter and photos from a writer who has threatened to behead me if I do not convert to Islam and support sharia law. It could be a hoax. It could be real. Either way, my message to Islamic State supporters in Australia is clear: get stuffed. I will not be intimidated and I will not be threatened. Anybody who supports and advocates for sharia law, the law of our enemies, should be put behind bars or deported. It is as simple as that.

Question agreed to.