Cory Bernardi (SA, Australian Conservatives) Share this | Hansard source

I want to come back to what the Attorney said earlier in reference to the Oxford dictionary. I managed to have the dictionary definition of 'harass' here. It says that 'harass', the verb, means 'subject to aggressive pressure or intimidation'—we are not dealing with intimidation. Then 1.1 is 'to make repeated small-scale attacks'. I come back to this point, Attorney. I accept your explanation about not being present in dealing with social media and electronic communications; however, I am struggling with the concept of 'harass' in the singular. All the dictionaries that I have consulted make it quite plain that it is about repeated attacks or ongoing harassment. I seek comfort because, at the moment, I am struggling to support this in the event that someone puts up a single tweet or a single Facebook post or sends a single email or there is a single instance that someone finds annoying, and that constitutes harassment under the definition or under the amendment that you are proposing in this bill.