Sam Dastyari (NSW, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

Well, it keeps changing! But what it represents is this: this is a desperate government. This is a government with nothing left. This is a government whose internal wranglings, fights and disputes have now so dominated their ability to make any kind of decision—any kind of decision—that all they have left is cheap stunts and attacks. This is a government whose strategy—look, you may as well lay it bare—is this: 'We have to go and try and discredit our opponents as much as possible because our current policy agenda is no longer electable.' And it becomes more and more desperate. It becomes more and more unhinged.

What you have is a government made up of two parties who are now just chasing the far right of Australian politics. What you have now is a National Party that is chasing One Nation. You know, Senator Hanson came into this chamber today and congratulated the National Party on following her policy lead. I'm not one who would normally agree with Senator Hanson in this chamber, but I think that, on that point, she is correct. The hypocrisy—that the same party, the National Party, that would come into this chamber and argue against same-sex marriage on the basis of its infringement on religious liberties would come and use their conference to argue for a banning of the burqa! The hypocrisy of that!

Let's be clear: I'm not a fan of the burqa; that's the type of Islam that I've always rejected; I'm not a fan of that. But I believe in religious liberty. I believe in freedom. And I believe that freedom sometimes means freedom for things that one doesn't necessarily like. To argue against same-sex marriage on the basis of religious liberty and then, at the same time, turn around and argue against garments or dress that you don't particularly like shows a level of hypocrisy that is preposterous. But I digress.