Pauline Hanson (Queensland, Pauline Hanson's One Nation Party) Share this | Hansard source

I rise to speak on the increasing attacks on Australia's traditional freedoms. I know a lot of people in this place like to deny it, but there are an ever-increasing number of attacks on Australia's traditional freedoms. Whether that is our freedom of speech, freedom of religion, the right to have a laugh, the right to celebrate the holidays you want to celebrate, equal rights for parents, the right to a fair go—and I could go on—these traditional freedoms are under attack. Many Australians feel like they are experiencing a cultural invasion as our schools, universities, government departments, political parties, media and even major corporations are overrun by a rabid new left-wing ideology often referred to as cultural Marxism.

I have many Australians tell me they no longer recognise the towns where they grew up. They feel like they are losing their country and their way of life. They are worried they won't be able to give their children or their grandchildren the same standard of living they had. Australians are worried about this and they are right to be worried. If we keep going down this path, we will no longer be able to call Australia the Lucky Country or the land of the fair go. That's why One Nation has been such a strong supporter of the traditional Western values that made Australia the greatest country on earth.

Just the other day One Nation's leader in New South Wales, Mark Latham, announced a policy designed to protect Australia's traditional freedoms and address the very issue we are debating here today. Let me read you some extracts from the New South Wales One Nation policy for uniting Australians as one nation. There is a section on defending individual freedom that says:

We hear a lot about 'minorities' in politics, but the smallest minority in any society is the individual. One Nation is committed to defending the rights of the individual. We believe in judging people by their personal character and work ethic, by their contribution to Australia and Australian values. We believe in talking honestly about these issues, free from the suffocating PC-censorship of the identity-Left.

One Nation strongly opposes the Left's attack on personal freedom, its attempt to control society by controlling our language, feelings and behaviour.

The policy also talks about stopping segregation and discrimination, arguing that we are losing one of the best things about our country: the sense of fairness and the great Australian tradition of rewarding those who work hard and seek self-improvement. The Left used to argue that racism and other forms of discrimination were plain wrong. Now they practise them against straight white males. They have created new forms of discrimination, supposedly to overcome old forms of discrimination—a self-defeating strategy. This has inevitably produced bitterness, division and unfairness in our society. It is also entrenching the evil of segregation, separating Australians from each other on the basis of race, gender, sexuality and religion.

There is even a section on reforming human rights law, a subject I know One Nation's New South Wales leader, Mark Latham, is very passionate about. It reads in part as follows:

Reforming human rights law … requires a fundamental rethink of human rights law at State and Federal level. New policies are needed to bring Australians together and restore fairness to our public and civic life.

The job of government is to adhere to the constitution, rule of law and the economic stability of the country. It is not their job to tell people how to run their businesses or their lives.