Ralph Babet (Victoria, United Australia Party) Share this | Hansard source

Yet another Captain Cook statue has been vandalised in my home state of Victoria. Masked idiots, claiming that Cook the explorer was responsible for colonisation, used an angle grinder to cut down his monument in Fitzroy Gardens. It didn't matter to them that Cook was an explorer, not a coloniser, nor did it matter that Cook died nine years before those aboard the First Fleet ever set foot on Australian soil. On the path beside the fallen Cook statue, they spray-painted the words, 'The colony must fall.' In other words, these activists believe that Australia must fall. They posted a video of their seditious behaviour on social media, urging others to join them in their horrendous behaviour. But it's worse than horrendous; it's seditious. It's treasonous. These activists are urging the overthrow of our nation, and they are happy to trash the joint in pursuit of their goal.

It's time we got serious with these scumbags. Can you imagine any other country tolerating these people or putting up with their behaviour? You know what? I'd be in favour of corporal punishment, done in public, to shame and humiliate these louts. There is no better, freer or more generous nation on the planet than this one right here. We ought not to tolerate being white-anted from within. If you are working for the overthrow of our country, as these activists by their own admission are, then you should be punished severely. You know what? Flog them in the public square. A previous generation might have done that and, if we have any self-respect left, that's exactly what we should do to these ungrateful louts as well.