Andrew Bartlett (Queensland, Australian Democrats) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I want to speak about an issue that has been debated today and last night in this chamber and in the wider community—that is, commentary by senior members of this government, and by others in the Australian community, targeted specifically at Muslim Australians. At the outset, I want to emphasise that nobody disputes the benefits of people who come to this country integrating effectively, and nobody disputes the benefits of learning English. But what should also not be disputed is the cumulative consequences of the range of comments made by the Prime Minister, Mr Howard, and more particularly by his senior acolytes, such as Mr Costello and Mr Downer, and others down the ranks. The damage being done to the Australian community, and the hostility that has been generated, is potentially very severe—and that too should be beyond dispute.

Mr Howard is widely recognised as one of this country’s experts at dog whistling. He is very good at giving very precise statements that he can step away from, point to in isolation and say, ‘How can anybody disagree with that?’ As I said, I do not disagree with the literal content of much of what he has said, but I do disagree with the specific and deliberate isolation of applying those common-sense principles specifically to Muslims as if they are somehow more at fault in this regard than everybody else.

Whilst Mr Howard is good at dog whistling, two other points need to be made: firstly, when you blow the same dog whistle more than once, it becomes louder and louder; and, secondly, whilst Mr Howard might be blowing the dog whistle, Mr Costello, Mr Downer and others are breaking out the full brass band. I do not know if it is just that they are less clever, more clumsy and more crass, or whether this is part of a deliberate strategy to allow Mr Howard to look a bit more statesmanlike at the top. Whatever it is, it is not feasible to have all Mr Howard’s lieutenants and backbenchers continually repeat and reinforce a range of messages which home in on Muslims and for Mr Howard to then say: ‘What’s the problem? It’s nothing to do with me. Of course we are not attacking Muslims!’ He cannot disassociate himself from the cumulative actions of the multitude of members of his government who repeat and reinforce this message.

As I said earlier today to those who get up in this place and in the wider community and insist on getting their particular message across and do the finger-pointing and make all the so-called common-sense observations and demand that the Muslim community stand up more firmly on issues: pause for a bit and actually listen. Listening does not mean you have to agree, but you should at least put yourself in their shoes and try to understand the impact of your comments. The most damning response to Mr Costello’s clear-cut targeting of Australian Muslims, and his offensive and ignorant attacks on Islam in general—and not for the first time—was not Muslim leaders disagreeing and criticising it per se, although they certainly did that. It was a response from Yasser Solomon, President of the Islamic Family and Childcare Agency in Victoria, who is involved with the government’s Muslim Community Reference Group. His response was that Mr Costello had never bothered to talk to them. That, to me, is the most damning response of all. Mr Costello is quite happy to puff his chest up and present himself as the leader in waiting, but he is passing ignorant judgement on people’s most personal beliefs while not even bothering to talk to them. That, to me, particularly from somebody who holds himself up as the prime minister in waiting, is simply unforgivable—and, of course, it is not the first time.

I suggest to Mr Costello and others that they do a bit of listening and a bit of reading as well. Mr Costello commented that Muslims need to make it clear to would-be converts that, when they join the religion, they are not joining a radical political ideology. Imagine if you turned that around and said that to people in any other religion. How patently offensive! We have had continual repetition—and we have had it from Mr Downer as well—that the Muslim community in Australia is not condemning terrorism. How many times do they have to condemn it? If it is 24 hours since they last did it, are they under suspicion again? How offensive can you get—continually telling people that they have to condemn terrorism. Each time you say that, you once again imply that they are somehow associated with it. It is incredibly offensive and it is incredibly destructive. It is not good enough for members of the government to complain about Muslims adopting a victim mentality. It is almost impossible not to adopt a victim mentality when you are being made the victim the whole time—when you are having the finger of blame pointed at you the whole time.

I say to people like Mr Downer: this is a two-way street. Honesty is a two-way street. And openness is a two-way street. If you are continually calling on people in the community to condemn acts of terrorism—completely dismissing the fact that they have done so time and time and time again—and yet you are prepared, as representatives of our nation, to turn a blind eye to major human rights abuses and atrocities by our key allies and by major trading partners, then people do not just get a bit annoyed and think that you are a bit of a hypocrite; people get very angry. When you are dealing with issues like this, it is not very helpful to deliberately make people angry.

Senator Mason in his contribution last night criticised an Islamic leader in Australia, a former chairman of the Australia Federation of Islamic Councils, saying that he was playing ‘the race riot card’ by expressing concern that allowing these sorts of inflammatory comments to keep going might lead to another Cronulla. Ironically, at the start of his speech Senator Mason said that ‘the time for debonair self-censorship is over’ and that it was time to move on from polite topics of conversation at chic dinner parties. I suspect that Senator Mason goes to a lot more chic dinner parties than the average Australian Muslim. When Australian Muslims do not self-censor, when someone says, ‘Look, this is causing problems. This is causing division. We’ve already had the incident in Cronulla which caused headlines around the world. This same sort of thing can cause it again,’ he gets attacked and told that he is playing the race riot card. Whatever happened to free speech and the end to self-censorship and the end to political correctness that Senator Mason proclaimed at the start of his speech? It is the same thing. It is a one-way thing. There is a blanket of political correctness continually put over the entire community. Anything that is deemed to be outside this government’s perceived correct world view is not polite conversation; is not a correct topic; will leave you open to being vilified, slandered and targeted by this government and their mouthpieces in the mainstream media.

So let us have a true end to political correctness. Let us not just shift it from one section of the community to another; let us have a true end to self-censorship. If we do not listen to the reality of the impact of these irresponsible comments made time and time again by government ministers—which always work a treat for them politically—then we cannot act with surprise if more division happens. We all know how the Cronulla riots happened. I suggest that anybody who does not should have a read of David Marr’s article in the Age on 13 December about the way things were whipped up and Alan Jones saying, ‘I’m the person that’s led this charge here,’ reading out the text messages about the gathering at Cronulla coming up that weekend. When people whip up prejudice, these things do have a way of coming back to bite. The role of true leaders is to actually try and reduce prejudice not inflame it for short-term political gain.