Jacqui Lambie (Tasmania, Jacqui Lambie Network) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The Chinese Communist Party is paying hundreds of thousands of dollars to Australian academics to steal our country's intellectual property. This is just more on the list when it comes to the Chinese Communist Party—what do you know! It's called the Thousand Talents Plan. Australian university lecturers who sign up get flown over to China to share their research and share their knowledge of our latest technological developments with the Chinese government. Communist Party recruiters who sign up our lecturers get paid $40,000 for each person they get on board. What do you know—it had to involve money! They've quietly set up 57 recruitment hubs around the country. Does that not scare anyone? It certainly doesn't in here. But, I'll tell you what: it scares millions of Australians.

They're recruiting from the ANU, the University of Sydney, Monash, the UWA and, of course, the University of Queensland. It's happening everywhere and it has been happening for years. But nobody here in this big, white house wants to talk about it. They don't want to talk about the Chinese Communist Party. God! Don't mention them! Goodness me! We might upset them. Who cares? These people are some of the best we have. They're experts in the latest technology in artificial intelligence, data mining and automation, and our government is letting them share their expertise with the Chinese military. And you want to speak to me about national security! This just keeps getting better in here, I tell you.

Tell me: how does this make any sense? Do we not worry about our national security here in this country anymore? The next time you guys come to me with a plan and need my vote for national security, we're going to have a problem, I reckon. Here we've got the federal government spending an extra $270 billion—that's right, $270 billion—on improving our defence capabilities over the next 10 years. When they made that announcement, it came with a big song and dance, as it usually does—everything you'd expect from you guys over there. But, at the same time, we've got our own experts and researchers going over to work with the Chinese military, and the government says, 'No worries. Nothing to see here.'

As long as the Communist Party keeps the money flowing, they're happy to look the other way, and the universities are doing exactly the same. Mind you, I imagine those universities are feeling the bite from not having those exchange students anymore, I'll tell you now. And probably you actually deserve it. That'll teach you; that'll serve you right. Instead of investing in overseas students, especially those from China, you should have been doing it for those in your own backyard. You universities out there that have been reliant on them, go suck it up, because, quite frankly, you deserve it.

There is a problem with our university system, and there has been for a long time. You have become reliant on the rivers of gold from international students and you have been turning a blind eye to overt Chinese influence. This is where we're supposed to be training our kids. This is where our best ideas are supposed to come from. And what are those unis teaching our students? What are they sharing with our nation's competitors? What you're teaching is not courage. You're not teaching them that. What you're teaching them is: 'Hey, take the money and roll over like a dog.' Apparently that's what we do now. That's what we do when we're frightened of another country. Don't show any leadership; don't show courage. Just roll over, because apparently that's the Australian way for the 21st century.

The fact is that those universities will always put their bottom line first, and they don't care about free speech. It's all about cash. They don't care about academic integrity. That has all gone out the window, and all they care about is keeping the Chinese dollars flowing. That's why the University of New South Wales backed down so fast when they tweeted an article supporting protesters in Hong Kong. How gutless is that? That is so un-Australian. It was up for only a couple of hours before their Chinese Communist Party masters pulled the puppet strings and forced the uni to take it down. How shameful of you. The tweet was deleted and the article mysteriously disappeared from the university website. What a mystery that is, hey!

Universities should be places where different ideas can be expressed and debated, because, once again, that is the Australian way. That's why those in the military, past and present, fought and shed blood, sweat and tears and died for this country—to give it those freedoms. And you're throwing it in their faces. The University of New South Wales pulling that article goes against everything it's supposed to stand for. It's a smack in the face to anyone who cares about free speech in this country. The fact that one of the biggest universities in the country can be bullied by the Chinese Communist Party should scare the hell out of the lot of us.

But it doesn't end there; it keeps getting better. Charles Darwin University apologised—and you're no better either—for an assignment that stated coronavirus originated in China. I don't know where they think it came from but I think we already know; the rest of us know. So who is looking like an idiot? A university that's supposed to be full of academics. Nice one! The university apologised because Chinese students felt the statement was racist, once again teaching our kids in Australia to roll over. For what reason? Because of fear. How is it racist to tell the truth about the origin of this pandemic? How is that racist? Has truthfulness now turned into racism by telling the truth, because China doesn't like it? Who cares? Who cares what China thinks?

We have perfect timing right now with COVID-19 to loosen the strings with them a bit and to stand on our own two feet. My God, the opportunity is staring us in the face. What are we waiting for? I just can't believe that we've allowed ourselves to get to this point. It just makes me feel sick to the stomach, and there'll be plenty of other Australians out there saying the same thing, I can assure you.

These latest incidents prove that our universities are prepared to look the other way as they invite the Chinese Communist Party surveillance state onto their Australian campuses. Aren't you just shameful? Are you teaching anything about national security in there? Maybe it's about time the universities started doing that and doing it in big lots. Start teaching our kids of the future about national security, because, by God, we're going to need it at this rate. We need to toe the line, because they have been propped up by government policies that encourage foreign students to come to Australia and study courses they have no particular interest in. They don't care. Mum and dad are usually paying for them and they pay up-front—isn't that convenient for our universities? Those students know that it's a pathway to residency as well and eventually citizenship. When is all this going to stop?

That is the great unspoken truth of our current university business model, and it is absolutely disgraceful. You are shameful, and that is where we are at. I'm not saying that international students shouldn't come to study here. Things need to change now before our academics and students are forced into invisible gags—although I'd say they're pretty much there. They can't be afraid to speak the truth in case they upset the Chinese Communist Party and end the rivers of gold. That's where we're at.

Everyone can see that we have a problem. It's getting worse and worse every day, yet neither of you major parties has the courage to do anything about it. You are just as shameful. Six times the major parties have voted against Senator Patrick's motion to have a Senate inquiry into our economic reliance on China—six times. Yet you sit here and you talk tough on China. You're ridding, right? You don't want to deal with this problem. You don't want to go there. You might upset them—God forbid. What's going to happen if you upset them? What's going to happen? We'll have to become more self-reliant in our own country. We'll have to start manufacturing again and doing other things. Who needs who—that's what you need to work out. But by continually rolling over like a dog and not standing up and doing it the Australian way, we're going nowhere and the situation will continue to get worse. You might as well just roll over and say, 'Come on in; take over,' because that's where you're just about at. We're just about there.

I can tell you, right now there's a wrecking ball heading our way. Right now, when you say, 'Nothing to see here' when it comes to the Chinese Communist Party, you have got to be absolutely delusional. If you don't have the guts and courage to stand up as the major parties, then maybe you shouldn't be in politics. If you're not putting your country, your kids and our own Aussie students first, then you shouldn't be in this place. You should not be in this place.

Hopefully, when we put the motion back up again, you might actually come to your senses and say: 'You know what? It's not in the best interests of this country not to examine the Chinese Communist Party and put them under the microscope.' Because I want to see some courage coming out of here. I want to see some leadership, and so do our kids of the future. It will make them more resilient. It will make them ready for anything that's put in front of them. But right now the leadership from both these parties when it comes to dealing with the Chinese Communist Party is not the way to do things.