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

As a servant to the people of Queensland and Australia, I ask: what's happening to our country? On COVID, due to the overseas deaths early last year, I was cooperative and supportive from the start. On 23 March 2020 and 8 April 2020, on single-day sittings in this Senate, we gave the government a blank cheque. But I added, on behalf of constituents, that we would hold the government accountable and we expected data and a plan. I mentioned the most successful nation was successful without crippling its economy because it did not cripple its economy. I mentioned ivermectin. Yet we never heard back—no data and no plan. Like people across Australia, I now have important questions.

People are feeling scared. Some are terrified, lost, hopeless, daunted and confused. People are feeling unsafe because of the vaccine side effects. People are feeling insecure because crucial, universal human needs are not being met—needs like security, health, reassurance, trust, confidence, support, leadership, honesty, competence, care, freedom, ease, calm and direction.

Where's the plan for managing the virus and our economy? There's clearly inconsistent behaviour across our states, and the national government has revealed no plan. Queensland, Victoria and WA have deepened fear and insecurity to win elections and to control people. Governments have abandoned the people and removed accountability. I asked the Chief Medical Officer, the Therapeutic Goods Administration and the head of the federal health department to confirm my list of strategies that should be part of a plan for managing the virus. Isolation is one. Testing, tracing and quarantining is another. Then there are restrictions, cures and prophylactics, vaccines, personal behaviour, and health and fitness. That's seven I've raised with them. They've agreed with all seven. But we only see three in use, and then only partially, with crude and limited impact on the virus and a huge economic and social cost.

In response to my question in Senate estimates in March, I received data on the severity and transmissibility of this virus. The mortality is known by the health authorities to be low to severe. In fact, Senator Rex Patrick didn't even know he had the virus. Others with comorbidity, though, can die. Just like with the flu, there's a huge range of symptoms. So why do the Chief Medical Officer and the health department not publicly separate out each of the group's mortality rates? Is it because people need to be kept in fear?

Now our taxes are being given to big pharma for unproven and risky vaccines. Let's consider some of those risks and facts. There have been deaths from the vaccine. Thousands of people overseas have died from it. There have been a wide variety of side effects from the vaccine, such as blood clots. The health minister, Mr Hunt, had cellulitis, reportedly a known vaccine side effect, and was hospitalised. The Chief Medical Officer, the Therapeutic Goods Administration and the head of the federal health department refuse to declare the vaccine as 100 per cent safe.

So my first question is: how did the vaccines get provisional approval? They said there were no alternative vaccines available. But wait—once the first was approved provisionally, the others faced an approved alternative. So how did the others get provisional approval? The vaccines fail to prevent transmission of the virus. The vaccines fail to stop someone getting the virus and getting sick. Intergenerational effects are not known at all. The vaccine's effect against mutations is still unknown. The dosage is unknown. Vaccine frequency, number and time between jabs are still all unknown. Are people going to be jabbed forever? The vaccine fails to remove restrictions on our lifestyle. The vaccine fails to open up international borders.

The vaccine makers all lack integrity. They have been fined billions of dollars—not hundreds of millions but billions of dollars—for misrepresenting their products. The health minister himself said, 'The world is engaged in the largest clinical vaccination trial.' I am not a lab rat. Australians should not be treated as lab rats. This is the first time in history that healthy people have been injected with something that could kill them—and yet, on ivermectin, this is the first time that sick people have been denied medicine that is safe and successful for COVID, as multiple overseas jurisdictions prove.

Let's move on to ivermectin. I took it successfully in 2014 for something else. Some 3.7 billion doses have been given over six decades. It is prescribed for many ailments. There's no risk. It's safe. It's cheap because it's off patent. It's affordable. It is being used successfully overseas to treat COVID en masse, regionally and nationally. There are 250 medical papers in support of ivermectin—proven successful with COVID. In times of emergency, when four vaccines are provisionally approved, and adults are vaccinated—and now kids, despite the early warnings, and now pregnant mothers, apparently—why isn't a proven, safe and affordable treatment like ivermectin provisionally approved? If no-one has made application, why didn't the government get off its hands and do it? The government has blood on its hands.

My second question is: why have four unproven, untested and risky vaccines been given provisional approval, yet one known, safe treatment has not been given provisional approval, despite extensive medical papers and successful widespread use overseas? What happened to basic freedoms? What is happening to Australia? I received a letter from the Therapeutic Goods Administration last week threatening me because I shared some facts publicly. I dared to ask questions. I have a duty as an elected representative to share the facts. The Therapeutic Goods Administration calls that 'advertising'—in an effort, apparently, to control me. I have a duty to the people of Australia to promote debate and understanding for informed debate. Without that there can be no informed consent, and without informed consent there can be no vaccination or treatment. People are free in our country to make what they want of the facts. The Therapeutic Goods Administration seems to think that discussing facts and data is advertising. Whose side is the TGA on—the people or Big Pharma?

My third question is: what are the connections between Big Pharma, Monash University, the Therapeutic Goods Administration, the Gates Foundation, Google and Facebook? Think about this. Google's parent company is Alphabet. It owns YouTube, which took down one of my videos on the topic. Google owns 12 per cent of Vaccitech, which created the AstraZeneca vaccine. Aren't these conflicts of interest? Another possible conflict of interest is surely Sequoia Capital, a venture fund known for making millions from early funding of Google, YouTube and Apple. Sequoia owns 10 per cent of Vaccitech. I have no financial or other ties with vaccine makers, ivermectin or drug companies. My interest is ensuring that we protect people's health and safety—our nation's health and safety. So what happened to basic freedoms? What is happening to our country?

Coercion seems widespread and primed for stronger, wider, more extensive coercion. Let's have a look at some of the types of coercion: letters from so-called authorities intimidating people; threats to doctors; threats to employees of withholding employment or livelihood—a basic means of survival; media intimidation from the legacy media; journalists labelling and misrepresenting people. It's no wonder that mainstream media is rapidly becoming the legacy media. There is also government funding of media companies on vaccine propaganda. But I do want to single out one journalist. Adam Creighton, in the Australian, has done a fabulous job of exposing and sharing the facts.

We move on now to what the government is calling a 'digital certificate'. Is that going to become a digital passport? Will there be the withdrawal of people's basic access to amenities, transport, travel and jobs unless they get the jab? Will there be the withdrawal of livelihood—the ability to live? This is not a digital passport; it's a digital prison. Social media threats: Facebook and YouTube take down posts and threaten shutdown. Always, beneath control, there is fear. So my fourth question is: of what are authorities afraid? Clearly, it's not the virus, because they have no plan. They're afraid of people, the truth and freedom. Freedom is so easily squashed.

The key question is: why is there no government action to approve ivermectin? I call on the government not to wait for an application for approval and to get on with the job of inquiring about, and investigating, ivermectin and approving it. Australians, I call on you to decide for yourselves. Compare ivermectin and the vaccine. Consider the actions of federal and state governments. What happened to basic freedoms? What happened to Australia? Are you willing to help us bring back Australia?

Senate adjourned at 21:29