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

Trust the Brits to get it right! They showed the way with Brexit, and now they're showing the way with gender dysphoria. The United Kingdom's National Health Service last week announced that it will no longer prescribe puberty blockers to treat minors—that's children under 18 years of age—presenting with gender dysphoria. The NHS said, 'We have concluded that there is not enough evidence to support the safety or clinical effectiveness of puberty blockers to make the treatment routinely available at this time.' This is a critical development in this space, with an alarming rise in children presenting with gender dysphoria all over the Western world. About 16 months ago, it was revealed that there had been a tenfold increase in Australian children being treated at public gender clinics from 2014 to 2021. More alarmingly, there has been a hundredfold increase in children being treated with puberty blockers over the same period.

If it were any other condition, such huge increases would warrant multiple inquiries into the causes. With this condition, any call for an inquiry similar to what has happened in the UK is blocked by the hideous politics of identity and victimhood embodied by the Labor-Marxist Greens, the seven regressive Liberals and Senator David Pocock. If Britain can listen to its people on this issue, so can the Australian Senate. If you don't permit the inquiry I'm moving today—my third attempt since 22 November—you will be showing your fear of the Australian people and their views; you will be showing that you don't care about the welfare of these poor kids and their families; you'll be showing you're a bunch of sick puppies; and you will face the consequences of your inaction.