Principal Medical Officer at the Civil Aviation Safety Authority (CASA) has been absent during our previous senate estimates sessions despite my requests for her presence.

I asked her questions about her other roles and responsibilities, including her role as supervising GP and her other board positions. I also asked about her knowledge of pilot adverse events and what research underpins her position that such adverse events as myocarditis are predominantly caused by the COVID infection rather than the COVID injections.

It’s been a long wait to ask these questions of Dr Manderson and her staff appeared anxious to shield her from my line of inquiry. What do they have to hide?

The $100-$200 million tunnel-boring machine known as Florence has been bogged in muddy water on soft ground for a year.

I followed up on previous estimate questions, where I was categorically lied to by bureaucrats who were trying to cover up this expensive and embarrassing disaster.

Why is the government allowing executives from the Snowy Hydro Authority to deliberately mislead the committee about the main tunnel being blocked by a boring machine that has not moved in a year? Why did Snowy 2 executives and the government cover up the toxic gas in the tunnel that is coming from the chemicals used to unsuccessfully free Florence?

The cost has now blown out to $12 billion, with another $5 billion needed to carve a 50 metre wide easement through the Snowy Mountains National Park. This is to build transmission lines to take the power into the grid and to upgrade, to carry 2200 MW of power for 20 minutes in the morning and evening peak, which is all Snowy 2.0 will generate.

I look forward to receiving the answers to my Questions on Notice for the Minister.

Transcript

Senator ROBERTS: Thank you for being here again today. Mr Whitby, in the November 2022 estimates, I asked you:I note that the tunnelling machine Florence was bogged up near Tantangara Reservoir. Can you confirm how long it was bogged and confirm that it’s now back in operation? The answer you gave was: The tunnel-boring machine hasn’t been bogged. It encountered soft ground, which we expected. We have been progressing the tunnel-boring machine through that zone with care and diligence. In February 2023, I was reassured Florence was not bogged, and, in May 2023, was advised it would progress shortly. Minister: today, the ABC published photos of Florence clearly in mud and water in a story that says it was flooded in and unable to function from the moment it hit the soft ground a year ago. It moved a matter of metres. Further, the article goes on to say Snowy Hydro authority knew it was bogged even as they testified in senate estimates that it was not. The authority was covering up the machinery to progress Florence. A slurry machine that lays down a base for the machine to travel over was not ordered when the waterlogging was discovered. It was only ordered when Florence became bogged. Why is the government allowing the authority to deliberately mislead the committee?

Senator McAllister: Thank you for the question, Senator Roberts. I don’t quite recall the evidence being provided in the terms that you suggest in your question. But I confess I don’t exactly remember all of the
testimony that was provided at all of the estimates. I will invite Mr Barnes to respond.

Senator ROBERTS: Minister, before you do, were they lying to you? When did you know about the machine being bogged?

Senator McAllister: I will take that on notice. You will understand that I don’t have all of the communications between the authority and shareholder ministers, so I will see what I can provide.

Senator ROBERTS: I would like to know when you found out the machine was bogged, if you made inquiries beforehand, were they lying to you, and whether or not you were misled.

Senator McAllister: I will take those questions on notice.

Mr Barnes: Obviously, there are many engineering terms, but bogged, paused or stuck, all have subjective definitions. There has been no point since Florence encountered this incredibly soft and wet ground in November 2022 that the machine has not been able in some way to move forward. In fact, as part of its stabilisation and commissioning of the slurry treatment plant since December 2022, it has in fact moved 10 metres as part of that activity, so it is not bogged; it is able to move. In May I apologised for my perhaps optimism regarding the ability to get Florence moving at pace again. The full story on the slurry treatment plant is that Florence is going to hit what we know to be naturally occurring asbestos about seven kilometres into its journey.

Senator ROBERTS: Naturally occurring what?

Mr Barnes: Asbestos.

Senator ROBERTS: Do you mean naturally in the strata?

Mr Barnes: Yes, and the slurry treatment plant is designed to handle those conditions. The incredibly soft ground it hit early in its journey was not predicted at that stage, so the slurry treatment plant, which was always
envisaged—just not envisaged that quickly—was ordered and started to be designed as early as December 2022. It is now complete, commissioned. Once we receive an approval from the New South Wales Department of Planning and Environment, we will be able to move forward.

Senator DAVEY: I agree with your recollection, Senator Roberts. Mr Barnes, you spoke in May about the fact that the slurry treatment plant was coming. I took it from that evidence that it would be activated sooner
rather than later, but are you saying it still hasn’t been turned on?

Mr Barnes: To jog your memory, I think I said weeks, not months. I should have said months, not weeks. It wasn’t a mistake, it was my optimism at the time. The physical works to get the slurry plant complete and
Florence able to move. We’ve all progressed. What I underestimated was the process with which to go through the approval process, given the sinkhole that formed in December is just outside our construction boundary.

Senator ROBERTS: Mr Barnes, could you give me on notice the movement of the machine, in metres, between November 2022 and February 2023, between February 2023 and May 2023, and from May 2023 to now?

Mr Barnes: Yes.

Senator ROBERTS: Thank you. Minister, it seems on the face of it that this is government misinformation covering up a massive failure. I’m not blaming you entirely for that, because this whole thing was started under
Malcolm Turnbull as prime minister and Scott Morrison as prime minister. There was no fully disclosed business case. It was heavily redacted. There was no cost-benefit analysis done. The whole thing is based on a false premise. This is what happens when the top is rotten. I’m not referring to you as being rotten, Minister; I’m referring to the project when it was first given the go-ahead. But you’re now carrying the can.

CHAIR: Is there a question?

Senator ROBERTS: Yes. Minister, what questions are you asking about the rest of the project, because this is serious stuff?

Senator McAllister: You are right in this regard: the project as first announced by the Turnbull government does not reflect the dimensions and characteristics of the project as we now understand it. Some of those changes and issues were known to the previous government and not revealed. Minister Bowen has made it very clear how disappointed he was when he came to government and discovered that aspects of the project, including significant delays in cost increases, had not been communicated. As I indicated earlier in my evidence, when Mr Barnes was appointed, the expectation from the shareholder ministers was communicated very clearly to the board and, I understand, through the department to Mr Barnes that we wanted to see this project back on track. We wanted the new management to examine it and provide advice about how to get it back on track. It took some time. It wasn’t possible to do that in weeks; it has taken Mr Barnes some time. When that advice was provided, it was to the Minister, who then sought to communicate it directly to the Australian public. These are complex projects. We accept that. We have noted a constructive tone and a more open approach to communication from the engagements we are presently having with Snowy Hydro, and we hope to see this project—which, as I indicated, is an important project for the energy system and the Australian people—back on track.

Senator ROBERTS: Let’s move to something else that the government has lied about. This might not be ministerial staff or the ministers themselves, but we know that the agency has lied about the toxic gas in the shaft
coming from isocyanate, used to strengthen the ground in the absence of proper machinery—the slurry machine. That was more government misinformation, wasn’t it, Minister?

Mr Barnes: I’m happy to talk to this. You are referring to an incident that occurred in early July. When polyurethane foam, which is sometimes used in front of the tunnel boring machine, comes into contact with water
it can create isocyanate gas. It did so. The incident was reported quickly, access to the site was restricted, additional personal protective equipment was provided and monitoring was put in place.

Senator ROBERTS: What was that personal protective equipment?

Mr Barnes: You can do positive-pressure face masks which stop any gases entering.

Senator ROBERTS: Does that involve carrying air or oxygen?

Mr Barnes: No. I don’t how the reverser flow works, but you picture the large face masks with a positive flow meter. They have a filter. I don’t know the details of how those machines work, but they do protect the individual. We have actually stopped using the polyurethane foam and reverted to grout on that.

Senator ROBERTS: So lives are at stake?

Mr Barnes: Absolutely. This is a complex project with many hazards.

Senator ROBERTS: And the economy is at stake if this project doesn’t live up to nameplate design. How much is Florence worth, and who pays if you can’t get it out or if it comes out as scrap?

Mr Barnes: Florence is not identified as a single item in the project line, but between $100 million and $200 million would be an estimate of a tunnel boring machine. But Florence is able to progress its journey once we
receive the necessary approvals.

CHAIR: We’ll need to rotate the call, Senator Roberts. Do you have a final question? We can come back to you.

Senator ROBERTS: In May I asked about the updated cost, and Mr Barnes replied, ‘We haven’t got an updated cost here and will provide that in months.’ Your updated cost is now $12 billion? Is that it?

Mr Barnes: That’s correct.

Senator ROBERTS: Does that include two major expenses: transmission lines to get the power in and out and the ongoing cost of Florence still being bogged?

Mr Barnes: It is the cost to complete the project to the transmission lines at the power station, including all action necessary to complete the head race tunnel, which is where Florence is.

Senator ROBERTS: So any additional transmission lines needed to take the power out are not part of that project cost?

Mr Barnes: We have one transmission connection from the power station up to the grid, which Snowy Hydro pays for on an ongoing tariff.

Senator ROBERTS: My understanding is that the current transmission lines will not be adequate after Snowy 2 comes in.

Mr Barnes: For snowy 2 to get its full potential, there is an extension to the transmission grid required.

Senator ROBERTS: Thank you. So the total cost of this project—

CHAIR: We need to move on, Senator Roberts. We need to rotate the call.

Senator ROBERTS: Okay.

Senator McAllister: Senator Grogan, I took on notice a series of questions from Senator Roberts. I had previously indicated that these were questions for shareholder ministers and I would take them on notice on their
behalf. I just want to clarify that that’s also what you were seeking in the other questions that you put to me later on?

Senator ROBERTS: I’m happy to get an answer from the government ministers. It doesn’t have to be you; just the person in charge would be perfect.

Senator McAllister: Thanks, Senator Roberts.

In the May/June Estimates, I asked questions about former MP Craig Kelly being booted off Facebook (META) for posting alleged misinformation about COVID, which turned out to be accurate. Initially, Home Affairs denied involvement in censoring parliamentarians, however it transpired they were involved. These questions are following up to those asked in the previous Senate Estimates, where we have confirmation that Home Affairs censored a sitting Parliamentarian.

An international advertising agency was employed to identify posts that were contrary to the government’s narrative on COVID. Over $1,000,000 of taxpayers’ money was paid to M&C Saatchi to act as the thought police against the Australian people.

These referrals enabled social media companies to make what Home Affairs calls ‘their own determinations’ about flagged posts and accounts should they go against the platform’s own guidelines.

This is significant. Home Affairs claims it’s not in the business of censorship, but what else would you call such an arrangement? If the Labor government legislates its bill to combat misinformation and disinformation, we will see even more of this dystopian censorship.

Judging by the strained and carefully worded answers in this video, Home Affairs would like us to believe it had no influence on the censorship of Australians online during the COVID response. We’re not so naïve to believe their collaboration with social media companies such as META, which resulted in de-platforming an elected member of parliament, was anything other than authoritarian overreach.

Transcript

Senator ROBERTS: Thank you all for being here today. At the last Senate estimates, I was given many assurances by the witnesses from the Department of Home Affairs that no parliamentarians would have been
referred for censorship under your COVID-19 program. We now know that that was false. The Department of Home Affairs did refer the post of a sitting parliamentarian to the social media companies for censorship, and we’re meant to believe that the senior witnesses at this table knew nothing about it. Either the Senate was misled or the witnesses at this table do not actually know what’s going on in your department, as they refer parliamentarians for censorship. Is your department out of control?

Ms Foster: Our department is happy to respond to your question. Mr Smyth can take you through the detail.

Mr Smyth: I think, as referenced in previous hearings, the department is not in the business of censoring. We referred posts to social media platforms to take action at their discretion as to whether or not they felt that
particular posts breached their service standards. I know that, from the previous hearings in relation to whether or not there were posts that were from particular members of parliament, the secretary at the time said that he would be surprised. You are quite correct that there were referrals for a particular member of parliament that were made. They shouldn’t have been made, and the department has looked at its processes. But we do not now engage in any of the same activity. That activity ceased in late May of this year.

Senator ROBERTS: So you’re enabling censorship and you were serving the social media giants—Meta, in particular—with the provision of their own services.

Mr Smyth: As I previously said—

Senator ROBERTS: Is that correct?

Ms Foster: No, that’s not correct, Senator.

Mr Smyth: we are not in the business of censoring.

Senator ROBERTS: But you enable censorship.

Ms Foster: No, we provide referrals to social media companies in order that they can decide whether or not the activity meets their own service standards.

Senator ROBERTS: So you’re providing a service to Meta. Do you charge them an invoice?

Mr Smyth: No. The issues that were at play at the time related to public health and safety. We operated on advice and criteria that were provided to the department from the Department of Health. That was then assessed through a service provider that we had— M&C Saatchi. The department then reviewed the references from M&C Saatchi as to whether or not they were likely to have been in breach of the service standards of particular platforms. The platforms were then informed of that, and they made their own decisions.

Senator ROBERTS: Isn’t Meta big enough to look after itself? Can’t it do its job? Are you helping them?

CHAIR: Senator Roberts, I want to draw you back to the question—as being relevant to outcome 1.

Senator ROBERTS: They referred it, it seems to me, Chair—

CHAIR: Yes, absolutely.

Senator ROBERTS: with the intent of taking it down.

CHAIR: The relationship is obviously relevant. Direct questions about Meta might be better directed to them and is outside of outcome 1’s relevance.

Senator ROBERTS: You referred it with the intent of it being taken down, Mr Smyth.

Mr Smyth: No, we referred it with an intent as to whether or not the platform could determine whether it breached their own service standards.

Senator ROBERTS: Are you in the business of helping large global multinationals conduct their own affairs? Surely—

Mr Smyth: We’re in the business of looking after public health and safety, and it was in the middle of a global pandemic where a lot of people were dying.

Senator ROBERTS: Have you received legal advice on whether your department has breached the implied freedom of political expression with this program?

Mr Smyth: No.

Senator ROBERTS: Why not? This is pretty significant.

Mr Smyth: Because the posts that were referred to were a decision of the platforms themselves as to whether or not they would take any action.

Senator ROBERTS: The department has paid more than a million dollars to M&C Saatchi for their part in this COVID-19 censorship referral program. Did M&C Saatchi determine what was misinformation or did the department? Did M&C Saatchi or the department determine whether or not it complied with Meta’s guidelines?

Mr Smyth: The funds that were paid to M&C Saatchi from March 2020 to July of last year were $256,000 in relation to the COVID information. There was a previous contract that was already in place that was around $500,000-plus.

Senator ROBERTS: I have a question on notice—BE23-193—about M&C Saatchi payments. This is your response:

  • Of these payments, World Services Australia (trading as M&C Saatchi) has been paid a total of $1,000,911 (GST inclusive) from 1 July 2019 to 31 May 2023 for their work to produce analytical reporting on COVID-19 malign information in the Australian social media environment.

I jump in there to say that some of what is known as ‘malign’ is now vindicated.

This can be broken down into the following payments by financial year:

  • 2020-21: $757,470 – that’s three-quarters of a million.
  • 2021-22: $127,908
  • 2022-23: $115,533

That’s a lot of money going to an international advertising firm.

Ms Foster: You’ve asked us to take that on notice. We will be happy to do so.

Senator ROBERTS: This was your reply.

When people said they thought the government was censoring posts around COVID, that wasn’t a conspiracy theory; it was actually true. You were helping Meta to censor posts that have now proven to be correct.

Ms Foster: I think the officer has provided this evidence a couple of times already. We were referring posts to social media companies for their own decision.

Senator ROBERTS: In accordance with their guidelines—helping them out? Right. Minister, the pending misinformation/disinformation bill legitimises suppression and censorship with no definition of truth. It relies on ministers’ rules. I want to read a quote from Mr Pezzullo—

Senator Watt: I don’t think I would agree with your characterisation.

Senator ROBERTS: There’s no definition of ‘truth’ in your pending bill.

Senator Watt: The entire statement you made—I wouldn’t agree with your characterisation of this bill. I think it’s a bill designed to deal with an increasingly important issue in society, which is the use of social media platforms to spread misinformation and disinformation. That’s what I would say this bill is about.

Senator ROBERTS: But the government is exempt. The mouthpiece media, the mainstream media, is exempt. Social media is not and individual citizens are not. How can that be fair? I will read from Mr Pezzullo in the last estimates:

If we’ve inadvertently—and it would be inadvertent—made a referral of a sitting member or a senator, then I would find that regrettable because, in a sense, you’re held to account by your peers and by your electors; it’s not my job to hold you to account.

Since when has it become the government’s job to hold senators to account on what they say?

Senator Watt: Mr Smyth has already acknowledged—I can’t remember the exact words he used, but it was to the effect that it was regrettable that this had occurred on one occasion. The department looked into that issue after it was raised at the last estimates. Mr Pezzullo said that it would be regrettable if it had occurred, and Mr Smyth has already addressed that this morning.

Senator ROBERTS: Let me make it clear. I’m not talking about the department anymore. I’m talking about Labor’s pending misinformation/disinformation bill.

CHAIR: If that’s what you’re doing, that’s not relevant to outcome 1. I’ve given you—

Senator ROBERTS: I’m using—

CHAIR: No. Senator Roberts, I’ve given you two direction about asking relevant questions in this section. If you don’t have relevant questions then we do need to share the call.

Senator Watt: Chair, I make the point that not only are Senator Roberts’s questions not relevant to this outcome; they’re not relevant to this committee, because this bill that he is referring to is actually being led by the Minister for Communications. Perhaps Senator Roberts could take up those questions at that estimates hearing.

Senator ROBERTS: He will do.

Senator Watt: That is on now—today.

CHAIR: It is happening today and tomorrow, so you do have an opportunity to ask those questions to the appropriate officials.

Senator ROBERTS: Thank you, Senator Watt. Thank you, Chair.

Senator Watt: Here to help, you know what I mean!

Senator ROBERTS: I’m sure you are!

At Senate Estimates I have been pursuing the Chief of the Defence Force over allegations he was illegally awarded a Distinguished Service Cross.

This represents the hard work and tiring investigations of veterans and others over many years. They deserve justice and CDF Angus Campbell must hand back his DSC and resign.

Read the full story here:

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2023-10-20/distinguished-service-medals-army-might-be-illegal/102999116

The motion from Labor on Wednesday 18 October shows complete contempt for the Senate and for the people of Australia who put us in this house.

I spoke to oppose Labor’s guillotining of debate. The Family Law Act is being amended and the government is amending its own amendments, which tells us the legislation is hasty. That demonstrates even more importantly that we must have scrutiny and debate on this bill. The modern Labor party is only interested in ramming through legislation on energy, immigration and other bills impacting Australians. Meanwhile, it plans to shut down debate across the country with its censorship bill.

Prior to the election Anthony Albanese promised that his party would listen and engage in consultation. Actions speak louder than words. This is a leader in bed with the United Nations — not a leader for the people of Australia. A government worthy of respect supports such protocols as debate, scrutiny, and accountability. It respects the will of the people. The current Labor party is failing the nation on all those checks and balances. It’s a party gone rogue.

Transcript

Here we are again today with Labor proposing to guillotine debate on bills. This will come up in the formal motions. It has become Labor’s custom and practice in this chamber to guillotine debate on bills and to stop orders for the production of documents, and who helps them every time? The Greens. They say they are the masters of transparency and scrutiny, but what do they do? They guillotine debate almost every time. They guillotine debate on just about everything. 

Let’s see who else supports them. Will it be the usual cronies or will they stand up and support debate? It’s true that the Liberal motion is also setting a guillotine, but at least it restores some hours for debate, and that’s what’s fundamentally important. It’s extended until 10 o’clock tonight, thank you, and extended tomorrow before imposing a limit. The Liberals are trying to compromise. That’s why today we’re supporting their extension of hours motion and sitting late tonight.  

Here we are again with the Labor Party avoiding debate on bills that are the subject of so many amendments. The Family Law Act is being amended and the government is amending its own amendment bills—not just once, twice or three times but many times. They won’t let discussion happened on that. The fact that the Labor government is putting forward so many amendments to its own legislation shows that the legislation is hasty. That’s why we must have scrutiny of this.  

The Family Law Act has been called the slaughterhouse of the nation. It has been killing people in this country—killing families and killing kids—since 1975 when it was introduced by the Labor Party following UN policy. That is a fact. There have been 48 years of the slaughterhouse of the nation thanks to Lionel Murphy and the Labor Party. Now they are introducing bills to make it even more complex. They won’t allow scrutiny of that complexity. What are they hiding? 

We also see that other parties, including my own, have got a significant number of amendments in this chamber. We’re not even allowed to discuss our own amendments or explain our own amendments. What kind of democracy is that? What kind of scrutiny is that? What kind of responsibility is that? 

Look at the two migration bills. Think of the impact on housing. We will be getting 1.2 million new arrivals in this country this year. Where are they going to sleep—under what roof and in what bed? What will that do to the cost of housing and the cost of rent in this country? Labor at the same time is invoking UN 2050 net-zero policies, which are raising the cost of living dramatically. We have high inflation raising the cost of living dramatically. Housing is going up, and they want to bring in more people. We have a lottery, a ballot. Energy prices and inflation—they won’t allow scrutiny of this.  

Instead of consulting properly in the first place, the government has chosen to put forward poor legislation and just ram it through. The Labor Party need to start doing what Anthony Albanese promised as opposition leader and start listening and consulting, not walking with their ears closed and ramming through legislation. Didn’t you learn from last Saturday? The disinformation and misinformation bill will shut down debate. Not only do you want to shut down debate here but you want to shut down debate right across the country. That’s the modern Labor Party for you.  

This is not how the Senate is supposed to work. The Senate is supposed to be the house of review on behalf of the people. We were elected to represent the people and to debate issues for the people. We’re not their masters; we serve them. This is the people’s house, and Australians expect their senators to give each piece of legislation careful, extensive and respectful scrutiny. The motion from the Labor Party this afternoon shows complete contempt yet again for the Senate and for the people of Australia who put us in this House and who we are supposed to serve. Labor promised consultation and listening, yet, in practice, shows us Labor does not even know what those words mean. 

I took the opportunity to set the record straight and clarify what Senator Penny Wong did to avoid answering a question I put to her on government misinformation. Having done so, I spoke in full support Senator Wong’s motion on Hamas attacks on Israel and ongoing conflict in her speech on the yesterday. Her speech was balanced, reasoned and befitting of an Australian Foreign Minister.

It’s true that the actions of radicals have caused untold death and suffering on both sides of the conflict. The Minister said what needs to be said and I refer everyone to her speech. The content, clarity and quality of her speech means I only have one point to add. There’s a chance this conflict could escalate to a catastrophic war and the need to avoid that happening must be paramount in the minds of all involved.

We have seen many such conflicts over the years and there’s one truth from them all: the sooner a ceasefire is declared, hostages are released and both sides sit down and talk to each other, the faster the suffering can be brought to an end.

May peace be with us all soon.

Transcript

As a servant to the many different people who make up our one Queensland community, I speak to the motion that Senator Wong moved yesterday on Hamas attacks on Israel and the ongoing conflict. Firstly, though, I briefly mention the minister’s answer to my first supplementary question in question time yesterday. I asked about remarks the minister had made to the media in a press conference where the minister restated and amplified remarks that were made earlier in the day to the children of Cheng Lei, an Australian and Chinese citizen who is back in Australia following a period of incarceration in China, having concluded her sentence in prison. I am, of course, very pleased to see Cheng Lei free and reunited with her family, yet the minister chose to spin my question in a way that contradicted the events of the press conference, apparently to avoid actually answering my question. The minister’s comments were widely reported after her press conference. Responding to me yesterday, as the minister did, by invoking a motion was an inappropriate and false reflection. 

Turning to this motion on Hamas, I fully support Senator Wong’s motion and her speech on the matter yesterday. Her speech was balanced, reasoned and befitting of an Australian foreign minister. It’s true that the actions of radicals have caused untold death and suffering on both sides of the conflict. The minister said what needs to be said, and I refer everyone to her speech. The content, clarity and quality of her speech means I only have one point to add. There’s a chance this conflict could escalate to a catastrophic war, and the need to avoid that happening must be paramount in the minds of all involved. We have seen many such conflicts over the years, and there’s one truth from them all: the sooner a ceasefire is declared, hostages are released and both sides sit down and talk to each other, the faster the suffering can be brought to an end. May peace be with us all soon. 

Minister Penny Wong’s Speech

The causes of the cost-of-living crisis are no mystery.

Deutsche Bank predicted this month that Australia’s net immigration for the financial year will top 530,000. There are 1.2 million new long stay visa holders which is almost triple the population of Canberra. That’s a million more people looking for housing, jobs, spending their money and using infrastructure and essential services that were already strained.

With the largest amount of wind, solar and batteries on Australia’s power grid in our history, power bills have never been higher. That pushes up goods and services costs for everyone and contributes to the pain.

Mortgages are climbing with another interest rate hike warning for November by the Reserve Bank to “fight inflation”. Why?

During the economy wrecking COVID response, the Reserve Bank printed half a trillion dollars out of thin air. Most of it went to foreign-owned multinationals. This $500 BILLION created out of thin air has, in turn, created the inflation problem.

Added to this, lockdowns devastated many of the smaller Australian businesses cutting off supplies of goods and further inflating prices.

The Reserve Bank’s longstanding policy on inflation is to raise interest rates to cause enough financial pain for mortgage holders to spend less and force the price of goods down. So having made the problem they are now punishing homeowners to try and fix it.

Here’s how One Nation would fix the cost-of-living crisis. Stop the flood of immigration into this country to fix the housing crisis; stop the chasing of the UN net-zero pipe dream to fix energy bills; and stop the Reserve Bank printing money out of thin air to fix inflation.

Transcript

As a servant to the people of Queensland and Australia I want to show how One Nation will fix the cost-of-living crisis. To fix the cost-of-living crisis there are only three things parliament must do: stop the flood of immigration into this country to fix the housing crisis; stop the chasing of the UN net-zero pipedream to fix energy bills; and stop the Reserve Bank printing money out of thin air to fix inflation. Every time we hear about the number of immigrants coming in, the number goes up. Just this week it was reported that Deutsche Bank predicts that a net immigration for the financial year will top 530,000. That does not include temporary workers. It does not include students, so the total is 1.2 million in one year. That is more than the entire population of Canberra arriving in one year; in fact, it is almost triple. Immigration is why we have a rental crisis. It is why we have a housing crisis. It is why many young people will never be able to buy a home. The big business donors to both Liberal and Labor benefit from big immigration. If we want a roof over every Australian head, we must stop this flood. 

The next contributor to our problem is the UN’s net-zero scam. The lie that wind and solar is the cheapest electricity is debunked using one fact. With the largest amount of wind, solar and batteries on Australia’s power grid in our history, power bills have never been higher. Every country in the world that has tried to go down the path of wind and solar has had higher power bills—every country. Watch electricity bills drop when we abandon UN net zero, fire up the coal-fired power stations and let nuclear onto the playing field. 

To fix inflation, just stop the Reserve Bank printing $500 billion, as they did during COVID—half a trillion dollars. That way the Reserve Bank doesn’t have to try and send mortgage holders broke to fix the problem the Reserve Bank caused. Many of the solutions are simple. We just need more One Nation members because only we have the guts to call this rubbish out. 

Liberal Senator McGrath mentioned in raising this MPI motion that mortgages are up an average of $1,500 a month. Let’s rewind the tape and look at why that is happening. The Reserve Bank claims it needs to raise interest rates to fight inflation. Inflation is like an equation. When you have too much money chasing too few goods, prices go up. It is that simple. Throughout history, the idea has been that if the Reserve Bank raises interest rates enough, mortgage holders will not have money to spend, so prices will come down. That takes care of the too-much-money side of the equation. With interest rates higher, Australians will have less money to spend on goods, so inflation will come down. 

Now, I am not kidding. This is what the Reserve Bank means when they say they are ‘fighting inflation’. They are sending Australians broke to solve a problem that the Reserve Bank created with the Morrison government. What no-one likes to talk about is the Reserve Bank’s part in creating the inflation problem. You will remember from our equation that too much money equals more inflation. During the pandemic the Reserve Bank printed roughly half a trillion dollars—$500 billion—out of thin air using what they call ‘electronic ledger entries’—their words. Half a trillion dollars was conjured out of thin air and dropped from a helicopter to compensate for the Liberal government’s economy-wrecking COVID restrictions that were not necessary. That $500 billion is new money and a major cause of the inflation problem Australia is still fighting, and who got the money? Largely, it was foreign-owned multinationals. 

To summarise the inflation problem, the Reserve Bank printed hundreds of billions of dollars out of thin air. That led to huge inflation. Now the Reserve Bank is trying to send enough mortgage holders broke so they will stop spending to try and bring inflation down—another housing crisis. Lockdowns devastated our economy, our businesses. That cut the supply side, which meant fewer goods, which meant prices for those of goods raised—inflation. This is not a comedy skit; this is the strategy of the people who were and who are running the country, and they are in charge of our economy. Every single part of this happened under the direction and watch of the supposedly conservative Liberal-National coalition government. For the Liberals to come to this chamber and bemoan the inflation problem and mortgage repayments is politics at its worst. I said earlier in the week that, with this economy, the Liberal-National coalition government gave Labor one of the largest hospital passes in political history. In saying that, Labor now wants to turbocharge the destruction of our economy. 

Since July 2020, I’ve been speaking about the fear, the oppression and the inhuman cruelty of our COVID response. Each of the measures in the COVID response was designed to add to the fear and anguish to keep the population scared and compliant, with measures that contradicted the government’s own rule book that had just been updated in 2019.

Developed over many years of successes and failures, this document clearly had arrived at the right way to handle COVID. It’s called the Australian Health Management Plan for Pandemic Influenza. Why was this Australian-made policies and procedures manual thrown out for a foreign military-style countermeasures response that involved national cabinet, secret contracts, clandestine meetings and authoritarian decision making?

No wonder the government is exempting itself and the mainstream media from its own misinformation and disinformation bill.

I promised to hound down those responsible and I will be relentless in keeping that promise. An inquiry must look at what we knew about the risk to human life at each stage of our response and compare that risk to the benefit achieved from the Commonwealth response to that risk.

The Chair of the L&CA References Committee spoke well and said he would welcome the task.

One Nation does not accept that the “toothless” inquiry the Prime Minister announced is in any way fit for purpose. If now is the appropriate time for the PM to call his inquiry into COVID, then surely now is also time for a Royal Commission.

Appointing COVID insiders, who championed the COVID response, to conduct an inquiry into themselves and their mates is a travesty of justice. We can’t ignore our sworn duty as the House of Review any longer and asked the Senate to start the process by passing this Motion.

Once the Terms of Reference are sorted, then the people of Australia will have an opportunity to use their voices to shape a Royal Commission.

Should the PM choose to defy the will of the Senate, the option of a Senate Select Inquiry is available to the Senate, which has similar powers to a Royal Commission and with the added benefits of a faster turnaround, lower costs and greater accountability.

Transcript

I move:

That, noting that a fully empowered Royal Commission with appropriate terms of reference is necessary to learn from the unprecedented government response to COVID-19, the following matter be referred to the Legal and Constitutional Affairs References committee for inquiry and report by 31 March 2024: 

The appropriate terms of reference for a COVID-19 Royal Commission that would allow all affected stakeholders to be heard. 

As a servant to the many different people who make up our one Queensland community, I speak in favour of this motion. One Nation’s motion seeks to arrive at a fair terms of reference for a royal commission into the Commonwealth response to SARS-CoV-2. Those terms of reference could alternatively inform a Senate select committee of inquiry. 

COVID resulted in the largest health response in Australian history. I put this motion forward as an invitation to all senators in this place, from all parties. Every single senator has heard from a stakeholder that the COVID response affected. This inquiry would ensure that none of those voices are missed by future terms of reference for a COVID royal commission. To be clear, the inquiry this motion seeks would not pass judgement on the COVID response. Its scope is simply to hear submissions from stakeholders to ensure that a future royal commission has properly informed terms of reference so that stakeholders will have an opportunity to have a say at such a commission. 

Death, injury and suffering have been caused not just from the virus but from our response to the virus. Only a royal commission will sort out how much harm the virus did and how much harm we did to ourselves—and there was a hell of a lot of harm. Firstly, this harm was caused through the use of politicised fear. COVID has taken an unknown number of lives during the four years the virus has been present in Australia. I say ‘unknown’ because the number of people who actually died from COVID as opposed to dying with COVID is unknown. Knowingly increasing the death count to dial up the fear simply to ensure compliance with health directives appears to have been deliberate government policy at state and federal level. We treated people as though they were not human beings—rather, a problem to be managed. 

Government did not manage the virus. Government managed us. They controlled us, the people. An inquiry must go back and look at what we knew about the risk to human life at each stage of our response and compare that risk to the benefit achieved from the Commonwealth response to that risk. From that process, we can create rules to guide our response to the next such event—fairer rules that dignify and sanctify human life. The anguish we felt was not just fear of the virus; it was fear of the governments. The public never knew what the governments were going to do next, let alone why. There was no excuse for that. 

If we do actually have a handbook to be followed in a case like this, it’s called the Australian Health Management Plan for Pandemic Influenza. This document was last updated in August 2019, just before COVID, and was produced as a result of consultation with the states and territories. What happened to this? Let’s see what’s in it: 

The Australian Health Management Plan for Pandemic Influenza (AHMPPI), the national government health sector pandemic influenza plan, outlines the agreed arrangements between the Australian Government and State and Territory Governments for the management of an influenza pandemic. To support an integrated and coordinated response … 

I would have thought that that seems to fit the bill exactly. In 2009 the Australian Health Management Plan for Pandemic Influenza was used to guide Australia’s response to H1N1 flu—swine flu. 

Next I’ll quote this from that document: 

The key factors in this plan’s approach include: 

  • The use of existing systems and governance mechanisms as the basis of the response … 

There is no national cabinet, no secret decisions and no new body—with no rules or structure—that uses secret data that the public still cannot see. I’m starting to see why the government put this in the bin. I quote again: 

  • incorporation of an analysis of risks and benefits— 

Oh wait; there it is, a risk-benefit analysis; what a marvellous idea— 

… to support evidence-based decision making … 

Evidence based decision-making—wouldn’t that have been nice these last four years? We had this rule book in 2019, developed over many years of successes and failures, which clearly arrived at the right way to handle COVID. Why didn’t we use it? Now, that is a question for a royal commission. 

Secondly, harm was created as a result of making decisions on the optics, not the data, in direct contravention of the government’s own handbook. From page 11, under ‘Proportionate response’: 

In the past all pandemic planning was aimed at responding to a worst case scenario, similar to the influenza pandemic of 1918-19. The 2009 pandemic showed clearly the need for the flexibility to scale the response to be proportionate to the risk associated with the current disease.  

Our response was supposed to be set to the actual harm that was occurring, not the fears around the worst-case scenario, which, as it turned out, never occurred. Around the middle of 2020, it should have been clear to our health officials and to this parliament, as it was to me, that the scary videos of COVID deaths coming out of China were not representative of the strain of COVID active in Australia at the time or, for that matter, anywhere else in the world. Even worse, information came out at the time suggesting those videos were possibly faked, a suspicion confirmed in 2022, when some of the producers of the videos posted behind-the-scenes videos and photos of their work to social media. And yet this is what we set our response to—the fear, not the reality. 

No attempt appears to have been made to determine just how dangerous Australian COVID really was. That was another of many direct contraventions of the rule book. Instead, the government leveraged dodgy Chinese videos to ramp up the fear. When that didn’t convince the public, the states started making their own fake propaganda videos, portraying the worst-case scenario, here in this country, something they had agreed not to do the year before. When people took to the streets to protest the measures being taken, the government responded with yet more fear. Then came the military and the police. We have all seen those videos of elderly Australians being tasered, shoved to the floor, knocked out, and a pregnant mother arrested in her own home for sharing information about a protest. We have seen protesters being shot with rubber bullets and hunted down in parks, and the Premier gloating. Each of these measures was designed to add to the fear and anguish, to keep the population scared and compliant, with measures that contradicted the government’s own rule book. No wonder the government is exempting itself and the mainstream media from its own misinformation and disinformation bill. Using any measure, the COVID fear campaign would have been struck down under that legislation and the government left to argue their case based on data, as the government were required to do but they didn’t. 

Thirdly, harm was caused economically—severe harm, right across the country. The Commonwealth COVID response was the most expensive federal government line item since World War II. Taxpayers have been left with a bill in excess of $600 billion, a bill that keeps going up with every interest payment on the money we borrowed to pay for our response. Not all the money was borrowed, though. The Reserve Bank printed a large amount, or, as the Reserve Bank prefers to say in answer to questioning from me, it created money out of thin air using an electronic journal entry. That money printing is a direct cause of the inflation and cost-of-living crisis Australia now faces. Lives were destroyed as a result of our economic mismanagement during COVID. Businesses were closed. Personal wealth was taken from everyday Australians and handed to the predatory billionaires who were behind every COVID curtain. Worldwide, $4 trillion has been redistributed from everyday citizens to predatory billionaires, and this figure continues to rise. 

Fourthly, marriages and families were destroyed. Children had stability, love and support taken away from them. Elderly people were left alone to die. All the while, troops were on the streets enforcing lockdowns that were unprecedented in the history of our beautiful country, as part of an international American, British, Canadian, Australian COVID defence countermeasures consortium. A royal commission must determine if the cruelty was justified. An inquiry must look at the medical decisions taken. It will not be easy to peel back the layers of medical disinformation coming from university academics and research scientists that have a track record of saying whatever they are paid to say. There were so many alternatives to the pharmaceutical response our secretive National Cabinet decided upon. Why were these banned, ignored or ridiculed? What went on behind this veil of secrecy to pursue untested, fake vaccines above all else and the secrecy around big pharma’s unproven antivirals like remdesivir, or, as it’s known after killing many people here and overseas, ‘Run, death is near’. Turning to the injections themselves, I don’t call these injectables vaccines because they do not comply with the definition of vaccine in use before COVID. The fact that the definition of vaccine was changed to make room for these dangerous injections should have been a red flag to everyone. A vaccine is supposed to prevent you getting the disease and prevent you transmitting the disease. It should provide long-term protection such that even if someone does get the virus, the body fights it straight off. None of that is true with the COVID injection. These fake vaccines do not prevent people from getting COVID and do not prevent people from spreading COVID. They cripple immune systems, making people more susceptible to future infections. Any protection from severe symptoms is for such a short period of time that it’s nothing more than a substandard treatment, a treatment that has caused more harm than good.  

This is not my opinion. It is among the findings of a landmark, published, peer-reviewed Cleveland study that found that every dose of the COVID jabs administered to the sample of 50,000 health employees made them more likely to get COVID. A separate re-examination of the Pfizer stage 2-3 clinical trial data that took 18 months, peer-reviewed and published by the Brighton Collaboration, found that the Pfizer vaccine was associated with a 14 per cent worse health outcome than the unvaccinated control trial. If the TGA was doing it job, these injections should never have been approved.  

The bad news about our medical response to COVID keeps coming. Only last month a panel of international scientists revealed that the COVID-19 mRNA injections are contaminated with plasma DNA from the manufacturing process. This can cause inflammation of organs and it can cause cancer. Last week I was sent a mainstream television piece which talked about turbo cancers being at record high levels. Medical researchers and doctors interviewed were apparently baffled about the cause. Let me help those researchers out. Here we have a substance that is contaminated through bacterial plasmas known to cause cancer, is full of spike proteins that are a whole class of medication which have not been studied for adverse health effects, and contain a substance called SV40 that directly inhibits our body’s resistance to cancer. The injection studied in the clinical trials was not the same product that was used in Australia. That has killed 14 people here and is suspected in a thousand more, and doctors have reported a thousand more deaths. Post-mortem data shows a direct link between the injections and turbo cancer, while at the same time Australia has had 30,000 excess deaths in the last year directly correlated and traced under much scrutiny to the COVID injections. New turbo cancers are at record levels. Australians whose have been in cancer remission for years have suddenly seen their cancer return. Despite the facts now coming out, doctors say they are baffled. The one person more than any other that must be referred to a royal commission is Dr Baffled.  

Finally, One Nation does not accept that the quickie COVID cover-up that the Prime Minister announced is in any way fit for purpose. It’s not. Asking these commissioners, three COVID insiders, who championed our health response, to conduct an inquiry into themselves and their mates is a travesty of justice that has been roundly condemned right across the Senate. None of us know the guarantees that Prime Minister Albanese gave pharmaceutical salesman and World Health Organization sugar daddy Bill Gates at their meeting in Admiralty House last year and early this year. Surely the need to cover up the evil committed in the name of health was discussed. Did Prime Minister Albanese agree to do just that?  

I’ve been speaking about the fear, the oppression and the inhumane cruelty of our COVID response since July 2020. I promised to hound down those responsible, and I will continue relentlessly to keep that promise. If now is the time for the Prime Minister to call his COVID cover-up, then now must surely be the time for a royal commission. We can’t ignore our sworn duty as the house of review any longer. We have one flag, we are one community, we are one nation, and the whole nation wants answers, or we will never heal and, worse, we may well go through all of this again. I ask the Senate to start the process today, pass this motion and let’s get the terms of reference sorted. 

Former Special Forces Commando Heston Russell repeatedly asked for a correction and an apology for stories the ABC published that defamed him and November platoon. The ABC accused them of committing war crimes in Afghanistan at a time when they weren’t even in that country.

Heston had to sue the ABC for defamation instead. The judge noted the ABC became defensive and considered any criticism as merely part of a culture-war attack. If they had responded properly, the taxpayers could have saved millions of dollars.

The response from the Minister shows a similar level of denial and lack of accountability, answering serious questions with cheap political taunts. What the government needs to remember here is that special forces commando, Heston Russell, was a victim of disinformation published by the ABC. It was an ordeal that he calls the ‘hardest battle he has ever fought’.

As the Government failed to answer, their Misinformation and Disinformation Bill WOULDN’T protect people like Heston Russell from fake news by the ABC as they’ll be excluded from the Bill.

Transcript

Senator ROBERTS: My question is to the Minister representing the Minister for Communications, Senator Watt. Former special forces commando Heston Russell repeatedly asked for a correction and an apology for stories the ABC published that defamed him and November Platoon, accusing them of committing war crimes in Afghanistan at a time when they weren’t even in that country. He offered to settle the case for $99,000, which the ABC refused, and proceeded to trial. The defamatory articles were brought to the attention of Minister Rowland, the Minister for Communications, by a 26,000-signature petition, which she acknowledged on 20 March and on which she failed to act. Minister, what is the cost to the taxpayer for the ABC’s legal fees in this matter so far? 

Senator WATT (Minister for Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry and Minister for Emergency Management) : Thank you, Senator Roberts, for that question. I will have to take on notice the exact details of that question that you’ve asked. Presumably, these are matters that you’d also have the opportunity to ask the ABC at estimates next week. So I am happy to come back to you with any details that I can provide on that. The broader issue around any defamation action taken against the ABC is really a matter for ABC management. Of course, this government believes in the independence of the ABC and, in particular, its editorial independence. 

Senator Rennick: You mean the bias. 

Senator WATT: Senator Rennick, on the other hand, thinks that it’s a biased organisation. That’s a very disappointing remark to make about the national broadcaster but perhaps one that we’re used to after years of ABC cuts under the former government. It would appear that Senator Rennick isn’t the only member of the opposition who regards the ABC as biased. Again, it’s a very disappointing view to express about the national broadcaster—the only publicly funded broadcaster. Again, it probably indicates why the ABC suffered such severe funding cuts under the former government. 

So, Senator Roberts, you’ll obviously have the opportunity to ask those questions of ABC management at estimates next week. I know Senator Henderson always has questions for the ABC as well, so she will no doubt do that again next week. 

Senator Ruston interjecting— 

Senator WATT: Sorry, Senator Ruston, we get to answer the questions, and I’ve already— 

Honourable senators interjecting— 

The PRESIDENT: Order, across the chamber! Minister Watt, please refer to me when you’re answering the question. Senator Henderson? 

Senator Henderson: On indulgence— 

The PRESIDENT: No, Senator Henderson. Resume your seat. Minister, please continue, or have you finished your answer? 

Senator WATT: I actually answered the question in the first five seconds by saying that I’d take those details on notice. But I’m obviously able to then comment on the question more broadly, and that’s what I’ve spent one minute and 55 seconds doing. 

The PRESIDENT: Senator Roberts, a first supplementary question? 

Senator ROBERTS: The judge in this trial was scathing of the ABC journalists involved in the case, saying they became defensive and considered any criticism as merely part of a culture-war attack and this inhibited ‘a proper remedial response to criticism’. The ABC journalists thought they were part of a culture war, and that prevented them from acting impartially and reasonably, leading to a potential multimillion dollar bill to taxpayers. Minister, what consequences will the journalists involved face for eroding people’s trust in the ABC, and why hasn’t their employment already been terminated? 

Senator WATT: Senator Roberts, I’m pleased to inform you that Australia now has a government that doesn’t have political interference in the ABC and so we have no intention of repeating the sort of intervention that we’ve seen— 

Opposition senators interjecting— 

Senator Canavan: Where’s the accountability? 

The PRESIDENT: Order! 

Senator WATT: from some of the people who are yelling across the chamber now in matters involving the ABC. These are matters that are the responsibility of ABC management, and we respect their independence. I understand, Senator Roberts, that the Federal Court has obviously handed down its decision in these defamation proceedings. There do remain several settlement matters before the court, so I probably shouldn’t be commenting any further on what might happen there. And, as I’ve said, the ABC is responsible for managing its legal matters, including defamation claims and litigation, just as any media proprietor, whether it be publicly funded or privately owned, is responsible for managing its legal matters, including when it’s sued for defamation. We believe that the ABC is a trusted source of news, information and entertainment for all Australians and we support it. 

The PRESIDENT: Senator Roberts, a second supplementary question? 

Senator ROBERTS: Minister, Heston Russell was a victim of disinformation published by the ABC in an ordeal that he has called the ‘hardest battle he has ever fought’. Can you please confirm that Minister Rowland’s misinformation and disinformation bill would not cover the ABC and won’t protect people like Heston Russell from government disinformation? 

Senator WATT: Senator Roberts, I’m very pleased that you’ve taken an interest in matters involving misinformation and disinformation. I welcome your sudden interest in misinformation and disinformation, and I hope that that’s something that you will retain an interest in when it comes to election campaigns that you’re involved in, Senator Roberts. I really do hope that you do that. We’d like to hear more about that. 

Senator Canavan: Mediscare was a great example! 

Senator WATT: And, Senator Canavan—he’s a big fan of misinformation and disinformation as well, so I look forward to Senator Canavan supporting us in tackling misinformation and disinformation. 

Senator Rennick: Where’s this greenhouse that you keep talking about? Talk about disinformation— 

Senator WATT: Oh, and Senator Rennick. We’ve got everyone! We’ve got all of the kings of misinformation and disinformation up commenting today! 

Senator Rennick interjecting— 

Senator WATT: Hello, Gerard; how are you? Of course, the government does have legislation before the parliament to deal with misinformation and disinformation. We think that it is an important issue in today’s media environment, particularly in the social media environment that we’re operating under, and we think that it’s an important piece of legislation to deal with. 

The return of Cheng Lei is good news and I can only imagine how relieved her family must be. My intention here was not to discuss Cheng Lei’s release but to highlight the misinformation from Labor around this story, and how this relates to the ACMA Combatting Misinformation and Disinformation Bill the government is aiming to implement.

Penny Wong, as Foreign Affairs Minister, last week took credit for the release of Australian journalist, Cheng Lei. That may be misinformation. According to a Chinese government post, Cheng Lei was released after serving her sentence in China for publishing information under an embargo. In other words, she completed her sentence and was sent home.

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said it himself: Cheng’s return was not part of a deal struck with Beijing and her release followed the completion of China’s judicial process. It couldn’t be more clear.

Yet the Labor government is passing off Cheng Lei’s release as a Labor government achievement with Penny Wong taking credit herself. The PM even advised his caucus in the aftermath of his failed $450 million Voice referendum to “focus on achievements” and placed the release of Cheng Lei at the top of the list.

Why did I feel this was important to point out in the senate and on the record? It’s an example of misinformation from a government that is about to censor everyone except itself and the accredited media. To a bureaucracy with a censorship hammer, every bit of unapproved information looks like a nail.

I think most of us agree after the past few years that if we are to combat misinformation and disinformation then the government and its media mouthpiece would be the best place to start.

Transcript

Senator ROBERTS: My question is to the Minister for Foreign Affairs, Senator Wong. It’s based on a constituent’s inquiry. Australian journalist Cheng Lei was convicted in China of illegally providing state secrets to overseas parties and imprisoned. Cheng Lei was recently released and arrived back in Australia last week. Minister, can you inform the Senate what role you had personally, your department had and the Prime Minister had in the release of Cheng Lei? 

Senator WONG (Minister for Foreign Affairs and Leader of the Government in the Senate): I thank the senator for his question. Obviously, as you would expect, this is an issue on which there has been a lot of discussion at various levels with the Chinese authorities, urging the return of Ms Cheng and urging her to be able to return to Australia. I can indicate to you—and obviously some of this is at officer level—that, as I said publicly at the time, this was my first engagement with the then foreign minister Wang Yi, when I first met him at the first bilateral discussion in Bali. It is the practice of Australian governments to ensure that we raise consular cases with other countries, China included, at all appropriate meetings. 

I can indicate to the senator that Ms Cheng Lei was the subject of representations from me, the Prime Minister and officers, just as with other consular cases such as Dr Yang’s and with those obviously facing criminal charges. We made those representations at the Prime Minister level, at the foreign minister level and at officer level, and we will continue to do so. I would acknowledge also that this has been the practice under successive governments. I spoke to former senator Payne after I had met Ms Cheng Lei at the airport to let her know before the news became public. I acknowledge that she also raised this with the Chinese authorities— (Time expired

The President: Senator Roberts, first supplementary?

Senator ROBERTS: The Chinese ministry of state has posted on Weibo that Cheng Lei had been sentenced to two years and 11 months in prison and had been deported after completing her sentence. Minister, your words on Cheng Lei’s arrival at the airport, as quoted in the Guardian, made it clear that the government was taking credit for her release. They quoted you as saying: I made them a promise some time ago we would do everything, I would do everything I could, to bring her home …Minister, who is telling the truth—you or the Chinese government?

Senator WONG: Senator, you and I have differences of opinion, but I regret that you would use something I said about what I said to her children in that way.

An opposition senator: Seriously?

Senator WONG: No—not ‘seriously’. It was an expression of hope, emotion and a degree of humanity, because, like all Australians, I wanted to see a mother return to her children. That was also what I said publicly. The Chinese legal system has been completed. We have seen what they have said—that is, the articulation of the Chinese legal position. What I can say is that we made a priority to make representations— (Time expired)

The President: Senator Roberts, second supplementary?

Senator ROBERTS: Minister, is this a case that proves the Albanese government’s misinformation and disinformation bill should not exclude ‘government misinformation and disinformation’ and
instead should include ‘government misinformation and disinformation’?

The President: Senator Roberts, I’m not sure how it relates, but I’m sure the minister will respond as she sees fit.

Senator WONG: Senator Roberts, there is no misinformation on our side. There is no disinformation on our side. What we have said—and if you had actually tracked every engagement I have had with the Chinese authorities, what I have said afterwards when I have articulated, at least in summary version, what I said to the Chinese authorities and what the Prime Minister said to his counterparts—you would know that we have made these representations. All I can say is this: this is not a partisan issue, and this is not a political issue. This is an issue about an Australian who is now home with her children. Behind her were many Australians across this country and across the political divide who made the same representations to Chinese authorities at all levels that Australians wanted to see a mother united with her children. I think that is a good thing. It was a great privilege to have the opportunity— (Time expired)

Transcript 

Senator ROBERTS: I move: 

That the Senate take note of the answer given by the Minister for Foreign Affairs (Senator Wong) to a question without notice asked by Senator Roberts today relating to the reporting of the release of Chinese Australian citizen Cheng Lei. 

The Chinese government announced that Cheng Lei’s release was simply a matter of her completing a sentence of two years and 11 months. In her explanation though the minister claimed an emotional high ground that is not supported by events at the airport. Minister Wong was most welcome to make remarks to Cheng Lei’s children in private, and she did so. The minister then restated and expanded her remarks to the press, which were widely reported. Further, at that press conference the minister stated that the release of Cheng Lei was a result of Senator Wong’s perseverance, which the minister did not restate in her answer to me. Did her representations have any effect on the Chinese government? Not according to the Chinese government. Who is right? We may never know. 

One Nation is concerned about the Albanese government’s misinformation and disinformation bill as applied to this situation. As drafted, the government and mainstream media are exempt from the bill. The Guardian‘s slobbering all over Minister Wong and the Albanese government over Cheng Lei would be exempt from this bill. The government can say whatever it likes and the mouthpiece media can repeat and even embellish those claims and that would be legal. Bloggers and social media companies who question the narrative though would be guilty of misinformation and fined or shut down. Weibo, which announced the Chinese government’s side of the story, has an office in Sydney and would be regulated under that bill. There’s no provision in the bill for truth as a defence. There’s no definition of what is misinformation. If this bill is passed, democracy itself will be at risk from an unending one-sided glorification of the ruling party. Last weekend, Australians rejected this sort of propaganda in the referendum campaign. The government proceeds with a misinformation and disinformation bill at its peril, because the people will see through it, just like they saw through the lies in the ‘yes’ case. This is about censorship.