Bringing Choice Back to Family Assistance

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One Nation fully supports the bill introduced by Senators Babet and Antic – A New Tax System (Family Assistance) Amendment (No Jab No Pay Repeal) Bill 2025 – which seeks to restore the conscientious-objection clause to federal family assistance laws.

This bill enables parents with unvaccinated children to access the childcare subsidy and Family Tax Benefit Part A without facing financial penalties, applicable up to age seven after which the child is deemed to meet the schedule irrespective of vaccination status. Under this amendment, parents would be able to file a written declaration of conscientious objection, alongside a consultation with an immunisation provider regarding risks and benefits, to legally satisfy childhood immunisation requirements.

Australian childhood vaccination rates are at a 12-year low, dropping below the federal government’s 95% target. This drop in vaccination rates is no coincidence and can be attributed to public distrust following government actions and mandates during COVID-19.

Medical coercion violates patient autonomy and the ethical guidelines of the Australian Immunisation Handbook, which mandates voluntary informed consent.

There are disparities in state-level “no jab, no play” childcare bans so vaccination status should have no bearing on child care, relevant subsidies and the ability to claim Family Tax Benefit A. Besides, we let in millions of people into Australia without knowing their vaccination status. India and China have vaccination rates higher that we do, however Pakistan is down to 80% and Yemen is at 50%.

Further, safety testing of childhood vaccines against inert placebos have NEVER been tested, a requirement of the ICH Guideline for Good Clinical Practice E6, which the Therapeutic Goods Administration (TGA) ratified. High levels of adverse events such as autism that parents associate with the vaccines, are brushed off by the authorities, with no examination, and no interest in exploring truth. A One Nation government believe this is a matter in the public interest and will require this safety testing to be funded given the significance of the exercise.

Transcript

Senator Roberts: Thank you to Senators Babet and Antic for this bill, A New Tax System (Family Assistance) Amendment (No Jab No Pay Repeal) Bill 2025, which One Nation wholeheartedly supports. The bill simply provides for the conscientious-objection clause to be restored to the A New Tax System (Family Assistance) Act 1999, which will allow children who are not fully immunised to access social security. 

Specifically, this will allow families whose children may not be vaccinated to access the childcare subsidy and the family tax benefit part A supplement without facing financial penalties. Under this amendment, if a parent files a written declaration of a conscientious objection and an immunisation provider certifies they have discussed the risks and benefits, the child is legally deemed to have met the immunisation requirements. This provision only applies to age seven, after which the child is deemed to meet the schedule irrespective of vaccination status. 

This bill is sensible. It’s fair. It restores the fundamental principle that parents make decisions for their children—not governments. Childhood vaccination rates in Australia are currently at a 12-year low, dropping below the federal government’s target of 95 per cent. Vaccination rates at 12 months are 90.5 per cent, down 4.3 per cent over the last five years. At 24 months, the rate is 88.4 per cent, and, at 60 months, the rate is 92.5 per cent. According to the latest data from the National Centre for Immunisation Research and Surveillance, approximately 80,000 children under the age of five are not fully up to date with their standard childhood immunisations. 

The timing of this fall is no coincidence. Immunisation was a major casualty of Australia’s criminal response to the COVID scandal. It turns out that, when you force vaccination on people and destroy the careers, businesses and, in some cases, marriages of those who refuse, many people do not react with acquiescence. They react with understandable suspicion, distrust, resentment and anger. They saw the harm people were experiencing from the COVID injections, they look at the harm some childhood vaccines are causing, and they ask, ‘What else have our authorities lied to us about?’ 

The reduction in support for vaccination takes two forms. Firstly, parents are increasingly choosing not to give some or all of the schedule to their child. Secondly, parents are delaying the shots until their baby is older. For instance, in 2025, two in five children received their first measles, mumps and rubella, or MMR, dose later than recommended. That’s 40 per cent. 

When looking at vaccination rates across Australia, national averages can be highly misleading. The national average sits at around 91 per cent, although this does not mean every area is vaccinated to that level. There are growing regional differences. The drop in vaccination rates is not happening evenly across the country. 

The National Centre for Immunisation Research and Surveillance map data from the Australian Immunisation Register onto a standard unit called an SA3, statistical area level 3. This is important when comparing vaccination rates in one area against those in another. Five years ago, more than half of all SA3, statistical area level 3, areas had reached or exceeded the 95 per cent target. Today, the number of SA3 areas meeting that target has plummeted to just 18 per cent—less than one in five. This shows that the fall in confidence in vaccination is happening right across the country. 

It can be argued that these SA3 areas with vaccination rates below 95 per cent no longer have herd immunity. Herd immunity has come under scrutiny following the failure of the COVID vaccines, the COVID injections, the COVID gene therapy treatments, to effect herd immunity, despite the level of coercion which went into achieving very high vaccination rates So far, this healthy scientific re-examination has shown measles, mumps, polio and rubella vaccines can achieve herd immunity because their outer shell is stable over time. 

Many countries, including the United States, have found the level of preservatives in the MMR vaccine is too high for safety and require those shots to be given separately and spaced out. One Nation supports that position. Viruses like COVID and influenza mutate rapidly and, as society proved with COVID, do not allow for herd immunity. This was conventional science before our COVID response tore up the rule book and threw out the science. Surprisingly, the areas of lowest vaccination are not in rural and regional areas. They are in growth corridors and inner-city areas. That’s interesting. Conservatives are frequently blamed for lower vaccination rates, yet where are the lowest rates? They’re in inner city left-leaning electorates. Vaccination rates in the bush, though, can be delayed, owing to distance and scheduling. 

Growth corridors are showing lower vaccination rates, and this is where the babies are and where mothers live with concern about government agencies’ actions dishonestly compromising their precious babies’ health. The bill does not address the issue of unvaccinated children attending child care. State governments control that policy. New South Wales, Victoria, South Australia and Western Australia all have laws preventing unvaccinated children attending child care. Queensland allows the centre to make the decision. The ACT, Tasmania and the Northern Territory have no regulations similar to no-jab no-play. Vaccination status is not relevant to child care. Canberra always makes rules for others that it does not impose on itself. Recall Commonwealth agencies inhuman, antihuman, immoral, dishonest COVID restrictions and lies contrary to the science. This is interesting. If vaccination status is critical to keeping children safe, we would see New South Wales, Victoria, South Australia and Western Australia having lower disease rates than the ACT, Northern Territory and Tasmania, who allow vaccinated and unvaccinated children to mix. Not surprisingly—to me anyway—there is no difference in disease rates between the states on average over time. Don’t you just love competitive federalism? I sure do! 

If you look at the raw infection numbers that the Australian Centre for Disease Control, the CDC, publishes, New South Wales regularly records the highest numbers of whooping cough and measles cases in the country. This may be because Australia does not screen new arrivals for vaccination status. For clarity, new arrivals are those visa types which are counted towards net overseas migration. Although the same no-jab no-play rule covers children of the net overseas migration and Australian children, when new arrivals apply for permanent visas, they come under the migration medical examination, which does check their vaccination status and requires makeups where required. 

What’s the take-home here? We go to all this trouble to achieve childhood vaccination, then we let in millions of new arrivals and don’t even ask their vaccination status. For the record, India and China have vaccination rates higher than ours. Pakistan is down at 80 per cent, and Somalia and Yemen are at 50 per cent. I’ve asked about this in Senate estimates hearings and always get nothing answers—crap—and that’s the problem. Unless we can talk honestly about these issues, confidence in health authorities will continue to plummet. Their hubris will be fatal to public health. We also know is that we have a 35-year high in whooping cough, pertussis, notifications and public measles alerts. Something is going wrong, and we have every right to ask about it. 

One Nation has concerns around no-jab no-play laws. In medical ethics the relationship between coercion and vaccination is a complex topic, with two competing ethical duties—respect for individual autonomy and the duty to protect public health. In Australian clinical practice, coercion is against ethical guidelines. Under the Australian Immunisation Handbook for a patient to give legally valid medical consent that consent quote ‘must be given voluntarily in the absence of undue pressure, coercion or manipulation’. A doctor cannot ethically use physical force, direct threats or deception to compel a patient to take a vaccine. Doing so violates the foundational bioethical principle of autonomy, and that’s the right of an individual to make decisions about their own body. It is this autonomy Senator Antic’s bill seeks to strengthen, with the re-inclusion of a conscientious objection. As such, the bill fits perfectly within the existing legal and ethical vaccination framework. Here I must make the point that during COVID this fundamental protection against coercion was torn up and ripped to shreds with apparent glee from our health authorities, who revelled in operating in an environment without ethics. The very people who should have displayed ethics instead chose hysteria with an added layer of financial gain. The fundamental rule here is that, if you ignore the rule on informed consent, the risk—in this case, COVID—has to be proportionate to the measures taken. The vaccine has to be proven safe and effective. The measures taken must be the least necessary to be the least infringement on the code, and, finally, the measures have to be necessary. The COVID immunisation agenda met none of these four tests—not one. The COVID shots were not tested. The skimpy so-called testing was done on a different version of the vaccine to the one actually sold in Australia. The term ‘safe and effective’ was two lies. They were not safe; they were not effective. And we know the health agencies and departments knew that at the time. I’ll say it again: we know the health agencies and departments knew at the time that they were not safe and effective. They were not necessary. Vaccinating for influenza has never worked and did not work in the case of COVID, and, lastly, they were not the least infringement on the code. Ivermectin and similar accessible, affordable, safe drugs were proven safe and effective yet were banned by our health authorities. 

The Australian Health Practitioner Regulation Agency, Ahpra, should have acted to defend the rights of patients and stood in defence of informed consent, which is supposedly an Ahpra objective. Instead, they chose to police medical practitioners to ensure none dared to follow the Australian Immunisation Handbook guidelines. Ahpra tried heavily and determinedly to ensure health practitioners did not comply with the Hippocratic oath. These dishonest travesties Ahpra continue today. 

Secondly, childhood vaccines have never been tested for safety against an inert placebo—never—which is what is required by the ICH Guideline for Good Clinical Practice E6, which Australia’s Therapeutic Goods Administration, the TGA, has ratified. Australian vaccines have not been tested against this standard. Instead, the TGA, in Senate estimates hearings, relies on the lack of reported serious adverse events to assume vaccines are safe. Despite there being high levels of adverse events such as autism that parents associate with the vaccines, the authorities, with no examination, brush off that the cause is vaccines. It’s this, more than anything else, that’s causing a loss of confidence in vaccination. A One Nation government will require this safety testing to be done and, given the significance of the exercise, fund the trials, in the public interest. 

Finally, under America’s health and human services secretary, Robert F Kennedy Jr, the US Department of Health and Human Services and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the CDC in America, announced an unprecedented revision of the routine childhood immunisation guidelines, shrinking approved vaccines from 17 to 11. Australia has 14. This move is currently blocked in American courts after the pharmaceutical industry fought back. I hope the measure is approved, as it will provide a very immediate answer to the question of a potential link between childhood vaccines and adverse events that agencies with connections to big pharma currently and blindly do not accept as being vaccine related. 

Greg Beattie’s excellent book, Fooling Ourselves, provides a proper statistical evaluation showing that the incidence of childhood diseases and their effects plummeted before the vaccines were released. That means that vaccines were not the cause of the near eradication of the diseases. Rather, it seems that improved hygiene, improved sanitation and improved nutrition were the causes of falling disease incidence. It means that there will be no harm in not forcing childhood vaccines—no harm. 

In summary, parents have every right to be wary of the harm these products may be doing to their children. They have every right to exercise their religious or conscientious objections to forced vaccination. They should not be treated differently for not having vaccinated their children in whole or in part. And childcare centres should be free to make the decision to accept or not accept vaccinated or unvaccinated children. One Nation will proudly support this bill

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Essential Infrastructure Belongs in Public Hands

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Infrastructure of national significance such as power transmission lines, substations and water systems should remain in the hands of the government, on behalf of the people, which will prevent corporate monopolies and price gouging. While power generation can be privately owned, it needs long-term supply price controls.

Privatisation of water in South Australia in 1996 failed and was brought back under government control in 2012. Not only was it poorly maintained, water went from being amongst the cheapest to the dearest. Similarly, Western Australia privatised water in 1996 and likewise, was brought back under government control in 2019. The Western Australian government discovered that managing complex private contracts was actually costing more than doing the work themselves. This saved taxpayers $5 million a year.

Rather than learning from the costly mistakes of other states, Victoria is pushing ahead with plans to lease VicWater assets to the highest bidder. The result? Victorians will face higher water bills only to inherit degraded infrastructure when its handed back.

Privatisation leads to monopolies, profit maximisation and price gouging. By contrast, I generally support the free market because it gives consumers choice, driving accountability, efficiency, and productivity.

Given Australia’s small population and vast size, duplicate critical infrastructure cannot exist, meaning private ownership inherently creates unregulated monopolies that maximise profit through gouging.

The Solution? Competitive Federalism. State-owned critical infrastructure avoids private monopolies because it operates within a system of “competitive federalism.” Citizens have freedom of movement between states, creating a “marketplace in governance” where states must remain accountable, efficient, and responsive to citizens, driving positive policy reforms across the country.

Transcript

Senator Roberts: I thank Senator McKim for moving this motion, which One Nation supports. It’s One Nation policy that infrastructure of national significance should remain in the hands of the government on behalf of the people—not under government control but on behalf of the people. This includes power transmission lines and substations. Power stations can be privately owned and operated under a long-term supply price, which prevents price gouging in times of power scarcity, which happens all the time with weather-dependent solar and wind power. It’s a travesty that the business model for Snowy 2.0 hydro seeks to justify the $42 billion price tag using a projection for power prices which suggests they too expect a profit from price gouging. AEMO, the Australian Energy Market Operator, is frequently forced to intervene in the market at $600 per megawatt hour, which is a staggeringly high price, because new gas-firming plants are not being required to accept a feed-in tariff. If it existed, it would be $60 to $80 per megawatt hour. Consumers are paying peak pricing which is 10 times the price they would pay if we built our baseload power stations with sensible supply contracts—fact. 

Privatising infrastructure of national significance has failed. South Australia privatised water in 1996 and brought it back under government control in 2012. This was after the operator failed to maintain a sewage treatment works and Adelaide endured months of what was called the ‘big pong’. Adelaide water went from being amongst our country’s cheapest to our country’s dearest. Western Australia privatised water in 1996 and brought it back under government control in 2019. The outcome in Western Australia was interesting. Perhaps Premier Carroll could pay attention there. During 25 years, the Western Australian government realised that managing complex private contracts was actually costing more than doing the work themselves. Moving Western Australian water back to government ownership saved taxpayers $5 million a year. Now Victoria is the latest bankrupt state selling off the silverware—VicWater. The plan is called Project Nerva and circumvents the Victorian constitution through leasing the $18 billion in assets of VicWater to the highest bidder. Victorians will pay more for their water and receive back an asset in a worse state than when it was leased. Such is privatisation. It leads to a monopoly, which leads to profit maximisation, which leads to gouging. I generally support the free market because it gives consumers choice, and choice leads to accountability, and choice leads to efficiency and productivity. Given Australia’s small population, though, and huge area, we cannot support two sets of critical infrastructure for roads, water and electricity. We cannot place monopoly power in corporate hands, where profit maximisation is the goal and leads to gouging. 

What of government monopolies? Our forefathers, the founding fathers of our Constitution, thought of that and came up with a solution—actually, they borrowed it from the American constitution. The solution is embedded in our Constitution. States provide infrastructure and critical services. That comes under competitive federalism. One state competes with another state. That’s a marketplace in governance. There is choice. If South Australia is stuffing things up, South Australians can move to New South Wales or Queensland. It doesn’t matter what it is. Whether it’s education, infrastructure, water, electricity, roads—whatever it is, there is no monopoly, because the states have competition under competitive federalism. That provides a marketplace in governance, which leads to choice. If you don’t like the state you’re in, you can move to another state. Freedom of movement leads to accountability. So state ownership of critical infrastructure is part of a marketplace solution. 

There’s not enough time to tell you about Sir Joh, but Sir Joh abolished death duties in Queensland, and people moved to Queensland so that they could leave their children more money. That led to other states doing the same. Warren Buffett, the most successful investor ever, said his ideal investment is the sole drawbridge on a wide river. When you put it in private hands, infrastructure becomes a mechanism for gouging. We must protect national infrastructure and national services like water. They’re key resources.

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Drill, Refine, Rebuild

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Reflecting on a decade in the Senate, it’s clear that every major issue facing Australia — from energy and water to economic decline — stems from the “uniparty” status quo.

We’ve fallen from the #1 highest per capita income a century ago to now hurtling toward 20th. Despite having the world’s richest natural resources per capita, poor policy choices have left us dependent on foreign powers for manufacturing, energy and fertiliser.

We need to restore Australia’s independence.

We need to drill and refine at home, keeping our oil, gas and manufacturing within our borders from start to finish.

We need to secure domestic supply by rebuilding local production for essentials like fertiliser.

I support Senator Bell’s inquiry to get the real data on how this happened and how we fix it.

Australia deserves better than managed decline.

Transcript

Senator Roberts: I was elected in 2016 in May-July. I started in July. I’ve had more than 10 years since I first joined the Senate. I’ve been elected once and re-elected twice. In that 10 years, I’ve learnt that every major problem in this country is due to the uniparty. Your policies on energy, your policies on climate fraud, your policies on water—disgraceful. You’ve done everything you can to hammer workers into subservience. You’re both guilty of mass immigration. 

Australia has fallen from having the No. 1 highest per capita income in the world a hundred or so years ago to now being headed out the back door. We’re heading for 20th thanks to you lot. We are still the richest nation in the world for resources per capita, yet now we’re dependent on communist dictatorships and the unstable government for much of what we need in this country. Our manufacturing has been shot, thanks to you lot, so we’re now dependent. We must have new capability restored within our borders—we drill for oil or gas within our borders, process it, refine it, transport it, and put it in bowsers, then into cars, trucks and tractors, with the whole process in our country. What’s the matter? You have abandoned that. You’ve both caused it. 

We need the same for fertiliser. We need to restore Australia. We have the world’s highest per capita resources, yet we’re heading down the road to poverty, thanks to you lot. We need to get the data on why this has happened. We need to get the data on what we need. We need to get the facts. That’s why I support this inquiry that Senator Bell has had the courage to put forward.

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Silencing the Oath

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Recent scientific papers, including one by Dr. Yaakov Ophir from the University of Cambridge and another by Dr Raphael Lataster from the University of Sydney, reveal high rates of severe adverse events such as myocarditis, pericarditis, and cancer links following COVID-19 vaccination, which were censored or downplayed by authorities.

Australian health authorities ignored these risks.

The Australian Health Practitioner Regulation Agency (AHPRA) silenced dissenting doctors, forcing practitioners to violate the Hippocratic oath. According to AHPRA’s own data, 16 doctors under AHPRA scrutiny have died by suicide.

Doctors’ registration fees have skyrocketed fivefold — not to keep standards high, but to fund Ahpra’s mounting mission creep.

With a growing appetite for complaints and power, AHPRA lack the ability to manage processes fairly or swiftly. When a regulator’s actions lead to serious distress and suicide risks, it’s no wonder they had to convene an “incidents of distress” review.

This isn’t regulation anymore; it’s harming our medical community.

A One Nation government is committed to calling for a royal commission into the COVID-19 medical response and convening a conference of state health ministers to review and reform AHPRA’s regulatory model.

Australians deserve to know who knew what and when regarding the COVID-19 medical response.

https://youtu.be/-HmexHho1zk

Transcript

Senator Roberts: In the week since I spoke about the huge volume of scientific papers on the COVID scandal, more new papers have been published. After years of censorship, Dr Yaakov Ophir from the University of Cambridge published an excellent paper in the EXCLI Journal titled ‘Real-time pharmacovigilance and cardiac risk communication during the COVID-19 vaccination campaign in Israel’. The paper included the Israeli Ministry of Health’s actual internal pharmacovigilance dataset, showing that, far from being rare and mild, adverse events from the COVID jab are dangerously high. From March to May 2021, immediately after injection started among males under 20, 85 per cent of the hospitalisations involved myocarditis or pericarditis. Among females under 20, 68 per cent of hospitalisations involved myocarditis or pericarditis. Two thirds of these patients had no medical history of heart disease, and 46 of these young people died. 

These are hospitalisations and deaths amongst healthy young people for whom COVID would not have been serious and certainly not fatal. This paper shows Israeli health authorities warned US and European authorities, ‘We are seeing a large number of myocarditis and pericarditis cases in young individuals soon after Pfizer COVID-19 vaccination.’ Yet the data behind that large number never reached the public. Instead, the warning was framed as ‘rare, mild and transient’—a lie—and the injection regimen was extended to even younger people. Australia did the same. Did we get the data Israel shared? Was our pharmacovigilance compromised? Only a royal commission can get to the bottom of who knew what and when. Only a royal commission can unpack decisions made and recommend changes for those who ignored the adverse events and acted contrary to the best interests of the public. 

Australian researcher Dr Raphael Lataster from the University of Sydney has published in the peer reviewed dedicated cancer journal Oncotarget. His paper shows a mechanistic link, which means the process that links, in this case, COVID injections with an outcome—in this case, cancer. I spoke last week of a paper from the McCulloch Foundation, which established a similar mechanistic link. The work in this area is now impossible to ignore. 

Why is this not big news? We have cause and effect, absolute proof of actual cases and hundreds of autopsies of people who should still be alive, and nobody in authority cares. Only One Nation will call a royal commission into a medical response that killed thousands—tens of thousands—of Australians due to adverse events, suicides, incorrect protocols or delays in medical treatment. That is criminal.  

What’s also criminal is the performance of the Australian Health Practitioner Regulation Agency, which is tasked with maintaining Australian medical standards. In Senate estimates hearings I’ve questioned Ahpra on many occasions. I’ve mentioned their jihad against any doctor who refuses to follow their self-determined medical truths and I’ve spoken about capable, sound doctors who are deregistered for the crime of providing their patients with the best possible medical care. Their actions during COVID and since show that Ahpra is dedicated to protecting orthodoxy, maximising pharmaceutical use and causing doctors to break the Hippocratic oath.  

I read an article in the Australian newspaper last weekend from obstetrician Dr Michael Gannon, former head of the Australian Medical Association. The headline correctly summarises the situation in which Ahpra has put us: ‘System to catch bad doctors is causing harm to the good ones.’ It’s killing good ones, and the regulator meant to protect patients has no filter on accepting complaints. Ahpra’s own data shows 16 doctors took their lives while under its scrutiny.  

Doctors’ registration fees have risen fivefold to pay for Ahpra’s mission creep, which is more reminiscent of a ministry of truth than a studious group of medical professionals ensuring their colleagues’ skill levels meet practising standards. In April this year, Ahpra convened the ‘organisational review group—incidents of distress’ to consider serious incidents relating to the suicide of people involved in their regulatory processes, and it’s no bloody wonder. This regulator has an appetite for more and more complaints, growing its budget and power. It’s lacking the ability to manage complaints in a morally fair and expeditious manner and it’s harming our society.  

A One Nation government will convene a conference of state health ministers to review the performance of Ahpra and explore alternative models of regulation based on correcting the balance between the practitioner’s standards and rights and the patient’s best interests. In doing so, One Nation will listen to doctors, nurses and health practitioners.

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Seeking Truth in Tragedy

Families and relatives of Australian Defence Force personnel killed in a fatal military helicopter crash appeared at a Senate hearing to share their stories.

They expressed deep anger over the senior ADF leadership’s refusal to admit fault, take responsibility, or answer straightforward questions, resorting instead to defensive “word salad” and bureaucratic deflection.

Critical equipment oversights were highlighted, such as flying aircraft with known defective turbines (unlike the Navy and New Zealand, which grounded their fleets) and ignoring safety reports regarding malfunctioning fast-release ladders.

They told us of a toxic culture where service members avoid raising safety concerns out of fear of harming their careers, promotions, or looking weak, leading to dangerous normalisation of risk.

Surviving partners detailed immense frustration with the Department of Veterans’ Affairs (DVA), citing rigid, unrolling support packages, bureaucratic hurdles, and a lack of practical assistance during their acute grief.

While these families maintained immense respect for frontline soldiers, sailors, and airmen, as well as immediate unit commanders, they expressed profound distrust in senior military leadership and questioned the overall security posture of the ADF.

Despite their devastating losses, the families expressed profound hope that the inquiry would finally bring out the truth, ensuring greater safety and accountability for future generations serving in the armed forces.

Transcript

Senator ROBERTS: Thank you for appearing. Thank you for your families’ service, because it’s not just the person who enlists who serves, is it? Thank you for your submissions and for sharing what your boys, your men loved. Look, I can’t imagine your grief and anger—I just can’t—especially because your loss and harm were avoidable. I asked some questions and had a briefing from Defence, Army, after the Jervis Bay incident. I kept asking why, and I got the feeling very strongly—I want to put it on the record—that they were delaying. They were dodging. Is there anything else you’d like to put on the record that you want to say? Your statements have been really effective. Does anything else come to mind? How do you feel? What are you feeling? Yes, Mr Naggs?  

Mr Naggs: ‘Where does this end?’ is a question I think we all have. How does it end?  

Senator ROBERTS: You’d like clarity.  

Mr Naggs: Yes. I’d also like an admission from the leaders of Defence that something went wrong. What we just saw there was an absolute effort to not admit anything. I don’t know where that fits in with the concept of leadership. I always thought leadership was about accountability and honesty—just an admission of, ‘Hey, we can do better.’ There are a whole heap of recommendations that can come out of these reports, and they can say, ‘We’ll adopt them,’ but the first thing of reform is to admit some accountability and transparency and go forward. That’s leadership. How do you train leadership when that fundamental value is not displayed in your leaders?  

Senator SHOEBRIDGE: Sometimes it feels like, when you’ve got Defence, it’s ‘pin the tail on the jellyfish’. It just keeps moving and avoiding.  

Ms Loft: Unfortunately, we often see that it’s not the people making the decisions that are held to any account or fault. It’s the people far down the chain of command who are simply enforcing those decisions that were made far above them.  

Senator ROBERTS: I’ve seen that in a number of ways in the last 10 years.  

Mr Nugent: I was sitting here today listening to the evidence of the Defence people—General Hafner—and I was waiting for you to ask the question: ‘How big is the flight manual? How many pages does the flight manual have? 10? 100? 1,000? 2,000?’ It’s huge. To sit there and say, ‘We put it in the book. Read the book. The pilots had read the book. And then, in those fatal few seconds, recall the book. Act appropriately. Follow your training’—  

Ms Nugent: And on something that’s against human instinct.  Completely against human instinct. Unfortunately, they talk about pitch ladders and horizons in the TopOwl, and you don’t get an opportunity to see what that actually looks like. That’s things moving around in front of you. It’s not something just off in the corner. It’s right there in front of you. To say, ‘It’s in the book,’ is an absolute cop-out. The Jervis Bay incident is a classic example of that. No-one told the pilots, and it’s in evidence that the pilots weren’t told that they were flying aircraft with a known defective turbine that was going to get fixed in maintenance down the line— Unidentified speaker: But not at the same time.  and that turbine could fail in a critical phase of flight.  

Mrs Lyon: Everyone else changed their turbines. Navy did. New Zealand did. Everyone else changed them.  

Ms Loft: They grounded the fleet.  

Ms Whyte: Immediately.  

Mr Nugent: My question for that one is: would those pilots on that night or the pilot in the ditched aircraft, had they known that they could have experienced an engine failure in a hover or a critical phase of flight, have reacted differently?  

Ms Nugent: Would they have gotten in there?  

Mr Nugent: Would they have just powered the aircraft away?  

Ms Nugent: They had people dangling underneath them. They didn’t even have a chance to know, to even stand up for themselves. They just said: ‘Alright, off we go. Everything’s fine.’ And they had however many people under them. It wasn’t just the pilot’s life or the crew’s life that was at risk then. That’s a lucky incident.  

Senator SHOEBRIDGE: We’ve since found out that the Army Aviation evaluation team also told them that the fast release on the ladder wouldn’t work in situations like this. They’d been told about it and they hadn’t fixed it. In that very situation, the fast release was pulled and didn’t work, and that’s why we were so close to yet another catastrophe. The ladder wasn’t released and all of those service personnel were pretty much under the helicopter as it was going down because, again, they ignored an AATES report.  

Mrs Lyon: That’s my concern. I’ve said it before. So we now know about the turbines and we now know about the circumnavigating and getting through TopOwl. What other pieces of equipment sitting in military aircraft, inside weapons, inside other really life-altering devices have also been circumnavigated? What else are they putting in or not putting in? Do you know?  

Senator ROBERTS: You need exposure, truth, openness.  

Mrs Lyon: Yes, that’s all we’re asking for.  

Mr Nugent: The cynical version of me says that they had made the decision to change the new Black Hawke prior to Talisman Sabre. Max was getting ready to go and do his Black Hawk conversion. The cynical part of me says, ‘This is the big show. Every two years is the big show. How bad will we look to our allies when we say our aircrafts don’t cut it? We can’t fly tonight. We shouldn’t be flying.’ They didn’t put in the recommendations from the near-miss at Townsville. If those recommendations were in practice and in place, would they have launched that night?  

Senator ROBERTS: I was going to ask and I still will: what can I or what can we do? You’ve already answered the question in part. You won recognition and acknowledgement that your husband fought to the end because he cared.  

Mrs Lyon: Yes.  

Senator ROBERTS: The last thing he did was to prevent that accident, that fatality, so I give you that acknowledgement—from me anyway.  

Mrs Lyon: Thank you.  

Senator SHOEBRIDGE: You can read it in the report. I just wish it was said in the conclusions. You read it in the report. Actually, for the first time ever, I heard it expressed just before. There wasn’t a lot that pricked my ears up. We did hear that expressed just earlier, Mrs Lyon.  

Mrs Lyon: We did.  

Senator SHOEBRIDGE: We should reflect back on that and acknowledge it.  

Senator ROBERTS: I asked: what do you need? You’ve already said ‘care’—care for those who are left behind.  

Ms Loft: Self-Determination. Alex told me one day, if he were not to come home, that I’d get this, this and this and I’d be looked after, and we have not been looked after. They go to work every day on the assumption that, if they do not come home, everything will be okay for whoever’s left behind and that is not the case. You’re left to fight through bureaucracy. You’re left to fight through a number of systems. We were a complex situation. We didn’t find out the result of the FSB investigation for almost two years. They were two years left to sit there, twiddle our thumbs and wonder what the heck was actually going on. You’re given two years under DVA with an acute support package to regain capacity. We’re still in the thick of this process. How can you even begin to regain capacity? This has been raised. Under those two years, you are allocated X amount of funding. That funding is then sent off to a delegate to actually determine where that funding is allocated. I did not use the majority of the funding that I received because it did not sit in something that I needed at that time. As part of my package, I was given services for return to work. I returned to work maybe six months ago. How could I use that in two years when we spent 57 days sitting in hearings? It’s one thing to hear that and say, ‘Okay, we’ve been given 57 days of hearings. That’s 57 days out of two years.’ Sure it is. That’s not wrong. We had the emotional lead up, where you spend a week preparing yourself to know that you’re about to hear the most traumatic information you could possibly hear about your loved one and the continued failures. Then you have the comedown from that during which you come home and you’re so mentally and emotionally fatigued that it takes another few weeks to put your life back together. So, yes, it may have been 57 days. In reality, it was far more than that. Yet we actually applied. We petitioned to have our acute support package extended and it was denied. It didn’t reach ministerial level. It was handled below that.  

Senator SHOEBRIDGE: Was this even though that each of you had unspent funds in it?  

Ms Whyte: The fact that it doesn’t even roll over—  

Ms Loft: Yes, it doesn’t roll over.  

Ms Whyte: is one recommendation that would make sense, and to be able to extend it because we didn’t have the capacity to (a) know it existed, that we could choose when it started. We didn’t know. We didn’t have the capacity. We weren’t informed. And (b) we didn’t have capacity to use it. We weren’t capable of being like, ‘Oh, what could we do right now in our free time to build capacity?’  

Ms Loft: Things that we asked for, we actually couldn’t get. I couldn’t cook. I cooked for Alex, so the thought of actually being able to cook a meal—I didn’t use my oven for 18 months. I asked for something like a thermomix because you just have to be able to delegate and offset any of those day-to-day tasks that used to be very simple 

Senator ROBERTS: The other thing that you said, Mrs Lyon, was that you’d like an admission from Defence, for them to have some responsibility. Basically, you’re saying that they failed your families in the fatal crash and they’re continuing to fail your families.  

Mrs Lyon: Correct. What happened to Dann and the boys and what happened to our family unit is the most devastating thing you could ever imagine. What then happened afterwards, and the trauma that that has caused, has been indescribable. It has not stopped, it will not stop and every time we turn around there is something that makes it worse. I would like that acknowledged and apologised for.  

Senator ROBERTS: Is there anything else anyone would like to say along that line? I want to change tack slightly and I don’t want to do that—  

Mr Nugent: I appreciate that. Look, I’ve listened to a lot of evidence over the years. I’m a 30-year-plus career policeman. I’ve been in enough courtrooms. I’d really like senior Army officers to just answer questions with ‘yes’ and ‘no’. I got a little bit tired of them thinking that they were the smartest people in the room. Sadly, they’re not. They definitely weren’t at the IGADF inquiry. There was the word salad, the stretching of words and the adding of acronyms to deliberately not answer questions. Even with the last question today about reputational damage— that damages their reputation.  

Ms Whyte: Precisely.  

Ms Loft: But also it’s— 

Mr Nugent: There’s damage to their reputation because they just cannot be honest and answer a question with ‘yes’ or ‘no’.  

Ms Nugent: And then it’s a punch in the face for us, again, to sit there and not—  

Mr Nugent: I sit there and I listen to this word salad over and over and over again.  

Ms Nugent: You just want someone to say ‘I’m sorry’—not even ‘I’m sorry’, but just ‘yes’ or ‘no’: ‘We were at fault here’ or ‘We were not’. I’m not going to take it personally. To go around and have my brother, your partner, your husband, your son to just be a blip of nothing and to not acknowledge that they were a human and that they mattered is exhausting. It’s just exhausting. 

Senator ROBERTS: Did you see the testimony of Mr Wilson and Mr Lamb?  

Mrs Lyon: Yes.  

Senator ROBERTS: The accusations of conflicts of interest stymied the investigation. We heard about the corruption—and I think you used the word ‘suppression’; it may have been someone else—and also evidence being fabricated. That is pretty serious stuff.  

Mrs Lyon: It is, isn’t it?  

Mr Nugent: This is no different to an internal investigation in the police. It’s no different.  

Senator ROBERTS: Yes.  

Mr Nugent: The first question that you get asked—the first form you fill out is the conflict-of-interest form. Perceived or real, you must disclose it before you take part, and I can tell you hand on heart: if you tick that box to say there is a perceived or potential conflict of interest, in 100 per cent of occasions you will be excluded from that investigation.  

Senator ROBERTS: Let me ask you a question, because some people in Defence have said that this inquiry just prolongs your agony. Does this inquiry needlessly extend your grief, or does it give you hope that some truth might come out?  

Mrs Lyon: It absolutely gives hope.  

Mr Naggs: It gives us hope.  

Mrs Lyon: We are so incredibly grateful, because we are desperate for the truth, and we can do this for as long as it takes to get there, because our boys deserve that. Our men and women who serve this country deserve it. Everyone has a right to go to work and be safe—everyone, no matter what they do. There is a difference between going to war, being in war, and going to work every day and doing your job, and that’s what they were doing. They were doing their job, and they had a right to be safe.  

Ms Whyte: I’ll add to that. Special operations shouldn’t be a reason not to adhere to that as well. It shouldn’t be more of a reason to go under the carpet—’Let’s not look at that or acknowledge it.’ They still had the same duty of care to uphold, and they didn’t.  

Ms Loft: They understood that their roles were inherently risky. Everyone knows that when it comes to military aviation, realistically, unfortunately, it’s a matter of when, not if. But, as has been said multiple times, they stepped onto those jets assuming that everything was fine and that everything had been put through rigorous testing and was signed off by the best of the best, and they had faith in that.  

Mr Nugent: Well, they have to have absolute 100 per cent faith in that, don’t they?  

Ms Loft: And they can’t question it, because otherwise how do they do their jobs 

Mr Nugent: Defence in general leverages young people with a can-do attitude. It exists for that reason—or not for that reason but because of that reason. Young men and women will put themselves in dangerous positions, and they leverage that. Over time, you get risk normalisation: ‘It was okay last night; we got away with that one.’ Probably, sadly, it was too long a gap between the Black Hawk disaster and our crash.  

Senator ROBERTS: Even Jervis Bay.  

Mr Nugent: Jervis Bay is a classic example. Max was rattled by that incident, and he said, ‘But hopefully it’s okay; they’re fixing the engines.’  

Ms Whyte: And he had faith in that. He thought they would do that.  

Mr Nugent: That’s pretty telling, you know. And how did they deal with that accident? They all went out on the drink, didn’t they? ‘Come on, boys. Let’s go to the pub. We’ll sort this out and have a chat.’ Culture—this comes down to culture.  

Ms Loft: And I think the inherent—I suppose I’ll use the word ‘tendencies’. Even though they may want to speak openly and honestly, at the end of the day, if they speak, it’ll cost them a promotion or it’ll cost them their career.  

Ms Nugent: You don’t want to be the one to say, ‘I’m too scared for that,’ or, ‘I don’t feel comfortable.’ You don’t want to seem like that. There are some girls in 6 Av, and I’m good friends with one of them. But, if you’re a guy, you don’t want to speak up, because you’ll look bad. Max was the one of the most junior. He was, I think, the youngest. He doesn’t want to say, ‘I’m sorry,’ because it’ll look bad on him, because that’s the culture of it. 

Senator ROBERTS: Twenty-odd years ago, when I was working as a consultant, I found it hard to get people to do their planning in underground coalmines: ‘Oh, no; she’ll be right.’ I went to a retired colonel and a retired captain, and their pride in the Australian Defence Force—both were in the Army, and I realised that the Australian Army punched above its weight in so many ways right from its inception. It’s got a record and a history of punching above its weight, earning the respect of its enemies and its allies. What the hell has happened?  

Ms Loft: It makes me really sad, because Alex discharged—this is before I was with him—because he kept getting passed over for deployment. He enlisted at 18. At 18, you think you know the world, but you really don’t. So he discharged and he got back in, and at that point that’s an informed decision. You already knew what was happening. It was his late 20s. He understood what he was signing up for, but he didn’t sign up for this. He was a proud soldier. One of the first things that we did together was the dawn service in the driveway, because it was the start of COVID. I had said to him, ‘Hey, I’m doing the dawn service in the driveway tomorrow.’ He goes, ‘Well, yes, I will be, too.’ We were two of only a few in the street in Toowoomba, freezing, listening to the neighbours’ radio. The guy bled green. He would have been in Army until he was retired in Army, because he loved what he did and he was good at what he did. But this is not what was in the contract or what he signed up for. It really upsets me that he was so proud to be a part of that organisation, and we’ve just seen ongoing failures.  

Mr Naggs: And do you know what his whole impression of civilian life was? He went and got a mechanic’s apprenticeship at a car dealer’s while he was out.  

Ms Loft: Maybe censor what he actually said!  

Mr Naggs: When he told me he was going back in, he said: ‘No-one’s got your back out here. Everybody’s trying to bring you down in civilian life. In the Army, people have got your back. They’ve got to have your back, and you’ve got to have theirs.’  

Mrs Lyon: And the boys do have each other’s back.  

Mr Naggs: Yes, the boys do.  

Ms Loft: I cannot fault his friends. They have stepped up where there have been so many failures. 

Senator ROBERTS: What level are you talking about? His immediate superiors?  

Mr Nugent: No. I will put it on the record that Max’s commanding officer—I won’t use his name because it’s probably still protected—is out of the Army now. He has been very good to me and our family.  

Senator ROBERTS: You’re talking about the senior levels of aviation?  

Mr Nugent: He’s the commanding officer at 6th Aviation.  

Unidentified speaker: At the time.  

Mr Nugent: At the time. But the senior officers now, when I look at the evidence that’s been given—I look at Senate estimates. I take an interest when it’s Defence because I like watching them sit there and not answer questions—  

Senator ROBERTS: We don’t!  

Mr Nugent: on every single topic.  

Senator SHOEBRIDGE: I’ll take that on notice, Mr Nugent.  

Senator ROBERTS: Let me ask you another question—has anyone else got anything to say?  

Mrs Lyon: We were incredibly proud of Dan being a pilot as well. Dan would always line up our home, or my daughter’s—or at the time, my son’s—day care and fly over. He always made sure that we always were able to see him coming home. We always waved. We knew it was daddy’s helicopter, and that was what our family did. We were so proud, and my son was so proud. He wanted to grow up to be a helicopter pilot just like his daddy. He doesn’t want to do that anymore. He will tell you that he doesn’t want to die like his daddy, and that, as a mother, is the most heartbreaking thing to hear. I don’t want him to join our ADF. I don’t trust it, and I don’t want him anywhere near it. I want my son to come home. I can’t imagine what that is like. It just breaks my heart because it would have been so different for our family otherwise. We were so proud of that service, and we still are. But it’s in a different capacity now. Sorry.  

Senator ROBERTS: No, don’t apologise. Thank you for sharing that with us. Anyone else?  

Ms Loft: Everything’s in my submission really. I’m sure there are other things I’ve forgotten about.  

Senator SHOEBRIDGE: Can I say that for all four of these young men, if they have family and partners like you, their lives were blessed.  

CHAIR: I think that—  

Senator ROBERTS: If I could just ask my final question.  

CHAIR: Of course.  

Senator ROBERTS: As Australians—not as bereaving parents, sisters and mothers—do you feel secure under the Australian Defence Force supposedly guarding our country?

Ms Whyte: What did you say, Dan? ‘Open the doors.’  

Mr Nugent: Yes, open the doors. The clock is ticking, isn’t it?  

Senator ROBERTS: It’s my biggest concern.  

Mr Nugent: To get this right. Defence knows it. Government knows it. I fear we’ve missed the boat a little bit. I think the average soldier, airman and sailor on the ground will do a fantastic job with what they’ve got at the time.  

Mrs Lyon: Because they have a love of it.  

Mr Nugent: I have every faith in that, but—  

Ms Whyte: They can only do as much as they can do under the circumstances.  

Mr Nugent: you can only do with what you’ve got.  

Ms Loft: I think it’s important that we still have incredible men and women that are willing to sign up because if we don’t, then who’s left? 

Senator ROBERTS: Mr Naggs, can I summarise by bastardising your phrase because I thought it was very, very powerful and it reflects my view of reality as well. The senior ranks of the ADF are not defending Australia; they’re defending their mistakes.  

Mr Naggs: This platform was the last of the non-American weapon systems. If you’re going to bring in the American weapon systems, this had to go. But did that have anything to do with it?  

Senator SHOEBRIDGE: I was about to say something about French submarines, so I think we shouldn’t—  

CHAIR: I am going to end now because that will lead us to AUKUS somehow, I’m sure.  

Senator ROBERTS: Could I comment about something else?  

CHAIR: Just one thing.  

Senator ROBERTS: I want to acknowledge the testimony of everyone today, especially this group, and Mr Wilson and Major General Lamb. I also want to acknowledge your chairmanship. You’ve done it very sensitively and honestly. Thank you. 

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The Cashless Trap: Surveillance, Fees, and Control

One Nation supports these bills: Cash Distribution Framework Bill 2026 and Cash Distribution Framework (Consequential Amendments and Transitional Provisions) Bill 2026.

These bills establish regulatory oversight, giving powers to the Reserve Bank of Australia (RBA) and the ACCC, over the cash-in-transit sector, treating cash handling as critical national infrastructure. However, we remain deeply suspicious of the government’s true motives, given their history of trying to phase out cash.

The government’s assumption that “cash is dying” is completely false. Since I began campaigning to protect cash in 2016, currency in the economy has grown 53% to $107 billion. Cash transactions are rising (now at 15%), 50% of Australians use cash weekly, and 7% rely on it exclusively.

The push toward a cashless society is a deliberate war on the middle class by the Liberal-Labor uniparty. It traps consumers into paying high electronic banking fees, forces overspending via plastic cards, and feeds massive corporate and government “big data” surveillance operations.

While some point to the cash economy in hospitality, this is largely driven by workers, including foreign students working off-the-books cash hours to bypass tax and fund untracked overseas remittances. The solution is targeting the black economy directly, not destroying cash for everyday Australians.

The banking cartel has abandoned regional Australia. These bills must be strictly used to mandate cash-handling ATMs and services in regional areas, including through post offices. Furthermore, the bush shouldn’t subsidise city security costs, especially since regional areas drive Australia’s export wealth while enduring the uniparty’s destructive “hollowing out” policies.

I have reservations regarding the $400 million emergency crisis-funding provision in the bill, which can be triggered on a very low bar.

One Nation has successfully fought the uniparty’s ongoing war on cash, from exposing systemic banking corruption that forced the Banking Royal Commission, to defeating the Morrison government’s cash ban bill in 2020 and calling out the Albanese government’s deceitful 2025 regulations that cleverly undermined legal tender protections.

From the very start, One Nation and I have been champions of the use of cash and critics of the banking cartel.

In the hands of a One Nation government, this bill will create a fair environment for the free market to thrive and for consumers to win.

Transcript

The fact is cash is king for retailers, sellers and buyers. The Cash Distribution Framework Bill 2026 and the Cash Distribution Framework (Consequential Amendments and Transitional Provisions) Bill 2026 establish a regulatory framework for Australia’s cash distribution system, with a particular focus on the cash-in-transit sector. The government’s claimed intention is to support continued access to cash as cash use supposedly declines and the economics of distribution become more difficult, especially in regional and remote areas. Key measures include allowing the Reserve Bank of Australia to designate systematically important cash distribution entities, giving the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission oversight of standard terms, pricing, service agreements, access arrangements and service level standards and creating good faith negotiation, arbitration and dispute resolution mechanisms. The bills introduce crisis readiness and resolution powers so that the Reserve Bank of Australia can intervene if a critical provider becomes financially distressed or services are disrupted. In effect, cash handling is moving from a commercial market service with many providers to critical national infrastructure. One Nation supports this bill. I would add that a main assumption in this bill is false. The use of cash is not declining. In 2016, when I first started campaigning to protect the use of cash, there was $70 billion of cash in the economy. Today it’s $107 billion, a 53 per cent increase in cash. Cash use is now increasing from 13 per cent of transactions in 2022 to 15 per cent today. Around 50 per cent or half of Australians use cash weekly, and seven per cent use cash exclusively. I’ll say that again: seven per cent of Australians use cash exclusively. Liberal-Labor uniparty governments have lost their war against cash because half of Australians disagree with ending the use of cash. Thank you, Australia. 

Reasons given for moving back to cash include the cost of electronic banking, which was always the plan—eliminate cash, and then banks can charge whatever they damn well like for electronic transaction fees, and consumers will be a captive market. We must keep cash. Secondly, an age-old budgeting trick is making a comeback. Withdraw your budget for the week in cash and, when it’s gone, stop spending. Swiping a plastic card encourages people to overspend. This is a measure one wouldn’t see making a comeback if everyday Australians were doing well. The truth is that the comeback in cash is directly linked to the cost-of-living crisis and the war on the middle class which the Liberal and Labor uniparty have been perpetrating for a generation. 

Increasingly, the use of cash is associated with privacy concerns. We know every purchase you make electronically is logged and then sold into the data market, often called big data. These companies have significant data files on every Australian, so much so that huge data centres are now necessary to keep track of it all and then exploit that data for the benefit of retailers and, of course, for the benefit of the government. 

The Australian Banking Association points out the rise in the cash economy. This is a valid point. There is significant use of cash payments in hospitality, among other industries. This is being driven by workers, not employers. I know one employer who advertised for bar staff and had emails from prospective employees asking what the rate per hour was for payment in cash. Foreign students are working their 20 hours legally and then working another 20 for cash. This is facilitating part of the $39 billion a year visa holders send back overseas. Recently, in Senate estimates hearings, I was given answers on this topic which suggested the amount foreign students earn each year was equal to the amount foreign students send overseas each year. So what are foreign students living on? Well, it’s obvious: their cash work and tax avoidance, adding GST to their subcontractor invoices and then shooting through before the ATO, the Australian Taxation Office, can catch up with them. 

I acknowledge that cash can facilitate a black economy, yet the answer isn’t getting rid of cash; it’s getting rid of the black economy. All of these things could be policed if the government really wanted to. It’s chosen not to. Both this government and the previous Liberal government chose not to get rid of the black economy. 

I note the bill does not explicitly mention Australia Post outlets or Bank@Post. It really should have included a statement of support for providing cash handling to post offices. Australia’s banking oligopoly, banking cartel, has badly served the bush. Local post offices are the last source of cash services for retail outlets in many rural and regional areas. The regulatory powers created in this bill must be used to mandate cash handling ATMs in areas that banks or post offices do not properly service so that business can still operate. 

Banks should earn their social licence to operate. In many ways direct and indirect, taxpayers protect the banks, and government favours increase bank profits and lower the risks banks face. Major banks today socialise losses and privatise profits. When things are going well, they’re private. When things are going badly, they want help from the government. In return, banks should fulfil adequate services, including provision of legal tender, cash. 

This Labor government continues the uniparty policy of hollowing out the bush, replacing farmland with industrial solar and wind installations and transmission lines to feed power to their city voter base. Part of that is the policy of turning agricultural land into a wasteland in the name of carbon dioxide credits, wind turbines and solar panels. As one of many examples for proof, look up Rushy Lagoon, Tasmania, which the Senate is debating. It’s 11,000 hectares of prime farmland turned into a pine plantation for carbon dioxide credits—for rubbish. Shame on you. You use taxpayer money to help these foreigners do it. You gave grants to yourself—grants to government entities. 

Australia’s banks have been actively supporting the uniparty government’s agenda to hollow out the regions, removing regional cash and banking services. This bill will provide a mechanism to restore the viability of cash handling in the bush, but I’m not convinced the government means a word of it. One Nation welcomes this new framework that we can use to restore cash handling in regions once we get into government. 

Armaguard is concerned about costs imposed in the bill making cash deliveries too expensive. This will result if the cost of regional cash services is charged on a cost-recovery basis. Banks, though, do not use cost recovery. They average operating costs across all their products. Yes, the city will pay for cash handling in rural regions. The bush though, right now, pays for the heightened cost of security in our crime ridden cities, the multiple armed guards on cash deliveries, the in-branch security and in-branch translation language services not needed in rural regions. 

Banks spend way more advertising in the city to get customers, whereas, when a bank has the only branch in town, that bank does not need to spend money advertising. In the growing number of regional towns with no bank, banks have no branch costs and simply give Australia Post licenced post offices a cheap fee to act as agent for the bank. By the way, the large majority of our country’s export income and wealth comes from the rural regions, from the bush. Don’t tell them in the bush they’re sponging off the cities. It’s the city’s sponging off the bush. 

The Cash Distribution Framework Bill 2026 allows the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission to require Armaguard-Prosegur to provide access to their depots for smaller operators, while noting these operators already access their depots. This provision is actually not really new. Nonetheless, protecting access rights in legislation is useful, so thank you. Potential market entrants into the cash-handling market, such as NCR, expressed support for this provision. The Bills Digest discusses concentration of industry power in the hands of the merged Armaguard-Prosegur entity. This bill may create barriers to entry for new or smaller entities and thereby serve to cement the Armaguard-Prosegur monopoly. It’s a fair point, although, once again, it goes to use of the powers in this bill not the creation of those powers. 

One power I am worried about, though, is the crisis-funding provision in the bill. Part 6 and 7 allow the Reserve Bank to declare a cash-handling emergency and may authorise up to $400 million in assistance to provide continuity of service while taking action that could include appointing an administrator. My concern is this provision can be triggered on a very low bar. One trigger provided in clause 90 is simply the entity asking for the money and the Reserve Bank of Australia deciding that, if the payment is not made, their operations may become unviable. 

From the very start, One Nation and I have been champions of the use of cash and critics of the banking cartel. In 2017, I was successful in creating the Senate Select Committee on Lending to Primary Production Customers, which I chaired, or rather, I should say, Senator Pauline Hanson was successful in creating the Senate select committee and appointed me as chair. The inquiry investigated unconscionable bank lending practices, default interest rates and predatory foreclosure behaviours that ripped off and traumatised Australian farmers and rural families and fishermen and loggers during periods of drought or financial hardship. Our inquiry found so much banking misconduct that Prime Minister Turnbull, at the time, was forced to call the royal commission into financial services that found widespread systemic corruption. Then the Morrison government tabled the Currency (Restrictions on the Use of Cash) Bill 2019, which was to introduce a $10,000 limit on cash transactions. When such provisions were introduced overseas, the $10,000 limit was quickly reduced. Greece now has a limit of 500 euros. France and Germany have a limit of 1,000. One Nation led the campaign against this obvious attempt to get rid of cash and force the public into the electronic banking system for the financial benefit of the banking cartel. They get to charge fees, and there’s no alternative. Despite Liberals and Labor passing the bill through the House of Representatives, we were successful, in December 2020, in removing the bill from the Senate Notice Paper. It didn’t go through the Senate. The banking cartel, though, did not give up. 

Recently, the Treasurer introduced the Competition and Consumer (Industry Codes—Cash Acceptance) Regulations 2025. This regulation destroyed the legal basis for cash. How? Very cleverly. It required only petrol stations and supermarkets to accept cash. Everything else did not have to accept cash. Petrol and supermarkets only had to accept up to $500 in cash and only between 7 am and 9 pm, so it was a furphy. That meant every other business—and every business, from 9 pm to 7 am—was not legally required to accept cash. The government justified this measure as guaranteeing cash, which was fundamentally a lie. 

Since Federation, the start of our country, cash has been legal tender. Businesses can only refuse cash in a narrow set of circumstances. The Albanese regulation was deceitfully designed to provide air cover for any business that wanted to move to card-only payment. That’s the real aim—to get rid of cash. This is the reason I’m suspicious of the motives the government has in preparing this bill. The uniparty government has now tried three times to get rid of cash. In the hands of a One Nation government, this bill, though, will create a fair environment for the free market to thrive and for consumers to win. 

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Ignoring the Core Threat

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One Nation strongly oppose the Australian Security Intelligence Organisation Amendment Bill (No. 2) 2025 in its current form. This is nothing but a government power grab disguised as national security rather than a genuine measure to protect Australians.

The bill fails to name or address radical Islamic ideology, which is the primary driver of global terrorism and an existential threat incompatible with Western values. Instead of ignoring this ideology, we must call it out honestly and halt Islamic mass immigration.

The interim report from the Royal Commission on Antisemitism and Social Cohesion cites that existing legal frameworks were entirely adequate and that agencies faced no legislative barriers leading up to the Bondi attack. Therefore, this bill cannot honestly be tied to that tragedy.

This legislation makes extraordinary ASIO powers permanent by removing sunset clauses, stripping away civil liberties, and expanding vague criteria like “communal violence” that could be weaponised against political dissent.

Both Liberal and Labor governments have historically eroded freedoms through digital IDs, censorship laws and pandemic-era restrictions. I pointed out Anthony Albanese’s own 2003 warnings against similar ASIO overreach, quoting warnings about how leaders use fear of attack to control the population only for him to pursue expansionary powers as Prime Minister today.

One Nation’s amendment to this Bill (which was defeated) was to explicitly name and include radical Islam as a target and to remove vague definitions surrounding “communal violence.”

Furthermore, rather than burdening law-abiding citizens, the government should simply deport the 230 known terrorists currently in Australia.

Transcript

Christians, Jews, Muslims, Hindus—all are victims of radical Islamic ideology and Islamic terrorism. More Muslims die at the hands of Islamic extremists than at the hands of any other ideology. Australia, Britain, America, Africa, Asia, India, Europe and other continents and countries are targets and victims of radical Islamic ideology. Iran sees tens of thousands of deaths at the hands of radical Islamic ideology, killing the Islamic caliphate’s own citizens, yet this bill fails to mention Islam anywhere—and this bill is supposedly about terrorism and security. 

The Royal Commission on Antisemitism and Social Cohesion, set up after the Bondi terrorist attack, recently delivered its interim report, saying on page 8 that there is no time urgency for any reforms in relation to the Bondi massacre: 

No material or advice from any agency identified any gap in the existing legal and regulatory frameworks that impeded the ability for law enforcement, border control, immigration and security agencies to prevent, or respond to, an attack of the kind that occurred at Bondi on 14 December 2025. No Commonwealth or state intelligence or law enforcement agency has suggested that it was prevented from taking prohibitive actions before or on 14 December 2025 by the then current legislative and authorising framework. In these respects, no issue requiring urgent or immediate action has been identified. 

Any attempts to tie this ASIO bill to the two Islamic extremists who perpetrated the Bondi terrorist attack should be dismissed with extreme prejudice. 

The Australian Security Intelligence Organisation Amendment Bill (No. 2) 2025—this bill—originally sought to make extraordinary powers permanent, removing the sunset clause, thereby weakening important safeguards designed to protect civil liberties, accountability and parliamentary oversight. We acknowledge that Labor has agreed to restore the sunset provision as one step to making it less odious. That’s a welcome first step from Labor. We acknowledge many, many constituents across our country—thank you to them—who’ve pleaded with us to oppose this bill, including its many powers. We hear you loud and clear. Government has three core roles: protect life, protect property and protect freedom. Everyone agrees on the importance of keeping Australians safe, and our intelligence agencies play a critical role in that. Omitting and ignoring extremist Islamic ideology, though, means the Albanese Labor government is ignoring all three core roles—especially protecting life. 

Islam is an ideology, a way of structuring society—just like communism, socialism and Nazism. It’s often used to control through being extremely punitive. It uses control of thought, belief and action using fear, violence or threats. Examples of punishment include the suppression and killing of women, killing non-believers, killing homosexuals, beheading, caning, female genital mutilation and stoning. Radical Islamic ideology goes against Australian values and Western civilisation. It is not compatible with civilised Western society. 

Right now, in 2026, Iranians want civilisation. They want progress. They want an end to the Islamic caliphate and its Islamic ideology. Britain, France and many other countries are experiencing high crime rates, lawlessness, mass rapes, brutality and declining living standards due to Islamic enclaves that do not assimilate and that instead seem determined to change their new country into a British caliphate. Stop calling Islam what it is not. It is not a religion of peace. In fact, Islam is an ideology of punitive control rooted in fear. Tell the truth. Stop pandering to political correctness. Call it for what it is and restrict immigration. Protect Australian values, culture, laws and lives. Parts of Britain, France and Europe are now lawless. 

We need to be proactive and stop Islamic mass immigration into Australia, and we need to specifically name radical Islam in this bill as a real and existential threat to the security of Australians. I’m reminded of Richard Dawkins’s words: 

Something you can convert to is not a race. A statement of simple fact is not bigotry. 

Kicking out the 230 terrorists who are currently in Australia would be better than supporting legislation that impinges on law-abiding Australians’ freedoms. Deport those 230. Send them home now. This is about protecting life, property and freedom, which are all vital for Australians’ safety and for human progress. Yet many of this government’s members of parliament, including its most senior ministers, actively encourage inhuman, anti-Australian radical Islamic ideology. This shows, clearly, that this bill is not about protecting Australians against the No. 1 terrorism threat to Australia, Australians and the world. It reveals, clearly, that this bill is about giving government agencies added control over Australians. 

Ironically, since the introduction of the original legislation in 2003, 23 years ago, only 20 questioning warrants have been issued. We know that ASIO did not use its full powers leading up to Bondi. We know that Liberal and Labor uniparty prime ministers Scott Morrison and Anthony Albanese together removed and stole basic human rights and freedoms during COVID and in loosely worded censorship bills as recently as last year. The suite of control bills and policies in which both have had a hand include the Identity Verification Services Bill 2023; the Digital ID Act 2024 for government digital ID; the Communications Legislation Amendment (Combatting Misinformation and Disinformation) Bill 2024, the censorship bill; internet controls for under-16s; and the massive curtailing of cash. Did I mention the Reserve Bank’s work on developing digital currency linked to a global digital currency? It was in answer to my questions at Senate estimates. Combined, these six initiatives and bills enable a social credit system to control Australians. 

To return to this latest bill, which reeks of control, if the Senate agrees to pass our One Nation amendment to specifically include and name radical Islam in the bill’s provisions, we could reconsider our current position to oppose this legislation. Including radical Islam will show that Labor is fair dinkum about security. If not, Labor is not serious about security. Labor’s real agenda is control of law-abiding Australians. We have concerns about many of the bill’s provisions. Let me name some: forced questioning without criminal charge; no independent judicial approval process; expanded questioning powers beyond the original terrorism focused rationale, broadening the circumstances in which these powers may be used to matters involving sabotage, promotion of the broadly defined ‘communal violence’, defence system attacks and territory security threats; and reduced transparency and limited public accountability. The inclusion of ‘communal violence’, to use your term, is especially concerning because the government’s definition expands this beyond violence to say: 

promotion of communal violence means activities that are directed to promoting violence between different groups of persons in the Australian community so as to endanger the peace, order or good government of the Commonwealth. 

That definition is so vague and so open ended. Some commentators have said that One Nation’s stance on immigration, being to the benefit of Australia, leads to fear and violence in the community—that we couldn’t protect Australians. One Nation’s amendment will remove this vague definition from the matters towards which these powers can be used. 

There’s another issue. Some aspects of compulsory questioning powers with minors as young as 14 have some merit, but I’ll leave the last word to Prime Minister Anthony Albanese who, in his second reading speech on the original ASIO bill in the House of Representatives on 27 May 2003, quoted Hermann Goering, Hitler’s Reich Marshal, at the Nuremberg trials: 

Naturally, the common people don’t want war, but after all, it is the leaders of a country who determine the policy, and it is always a simple matter to drag people along whether it is a democracy, or a fascist dictatorship, or a parliament, or a communist dictatorship. Voice or no voice, the people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders. This is easy. All you have to do is tell them they are being attacked, and denounce the pacifists for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to danger. It works the same in every country. 

Anthony Albanese continued his speech with these words: 

This legislation— 

referring to the original ASIO bill— 

is without precedent in Australia’s post Second World War legal history. Its provisions potentially allow for the mistreatment of ethnic minorities, the suppression of dissent and the detaining and investigation of wholly innocent Australians … 

This was Anthony Albanese talking about the basis of today’s bill. He went on: 

In fact what this legislation represents, indeed, is a threat from the inside. It represents a threat to the very democratic values which we say, quite rightly, distinguishes us from authoritarian, undemocratic regimes. 

Yet now, as prime minister, he wants to add harsher powers to control law-abiding Australians—to control! 

This bill erodes the rights of all Australians regardless of whether individuals have a desire to commit an act of terrorism. One Nation wants to protect all Australians. That requires specifically identifying and including radical Islamic ideology that drives Islamic terrorism. Once powers like those in this bill are introduced and made permanent, they’re almost never wound back; they’re here to stay. That’s why we oppose it. What’s the point of security with no personal freedom? 

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Red Tape Threatens Breadwinner Jobs

Transparency is vital when it comes to taxpayer funds. During this session, I asked the Department of Climate Change for a comprehensive breakdown of the 2026-27 international travel budget across the climate change and energy portfolios, specifically requesting data on employee numbers and trip durations. In response, officials said they could not provide these details upfront, explaining that travel decisions are handled purely on a case-by-case basis.

Pointing to data from the Minerals Council of Australia, I noted that average decision times for resource projects had blown out to 3.8 years by 2025. I asked the Minister whether these ludicrous delays are intentionally used to discourage applications and penalise proponents millions in holding costs.

I questioned whether the newly introduced artificial intelligence pilot would be utilised for actual decision-making or just data collection, with officials confirming humans will remain the ultimate decision-makers.

I argued that the current environmental laws and sluggish approval processes act as a disaster for economic growth, stifling the mining sector, our number one exporter, and choking off funds needed for essential social and welfare programs.

While the government claims recent reforms aim to speed up approvals, the ongoing red tape continues to threaten breadwinner jobs and our standard of living.

Transcript

Senator ROBERTS: Thank you. I appreciate your direct answers. This next question comes up frequently, so I assume you have the data on hand. What is your budget for international travel within the climate change and energy portfolios—that’s wages, airfare and accommodation—in the 2026-27 financial year? Could you include a breakdown of how much over how many days for how many employees?  

Ms Munro: These decisions, in terms of what the required travel is, are always taken on a case-by-case basis. A lot of the work that we do is done virtually, and it’s really by exception that there will be that international travel, but it is necessary to build the relationships and to negotiate outcomes. That’s the responsibility that the government has given us. We don’t have the detail that you are asking for, given that we need to plan through what are going to be the priorities for this year, and, as I said, we make those decisions almost on a case-by-case basis.  

Senator ROBERTS: Could you give me a broad idea of the categories of considerations that will go into that or could go into it.  

Ms Munro: Go into travel?  

Senator ROBERTS: Selecting travelling companions.  

Ms Munro: Yes, we’re happy to.  

Dr Box: There are a range of factors that we consider. Value for money is obviously a very big consideration. Another is whether the intended meeting outcomes are of significant benefit for Australia’s climate, energy, environment and water agenda. We also consider whether virtual or alternative representation options aren’t suitable, and, of course, all approved travel requests include a contingency. We look at the intended meeting outcomes and whether virtual participation is available and, of course, value for money as an overarching consideration in coordination with the PGPA Act.  

Senator ROBERTS: Value for money is a pretty subjective thing. It depends on the goals of your party going there. Coming back to the EPBC Act, your website page for the new national environmental standards under the EPBC Act does not appear to have been updated for some time. It still says that the circulation draft of the new standard would be made available in April, and it wasn’t. When will the new standard be made available to senators?  

Senator Watt: I’m not sure when that research was done, but, in the last month, we have begun a second round of consultation on two of those national environmental standards. In outcome 2, we’ll be able to talk to you at length about that. 

Senator ROBERTS: Thank you. As things stand, the EPBC Act is, in our opinion—we differ on this, no doubt—a disaster for economic growth in Australia. The Minerals Council of Australia said, and I quote: Average decision times for resources projects have increased by 60 per cent, from 2.3 years in 2019 to 3.8 years in 2025 … What steps are you taking to increase your throughput?  

Senator Watt: Again, we could have an extended conversation about this in outcome 2, but that was exactly one of the key reasons for the reforms that we passed in the parliament last year. I know you voted against them, but one of the key objectives of those reforms was to speed up decision-making on projects after that blowout of timeframes that you referred to, and we’re confident that will happen.  

Senator ROBERTS: I note that the budget—and you’ve answered a related question from Senator Waters— includes a measure for introducing AI. Will that help in data collection and analysis or will that be actually making decisions?  

Senator Watt: Again, we can talk about this in more detail in outcome 2, but the primary purpose of that AI pilot and tool is essentially to help proponents in preparing their applications. There are people who know a lot more about it than me who will be available to talk to you about it in outcome 2.  

Mr Kaiser: I’ll just add to the minister’s answer an important principle in the application of AI in the public sector generally, and including in this department, is that humans remain the decision-makers.  

Senator ROBERTS: Minister, are you using ludicrously long delays in approvals for minerals projects to discourage application for minerals projects?  

Senator Watt: No.  

Senator ROBERTS: On a $500 million project, the holding cost of the project across a 3.8-year development application cycle will cost the proponents $25 million per year—almost $100 million total across 3.8 years to four years. How is this not a financial penalty on applicants caused by a procedural failure in your department?  

Senator Watt: Again, we can have an extended conversation about this in outcome 2, but a key objective behind the EPBC reforms was to speed up assessments and approvals of projects.  

Senator ROBERTS: Let’s get a benchmark going. How many applications for resource projects with a project cost in excess of $50 million are you currently holding, and what is the average age of those projects?  

Senator Watt: There will be officials available to answer those sorts of questions in outcome 2.  

Senator ROBERTS: What is your expectation for reductions in this figure of 3.8 years? When will the EPBC laws stop getting in the way of economic growth and the breadwinner jobs that go with minerals projects?  

Senator Watt: Again, we can talk about that in more detail in outcome 2.  

Senator ROBERTS: Can we talk about mining being a driver of the economy, of standard of living, and the six-to-one jobs multiplier in coalmines?  

Senator Watt: In my opening statement, Senator Roberts—and I realise you weren’t here for that—I referred to the fact that, along with greater protections for the environment, one of the key objectives behind the EPBC reforms was to speed up decisions around housing, energy and critical minerals projects.  

Senator ROBERTS: One of the things that’s become clear with new Labor is that it appeals to activists to get more votes.  

Senator Watt: That’s your view.  

Senator ROBERTS: Is the government aware, Minister, that obstructing resource projects stifles funds for social and welfare programs for caring for people?  

Senator Watt: I would agree with the general proposition that economic development delivers economic wealth for the country that can be used for those sorts of social services.  

Senator ROBERTS: And mining is a key to developing economic—  

Senator Watt: It’s a big industry. I recognise that.  

Senator ROBERTS: Number one exporter.  

Senator Watt: It’s a big industry. 

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The Price Tag of Pacific Climate Leadership

$147.8 million has been allocated over three years in the 2026-27 budget under the measure “Standing with our partners in the Pacific,” to support activities related to Climate Change and Energy Minister Chris Bowen’s role as COP31 president.

Officials clarified that the money is not being used to create a new office, but to fund Pacific preparatory meetings in Fiji and Tuvalu, a COP31 pavilion, Pacific delegate travel, climate envoys, and departmental staff travel. Specific costs and delegate numbers for attending COP31 itself have not yet been finalised.

Similar to COP30, which included grants for youth, First Nations, and agricultural stakeholders, funding has been set aside to support external organisations attending COP31, though final parameters are still under review.

I questioned the return on investment for taxpayers and criticised government climate spending, pointing out that international agreements hold no domestic weight unless legislated by Parliament, which can be unwound by a new government with a simple piece of legislation.

Senator Watt defended the expenditure, stating that Australia holding a leadership role secures a “front-row seat” in global negotiations, protects national security interests through partnership with the Pacific, and aligns with the government’s electoral mandate on climate action.

One Nation is committed to abolishing the Department of Climate Change and related agencies, programs, and regulations. These government-funded climate initiatives and international climate agreements are economically damaging and a misuse of taxpayer funds.

Transcript

Senator ROBERTS: Thank you for appearing again. Good morning, Minister.  

Senator Watt: Good to see you, Senator Roberts.  

Senator ROBERTS: You’re looking chirpy.  

Senator Watt: Always chirpy, just like yourself.  

Senator ROBERTS: The Minister for Climate Change and Energy, Chris Bowen, is the president of negotiations for COP31—the Conference of the Parties—in Turkiye taking place in November this year. Has the department incurred any expense in respect of that role for travel, expense for extra staffing or expense in any other related purpose, and, if so, how much?  

Mr Kaiser: Yes. We covered some of that ground in answer to questions from Senator Henderson just moments ago.  

Senator ROBERTS: The specific amounts for staffing, travel and related weren’t covered, though, were they?  

Mr Kaiser: I think what we said was that a number of staff did travel with Minister Bowen, most recently, as part of his responsibilities but that those figures had not been reconciled yet because, I think, the staff literally arrived home on Saturday.  

Senator ROBERTS: Does he have any additional staff as a result of his duties, not just travel?  

Mr Kaiser: In terms of his ministerial staff?  

Senator ROBERTS: In terms of his position as president of negotiations, does he have any additional staff in his—  

Mr Kaiser: In his ministerial office?  

Senator ROBERTS: Are the taxpayers paying for anything for the United Nations role?  

Mr Kaiser: There was a specific budget measure which provided funding to the department to assist him with that role.  

Senator ROBERTS: What is that amount?  

Mr Kaiser: My colleagues will be able to help you with that. 

Dr Box: I’ll take that, Senator. The amount allocated for the budget measure ‘Standing with our partners in the Pacific’ in the 2026-27 budget was $147.8 million over three years.  

Senator ROBERTS: $147 million over three years?  

Dr Box: That’s right.  

Senator Watt: Just to be clear—because what that money is for shouldn’t be misrepresented—it might be helpful to have Dr Box set out what that money is going to. It’s not to create an office, for example.  

Senator ROBERTS: I’m all ears.  

Dr Box: The money is for a range of activities: the delivery of the pre-COP, the preparatory meeting in the Pacific, in Fiji, and with the leaders element in Tuvalu; things like sponsored travel for Pacific delegates; additional events in the Pacific; and to support a pavilion at COP31. It also includes some funding for the presidency youth champion and to support our Pacific climate envoys, and of course it also includes some funding for staff and travel.  

Senator ROBERTS: Thank you. Was there an amount—I may have missed it—for the cost of attending COP31 itself?  

Dr Box: For COP31? No.  

Senator ROBERTS: So that is yet to be added?  

Dr Box: That budget measure will support attendance at COP31, but the delegation for COP31 and associated costs hasn’t yet been determined.  

Senator ROBERTS: Why are the Australian taxpayers, Minister, paying to raise Minister Bowen’s international profile? Where’s the benefit to taxpayers? Where’s the return on investment? What is the return?  

Senator Watt: Well, you won’t be surprised to hear me say that that funding is not about raising Minister Bowen’s profile. It’s about ensuring that Australia has a leading role in international negotiations regarding climate change and energy. I know you and I, Senator Roberts, have a pretty different view about whether climate change is real and what we should be doing about it, but the reality is that countries all around the world are negotiating and reaching agreements about this, and our government’s view is that it’s a very good idea and it’s in Australia’s national interests to be helping to lead those negotiations. We’ve got a view that you’d rather be involved in negotiations than have outcomes imposed on you by the rest of the world, and, through Minister Bowen, occupying that role gives Australia a front-row seat in those negotiations. The other reason for us doing this is that it’s an opportunity for greater partnership with our Pacific neighbours. I’m sure, Senator Roberts, one thing you and I could agree on is that the Pacific is a region where there are a lot of national security interests for the Australian people and there is an opportunity for Australia to work in partnership with the Pacific on an issue, being climate change, that they consider to be arguably the biggest challenge they’re facing. That is a good thing for Australia, and dealing with those national security interests as well.  

Senator ROBERTS: I think the better way to go about dealing with our neighbours, who are very important to us strategically, is to tell them the truth. That’s much more important for me. You said ‘costs imposed’ or ‘agreements imposed’. The UN cannot impose an agreement on us. The only way it can be imposed is if parliamentarians in this place legislate it.  

Senator Watt: Well, again, you and I might disagree on this, Senator Roberts, but our government, and I personally, believe that it is useful to Australia and the Australian people to be part of international agreements about how we manage a range of challenges facing the world. There are some governments around the world that have withdrawn from those sorts of agreements—  

Senator ROBERTS: The United States of America, for example.  

Senator Watt: For example.  

Senator ROBERTS: Keir Starmer calling it now the ending of climate catastrophes— Senator Watt: I don’t think the UK has withdrawn from those agreements, and we think it would be a negative for the Australian people if we were to withdraw from those agreements. I know One Nation’s got a different view. You’re entitled to your view, but we think it’s better to be at the table, in this case in a leadership role, leading the world to negotiate outcomes that are in Australia’s interests.  

Senator ROBERTS: Minister, are you aware that 65 per cent of the voters in the recent Farrer by-election voted for a party that wants to end net zero?  

Senator Watt: Are you adding the Liberal and National Party votes to your— 

Senator ROBERTS: No. We’re not.  

Senator Watt: I didn’t think you got 65 per cent.  

Senator ROBERTS: No, we didn’t. We got about 40 per cent.  

Senator Watt: That’s what I’m wondering—how you got from 40 to 65.  

Senator ROBERTS: The other minor parties. Have a look.  

Senator Watt: I recognise that there are different views about this in Australia. I think this government has been pretty clear, going into the last two elections, that we support action on climate change and that that is not only a good outcome for our environment but good for our economy and jobs as well. We’ve gone to the election with that policy. We’ve won the last two elections. We’re now implementing that policy. But you’re entitled to a different view.  

Senator ROBERTS: I may have missed something here, Mr Kaiser or Dr Box, but COP30 in Brazil was extremely expensive at $1.6 million in taxpayer money. What’s the budget for the actual attendance at COP31?  

Dr Box: We don’t have a specific budget for attendance at COP31 yet, because we haven’t determined how many people will go to COP31. The travel to COP31 will be taken from that $147 million that I mentioned that’s in the budget.  

Senator ROBERTS: In COP30 you gave away $395,612 in grants to bring along climate change activists and so-called stakeholders. Will you be doing that again in COP31? If yes, why? What is in it for the taxpayer? Mr Rudd took, as Prime Minister, to Copenhagen 114 people, including his hairdresser. Will that same graciousness be extended to Mr Bowen?  

Dr Box: You’re correct that we did have a grants program for COP30 that supported a range of organisations to attend COP30 in Belem in Brazil, including youth organisations, First Nations organisations and organisations from a range of sectors, including the agricultural sector. There is funding in the budget to support organisations to attend COP31 in Antalya in Turkiye, but the parameters of that haven’t yet been decided.  

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Trading Defence for Dollars: Australia’s Debt Crisis

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Labor is so desperate to fund its spending addiction it’s selling off Defence assets instead of living within its means.

Australia’s debt has passed $1 trillion, yet Treasurer Chalmers wants to flog off 67 defence sites, including strategic assets like Victoria Barracks.

One Nation would cut waste, balance the budget, strengthen our defence capability and keep these sites working for Australians, not put them on the auction block.

One Nation’s advice to the Treasurer is simple.

Don’t sell these sites. Use them.

Transcript

I thank Senator Lambie for this motion, which One Nation supports wholeheartedly. British prime minister Thatcher made the famous comment that socialists always run out of other people’s money. Australia’s federal debt under Labor has now passed $1 trillion, yet this government continues to run deficits to fund their big spending agenda. Australia will shortly be unable to keep borrowing at affordable interest rates. We recently just barely avoided a downgrade to our credit rating, yet rates are rising anyway. Ten-year government bonds have gone from 4.85 per cent in the budget to 5.22 per cent—the highest level in 15 years. This means our borrowing will cost more, the deficit will get worse and we will have to borrow even more to pay for it. 

Printing money is not an option. During COVID, the Liberal government printed so much money and ever since we’ve been living with the inflation this caused. More printing will cause more inflation. This means Treasurer Chalmers had two choices: reduce spending and live within our means or sell off the silverware. He chose selling off the silverware. One Nation would have chosen living within our means. One Nation’s alternative budget listed savings of $90 billion, costed, turning a deficit into a surplus. We would then put $40 billion back into people’s pockets through tax and duty cuts and still balance the budget. One Nation does not need to sell off public assets, and we will not. Treasurer Chalmers is flogging off 67 Defence sites, worth $3.5 billion, including sites that are in use or would be in use under a One Nation government because he needs the money. Selling off Victoria Barracks is insane. They defend our capital cities and should have an integral part of defence training and support. Selling any site weakens our defence capability and reflects this government’s pathetic attitude to defence and to veterans. One Nation’s advice to the Treasurer is simple: don’t sell these sites; use them. 

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