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1984: The Department of Home Affairs COVID Censorship team

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I asked Home Affairs why they’ve asked social media to censor more than 4,000 posts related to COVID.

We must protect people from being labelled or categorized based on their beliefs, and Home Affairs has no place policing COVID given the amount of “misinformation” that turned out to be true.

Is Home Affairs merely providing a conduit between the dictators in the Department of Health and the social media platforms? #COVID19 #HomeAffairs #SenatorRoberts

Click here for Transcript

Senator Roberts: Thank you, Chair. And thank you for appearing today. Just to clarify, I looked up the

definition of regime, and it includes the government of the day, so, Senator Watt, you are a part of the Albanese regime.

Chair: Have you got questions?

Senator Roberts: Yes, I have, I just wanted to clarify that. Mr Pezzullo, counterterrorism is important; I want to say that up-front. Extremists can pose a threat; I want to say the up-front. But labelling and categorising people, anti-vax etcetera—that is not okay. What has been the arrangement between Home Affairs and social media platforms to intervene or censor or block posts related to COVID-19 that were or are contrary to government policy? Was it purely being the conduit from the department of health to the media platforms?

Mr Pezzullo: And also making judgements against the platforms’ own policies, but to answer the senator’s question, I said earlier that we’re not the arbiters of health science. Can you describe what might have triggered action on the part of our staff to start a to draft up a referral, for instance? Ms Hawkins?

Ms Hawkins: Senator in terms of the way I was answering the previous senator’s question, I would say to you that the government was concerned about instances of harmful mis- and disinformation in relation to COVID.  This line of effort was set up in 2020 and, as the secretary has said, it came out of the fact that we had been doing referrals in relation to terrorist and violent extremist content. As I understand the secretary’s evidence in terms of having conversations with the department of health early in the piece about the fact that we could use that same kind of mechanism to provide referrals about harmful mis- and disinformation in relation to COVID, we could use a similar technique that we had been using in the context of terrorist and violent extremist content, and we could use that same kind of technique in relation to harmful mis- and disinformation in the context of COVID.

For example, in relation to Facebook’s policies on mis- and disinformation, we scanned the environment, we identified where there were harmful instances of mis- and disinformation in relation to COVID, and then we provided those referrals to platforms, such as Facebook, for them to determine against their own policy about not allowing COVID mis- and disinformation on their platforms. So, in relation to their own policy, we then made referrals to say, ‘You might want to look at these posts, in the context of your own policy, about not having COVID mis- and disinformation on your platform.’ That’s what we have been doing since 2020, and, as the secretary said earlier, we will finish doing that on 30 June this year.

Senator Roberts: Mr Pezzullo, your department has been a conduit between the department of health and Meta and other platforms, and those platforms have been funded by big pharma to shut down posts that raise any questions about the COVID-19 injections. So you’re actually aiding and abetting censorship of relevant and scientifically correct information. As Senator Antic pointed out, much of what was labelled misinformation by people like Meta is now found to be correct and true. So, you aided and abetted in the injection of Australians that led to 30,000 excess deaths in 2022.

Chair: Senator Roberts, do you have a question?

Senator Roberts: Yes, I did.

Chair: The officials are here to answer your questions.

Senator Roberts: You were a conduit from the department of health to Meta and other platforms. Are you a conduit for any other departments? Do you follow their instructions just like you followed the department of health’s?

Mr Pezzullo: On the question of health, ‘conduit’ may not be the right phrase, because that would imply that an action was initiated in the Department of Health, sent to us as, if you like, a clearing house and then forwarded on. I think the evidence you’ve heard is that, in order to relieve the Department of Health at the time when we were dealing with the front end of a public health crisis, we stepped into that breach to say: ‘We’ve got the capability. As long as we can understand from ATAGI and others what the broad parameters are of health information the public should be advised of versus harmful misinformation, we’ll run with that’. And we put in place a program that allowed us to do that. As to your characterisation of the COVID-19 response and the efficacy of vaccines—you made reference to Australians being injected—I ask you to direct those questions to the department of health.

Senator Roberts: I will be.

Mr Pezzullo: I’m sure you will be. They’re better qualified to give you a better view, certainly, than I can, about the efficacy of that advice. We’re not a health department. We don’t have an independent way of saying to the—

Senator Roberts: So, you’re a conduit.

Mr Pezzullo: Well, ‘conduit’—again, I’ll just repeat what I said.

Senator Roberts: You take orders from the department of health.

Mr Pezzullo: A conduit implies that an action is initiated in one department, it comes through a middle broker, such as ourselves, and ends up in Facebook. Other than the policy settings being made known to us by the department of health, this was an area of action, like so many other things in the early days of COVID, where we didn’t need any instructions; we were just told to get on with a function, which we performed. Occasionally there would be engagement with Health, to make sure that we weren’t operating off obsolete information.

Senator Roberts: So you were just told to do it. Who was the service provider advising you on what was or wasn’t misinformation?

Mr Pezzullo: We use the service provider to do the scanning, do we not?

Ms Hawkins: That’s right. The service provider that we have used is M&C Saatchi.

Mr Pezzullo: Who do the scanning.

Ms Hawkins: Who do the scanning. They—

Mr Pezzullo: They’re not scientific advisors, as such.

Ms Hawkins: Exactly. They’re scanning the platforms and then providing us with proposed referrals that they consider are in breach of the platform’s own policy on misinformation and disinformation in relation to COVID.  Then there would be staff in my team who would consider that, and, after considering Saatchi’s proposed referrals, we would decide whether or not to pass it on to the platform.

Senator Roberts: Is it not true that it was said in past Senate estimates that Home Affairs considers that a significant threat to Australia is that of domestic terrorism?

Mr Pezzullo: I’m sorry?

Senator Roberts: Isn’t it true that in past Senate estimates Home Affairs has said that it considers a

significant threat to Australia is that of domestic terrorism?

Mr Pezzullo: Most certainly.

Senator Roberts: I was hoping you’d say that.

Mr Pezzullo: It’s one of the key risks that we seek to manage.

Senator Roberts: Do you consider that those who would challenge the safety and efficacy of COVID-19 vaccinations are domestic terrorists—if they challenge government policy?

Mr Pezzullo: Not if it wasn’t associated with any extremism, politically motivated violence or planning to attack institutions of society, no.

Senator Roberts: Do you consider that those senators who have posted comments opposed to the COVID-19 mandated vaccines—injections—are domestic terrorists?

Mr Pezzullo: Senators?

Senator Roberts: Yes.

Mr Pezzullo: You can post whatever you like, Senator. You have the privilege of being a senator.

Senator Roberts: I’m pleased that you just said I can post whatever I like, but Meta will not let people like Senator Antic and myself, and Senator—

Mr Pezzullo: If they, with their own service conditions, take your post down, then you can you deal with them as an elected representative. If you want to contest their takedown, then feel free.

Senator Roberts: Are you aware of any social media posts by elected members of this Senate that have been secretly censored through this arrangement?

Mr Pezzullo: I have no advice or information on that.

Senator Roberts: Interfered with in any way?

Mr Pezzullo: I don’t know.

Senator Roberts: Limited in reach? Not just censored, but limited in reach, so we can get to fewer people?

Mr Pezzullo: A posting by a member of the House or the Senate? I don’t know. I will check. When we come back to Senator Antic, will I be surprised to learn that there were any referrals that related to a member of parliament?

Ms Hawkins: I hope not.

Mr Pezzullo: I’ll check, but I’m rather thinking I won’t be surprised.

Senator Roberts: Are you aware of any posts by members of parliament that were taken down as a result of your actions?

Mr Pezzullo: That was a side discussion I just had. I don’t even know that we made any referrals that related to parliamentarians.

Ms Hawkins: I would have to take it on notice, Senator.

Mr Pezzullo: I would be surprised and verging on disappointed if we had.

Senator Roberts: Could you find out in particular if Home Affairs has been involved with or responsible for any of the posts that have been taken down from my media pages and also restricted in any way.

Mr Pezzullo: That, in effect, is a subset of the question asked by Senator Antic, but we’ll make a particular effort to check. I’m interested as well. There are questions of privilege that I would be much more respectful of than Facebook might be. It might well be, if we have made such a referral, that it’s something that I’ll need to reflect on. But I will check. In fact, why don’t I come back to you directly in relation to your own personal circumstances, on notice?

Senator Roberts: Thank you. Several MPs, in both the Senate and the House of Representatives, have

been heavily censored for posting material that was classified by social media platforms as misinformation and has now been found to be true.

Mr Pezzullo: Regarding the latter part of your assertion—in what might have been a question; I’m not quite sure—I don’t have any basis for thinking that something that was considered to be misinformation at the time under social media policies is now, through some kind of scientific evolution, considered to be true. I just don’t know.

Senator Watt: Senator Roberts, would you mind clarifying who it is that you say has found these comments to be true?

Senator Roberts: The government itself. Pfizer itself has admitted itself that the COVID-19 injections are not safe and effective. Yet the government, the previous regime, under Morrison, said that they were safe and effective. They’re neither effective nor safe. They have negative efficacy. That’s proven.

Senator Watt: That’s always been your opinion. I’m wondering which authority you’re pointing to that has deemed—

Senator Roberts: Pfizer vice-presidents.

Senator Paterson: A point of order. It’s not appropriate for a minister to ask a senator a question.

Senator Watt: One of your senators was asking about this as well.

Senator Paterson: No. A minister is directing questions to a senator. I don’t think that’s the usual order of—

Senator Watt: Well, when an assertion is made that things are true—

Senator Roberts: Mr Pezzullo, are you aware that—

Chair: Senators! I think the minister is actually trying to assist Senator Roberts, as I think most of us do.

Senator Roberts: if—

Senator Watt: If an assertion is going to be made that something is untrue, I think someone—

Chair: Minister! I’m speaking. Thank you. Senator, you have one last question.

Senator Roberts: How many other senators have had their media posts censored through these

arrangements? Could you get back to me on that one as well, please.

Mr Pezzullo: I will, as a further subset of the question taken on notice from Senator Antic, make a particular point of checking whether any referrals related to members of the House or the Senate—inclusive of you, but others as well.

Senator Roberts: Thank you. Minister, if senators have had their media posts censored by Home Affairs being a conduit to Meta and other platforms, then I call for a full royal commission to get to the bottom of this gross breach of freedom of speech at the highest level. The Labor Party itself—

Mr Pezzullo: I’m so sorry, Senator, I missed the first part of your question.

Chair: I don’t think it was a question.

Senator Roberts: The Labor Party has already said—Anthony Albanese said, before the election, that he committed to a royal commission. Will we now have a Labor Party royal commission?

Senator Watt: The whole thing is based on a hypothetical about whether senators or MPs have had their social media interfered with. Let’s wait and see what the answer to that question is. Let’s continue the questioning with Senator ‘Professor’ Rennick.

Member of the committee interjecting—

Senator Watt: I don’t spread COVID misinformation.

Senator Rennick: We’re not the ones spreading misinformation, Murray.

Click here for Transcript

Senator Roberts: Just a few questions for clarification, Mr Pezzullo. I will read from your website: Home Affairs brings together migration, cyber and infrastructure security, national security and resilience, and border-related functions, working together to keep Australia safe. You’ve been credited, justifiably, I would say, with the success in closing our borders after your appointment to Immigration in 2014. You have also been the inaugural and only secretary of the Department of Home Affairs, which is seen as crucial in that role. Is that correct?

Mr Pezzullo: Well—

Senator Scarr: He’s too humble to say!

Senator Roberts: I didn’t mean about the praise; I meant about the roles.

Mr Pezzullo: I have occupied the office for the time period you have spoken about. As to whether I have achieved any success in the role—

Senator Roberts: You have been widely credited with a lot of success, so we appreciate that.

Mr Pezzullo: That’s for others to determine. I’ve certainly been the occupant of two secretaryships over a decade, yes.

Senator Roberts: And key in security. Do you consider that elected representatives who challenge government policy are domestic terrorists?

Mr Pezzullo: I just go back to my earlier evidence. Terrorism has got a particular definition under our Criminal Code. Under the heads of security power set out in the ASIO Act, if any person, elected or otherwise, is acting in contravention of the criminal law, acting as terrorists—they are of course subject to a judicial process finding them so. Your question relates to elected members, I think you said, challenging government policy. All other things being equal, that’s just called democracy; that’s not called terrorism, no.

Senator Roberts: Do you consider it legitimate to deliberately or inadvertently censor elected senators who are duly elected representatives of the people, if their social media statements differ from government policy?

Mr Pezzullo: I took on notice, both at a general aggregated level from Senator Antic and from you specifically in relation to your own personal circumstances, whether we had—I think you might be going to COVID here, but I just want to be clear about what you’re asking about. I took on notice earlier that we would look at the COVID related referrals, the so-called takedown referrals, the 4,000 and some other number associated, and check that there were no members of the House nor members of the Senate included in that list. If the answer is no, zero, then the question, in a sense, becomes void because we haven’t done anything. If, frankly, regrettably, we’ve accidently, without identifying the person’s name—I don’t know if you self-identify as a government senator, but if we have taken a view of Malcolm Roberts—

Senator Roberts: Not a government senator but as a senator.

Mr Pezzullo: Sorry, as a member of the Senate, I should say. I do apologise.

Senator Watt: We’ve got some standards.

Mr Pezzullo: If we’ve inadvertently—and it would be inadvertent—made a referral of a sitting member or a senator, then I would find that regrettable because, in a sense, you’re held to account by your peers and by your electors; it’s not my job to hold you to account. There is a grey area. If you, whether you’re a senator or otherwise—and I couldn’t imagine for a moment that you would do this, Senator, or that any other senator would do it—inadvertently disseminated terrorist or violent extremist material, notwithstanding the privilege of a senator, my staff would take the view that there’s a referral here. On matters of COVID, which related to a public health emergency that was catalysed as a direction to us about three years ago by the then Morrison government, if one of your tweets or postings has been inadvertently swept up in our referral process, we’ll get to the bottom of

that on notice and get back to you through the notice process.

Senator Roberts: So I’m assured that if I were a terrorist or engaging in terrorist activities or promoting terrorism, you would treat me no different from a terrorist.

Mr Pezzullo: Your status as a senator in those circumstances would provide no protection at all.

Senator Roberts: That’s very reassuring. Thank you. It’s also reassuring that if you inadvertently caused me to be censored in any way, you would also protect my rights to free speech.

Mr Pezzullo: I’m distinguishing here between the service that we were providing in support of the health department on a public health emergency—which is really not about terrorism; it is about public health advisories. I’ll examine the data when Ms Hawkins and her people assemble it for me. I would take the view that we should not be doing referrals of sitting members or senators on public health issues. Terrorism? Acts of incitement to violence? Then we are in an area where the privilege that you have as a senator might well be thwarted by the criminal law, let’s say. But I can’t imagine that that circumstance would arise in relation to COVID.

Senator Roberts: I’m reassured, because privileges do come with responsibilities. I’m reassured by what you’re saying.

Mr Pezzullo: Thank you.

Senator Roberts: So do you not believe that Australian people have the same right to freedom of expression as I have?

Mr Pezzullo: I thought I’d answered this before, but let’s just recap. Even on the internet, which is considered to be untrammelled and unfiltered and uncensored, there is no accepted absolute freedom of expression, because you’ve got laws—for instance, you cannot stream the abhorrent abuse of a child.

Senator Roberts: Accepted.

Mr Pezzullo: But once you accept that there is some constraint at the outer edges—self-evident cases of child abuse, a terrorist’s live streaming of an abhorrent act—

Senator Roberts: But questioning government policy? That’s okay.

Mr Pezzullo: I was going to get to that, Senator. But then you start to get into distinctions and lines of definition. We’re not arguing the principle anymore about censorship because, even on the internet, which is thought to be this untrammelled, utopian public square of enlightened discourse and conversation, it’s been many years, if not several decades, since that view went out the window, because there have been laws, there are treaties, there are international understandings that say, no, there is certain content that is so vile and so unacceptable that it will be taken down by those providers who are acting responsibly. Now, you can’t get to every app and every dark website and every provider, particularly on the dark web, and they do peddle abhorrent material, so you’re not going to regulate that world; you’ve just got to go hunting and take other actions in relation to, if you like, what’s under the clear web.

Senator Roberts: I understand that there’s a lot of grey area there. But what you’re saying is that I have a right to speak but everyday Australians do not on COVID matters.

Mr Pezzullo: I’m struggling to understand how you’ve jumped to that conclusion.

Senator Roberts: Let’s go to two more points of clarification. In Australia in 2022 we had more than 30,000 excess deaths. That’s the equivalent of two Dreamliners crashing with total fatalities every week. Would you inquire into the crashing of two Dreamliner aircraft every week for 52 weeks?

Mr Pezzullo: My remit in that instance would be related to terrorism or related acts of violence or sabotage that caused those aircraft to go down, so of course I would get involved. I know it’s a hypothetical question that you’re putting to me but, as a matter of principle, that would fall under our remit of aviation security as well as counterterrorism. If you’re putting to me, by way of analogy, some kind of quantitative analogy that says this many people died who otherwise would not have died because of the advent of COVID vaccinations—you used the term ‘injection’—I would really urge you to direct that question to the secretary of Health and his officers, because (a) it’s not my responsibility to give you advice or evidence on public health issues; it’s—

Senator Roberts: No, I accept that. What I’m getting at is: would it be part of your remit to at least question what was going on with 30,000 deaths? That’s more than 10 times—

Mr Pezzullo: Sorry, is that 30,000 deaths in relation to COVID or in relation to airline crashes?

Senator Roberts: COVID injections.

Senator Watt: Again, that’s an assertion from you, Senator Roberts.

Senator Roberts: That’s 10 times the level of deaths from the Twin Towers World Trade Center collapse.

Mr Pezzullo: If there’s a question of an abnormal rate of premature death, which is to say death beyond normal morbidity statistics—and I don’t know what the science or the evidence is; I don’t know what data you’re pointing to—

Senator Roberts: Would it raise questions in your mind?

Mr Pezzullo: It might raise questions for the secretary of Health, so I’m suggesting that that’s appropriately directed to him.

Senator Roberts: He’ll be getting it. I take my responsibility to serve the people because they pay my salary. Taxpayers pay your salary as a public servant. Just as a final point of clarification, do you work for the government or for the taxpayers?

Mr Pezzullo: Well, I’m a public servant employed under the Public Service Act, so ultimately I work for the public. In fact, as a matter of law, I’m required to be impartial, I’m required to be apolitical and I’m required to serve the government of the day responsively—because that’s in law—but also in a way which is apolitical. For instance, if issues arose as to the records of former governments or if issues arose in relation to the observation of the caretaker conventions, I would stand my ground and, potentially, provide difficult advice or decisions to the government of the day. Generally speaking, by law, we are required to be responsive to the government of the day. That’s in the Public Service Act. On those rare occasions—and in my experience it doesn’t happen very frequently—that a government of the day might do something inadvertently that relates, for instance, to the records of decisions of previous governments or to the application of the caretaker conventions, I’ve got a duty not simply to say, ‘Well, I work for you, so we’ll just do whatever you say,’ but to say, ‘Hang on—that is unlawful,’ or, ‘That is contrary to Westminster conventions.’

Senator Roberts: Final question: would you fully cooperate with the royal commission which Mr Albanese promised before he was elected if it were tasked with examining these take-down notices around COVID?

Mr Pezzullo: I would cooperate with any commission of inquiry, royal or otherwise, commissioned by the government and instituted pursuant to letters patent. It wouldn’t matter what the topic was. We would always engage dutifully and conscientiously with any commission of inquiry.

Senator Roberts: Thank you very much, Mr Pezzullo.

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AHPRA denies bullying doctors while more than 100 are threatened

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The Australian Health Practitioner Regulation Agency is the professional body that registers medical practitioners. For example a doctor or nurse cannot work in those professions without approval from the AHPRA. AHPRA can suspend a medical practitioner for breaching the Practitioner’s Code of Conduct.

Recently AHPRA amended the code to include instructions to medical professionals that they must support the Government’s vaccine agenda in their words and actions, or their registration would be reviewed. Senator Roberts asked AHPRA how many medical professionals they have cautioned for wrong speak, placing their registration at risk. The figure was 108.

Of those 16 were then suspended, and a further 11 were suspended after defending their patient’s right to informed consent.

Unless a medical professional can talk openly with their patient, explain the procedure, explain the risks and explain alternatives a patient cannot give informed consent. AHPRA’s actions are in conflict with long-established legal principles surrounding patient care.

One Nation will continue to pursue this matter.

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The video that got me BANNED from LinkedIn

It’s been nearly three months since the platform LinkedIn inexplicably banned me for sharing this video. Big tech censorship is getting out of control. Just imagine the consequences when getting labelled with “wrongthink” is combined with the power of a Digital Identity.

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Globalist politicians in Australian Parliament show they want to squash all dissent

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It’s a sad day when any politician, whose career and life is predominantly political, thinks that his narrow world perspective has any resonance with the Australian people at large.

The good order of the Australian community requires debate and dissent, compliance and cohesion, and, most of all, robustness and honesty, not the squasing of dissenting views.

Transcript

I speak as a servant to the people of Queensland and Australia. It’s a matter of urgency that our elected parliamentary representatives are increasingly not a reflection of the typical, everyday Australian. It’s fundamental to our Australian democracy that people can demonstrate against incursions of their freedoms. I applaud any politician who has the guts, the integrity and the resolve to make a stand for the people, even if it is against their party line.

Senator Chisholm has done well to show his true self in this MOU, where he believes that only good order should reign at the expense of individual voices. Senator Chisholm clearly believes politicians ought not to use their public profile and status to represent the deep concerns of the people. Does Senator Chisholm suggest politicians use their high profile and status to be solely compliant and silent? I believe that politicians have a duty to listen to our consciences and speak out when we believe something is not in the interests of the Australian people. Senator Chisholm’s urgency motion says more about his narrow Labor perspective on life than it does about the topic or about the Australian people. Personally, I’m proud to stand beside anyone who has the courage of their convictions and who is brave enough to take their unpopular stand and risk ridicule for their beliefs. I admire anyone, particularly politicians, who have not lost sight of the Australian people, our democracy, our values or our freedoms and who will stand with the people regardless of the party line. I have done so and will proudly continue to do so.

Senators Rennick and Antic, and Mr George Christensen and Mr Craig Kelly, have the mettle to stand for a broader Australia. I support their efforts to question, expose and call out the deliberate misuse and abuse of science—the fraudulent use of science—as a basis for lockdowns and vaccine mandates. Senator Chisholm’s motion has demonstrated his belief that there should be only one world view held by all, and Senator Chisholm will decide what that view is no matter how far removed this groupthink is from how Australians see ourselves. The good order of the Australian community requires debate and dissent, compliance and cohesion, and, most of all, robustness and honesty. Our social and democratic institutions—failing, as they are, to protect the rights and freedoms of the people—must be robust enough to embrace a debate from the people and from politicians who represent them.

Why is there low, and declining, trust in MPs? Here is a quote from someone today: ‘Declining trust in our institutions is not the problem. It is the solution.’ We need to have less of the institutions. It’s a sad day when any politician, whose career and life is predominantly political, thinks that his narrow world perspective has any resonance with the Australian people at large. Senators Rennick and Antic, and Mr Christensen, are fighting for the people because they themselves are of the people, having carved out independent careers from the city to the land, facing uncertainties along the way. Senator Hanson and I have this same grounding in real life. From their actions these representatives, like us, feel what the people are feeling. They know, as One Nation knows, that unnecessary lockdowns, debilitating and inhuman vaccine mandates, and an absence of longitudinal testing on vaccines is just not good enough. They know that the people deserve better and are willing to stand up for what is right.

They also talk about ivermectin—a proven, safe, effective, affordable and accessible treatment that has stopped COVID wherever it has been used properly. The government falls silent on it and actually withdrew that from the people. The real matter of urgency here is that too many Labor, Liberal, National and Greens politicians do not have the courage to stand against this attack on our freedom and basic human rights. Too many in this place stand meek and silent while businesses fail and while everyday Australians are coerced into a repeated, unproven medical experimental procedure in order to feed their families. It’s time that gutless, groupthink politicians are consigned to the biowaste bin of history.

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Free Media dead in Australia

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As Government becomes more and more powerful, anyone who challenges the current policies is smeared and censored. The legacy media happily parrots the propaganda, afraid of losing government funding.

Transcript

This parliament’s descent into a one-party state could not have happened without the media’s complicity. The cancelling of Jessica Rowe’s interview with Senator Pauline Hanson is the latest manifestation of a power structure that George Orwell gave these words to in 1941 following a failed attempt to publish his seminal work Animal Farm: ‘The British press is extremely centralised, and most of it is owned by wealthy men who have every motive to be dishonest on certain important topics by employing veiled censorship. At any given moment there is an orthodoxy, a body of ideas which it is assumed that all right-thinking people will accept without question. Anyone who challenges the prevailing orthodoxy finds himself silenced with surprising effectiveness.’

In 80 years, nothing has changed. Media and multinationals have the same wealthy owners who use their power to corral thought and enrich themselves. Orwell’s Animal Farm is a metaphor: animals overthrew their farmer to create a fairer society—only for that power to corrupt, leading to less freedom, with the pigs assuming the role of dictators. Ironically, not only are the media acting like the pigs in Animal Farm; the book has been wiped from our curriculum for the crime of making children think about the power paradigm. Our media are not some noble fifth estate; the media are a fourth column, advancing their billionaire owners’ interests at the expense of truth and integrity.

The only solution to the problem of media propaganda is introducing competition, removing federal support for commercial media and expanding the market through a ballot of spare spectrum open to only new media organisations. Instead of the media being protected under the power of their oligopolies, let the media earn their survival on the worth of their coverage. Instead of conflicted journalists promoting the orthodoxy, our community and our nation must have honest, independent journalists who challenge the orthodoxy. We have one flag, we are one community, we are one nation and we want our human rights and freedom restored.

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GOVERNMENT VS. FACEBOOK – News Media Bargaining Code

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I have little sympathy for big tech, who have been systematically censoring and silencing conservative voices for years.

However, the government has no place getting involved in a fight between the billionaires in legacy media and the billionaires in new media, yet it looks like that is exactly what our parliament is doing.

Transcript

The Treasury Laws Amendment (News Media and Digital Platforms Mandatory Bargaining Code) Bill 2021 is a masterclass in self-interest from both the tired old parties. As a servant to the people of Queensland and Australia, my view is that this bill should more rightly be called the ‘Getting the News Media On Side Before the Next Election Bill’. It’s apparently co-sponsored by every party in this place that seeks to replace data based policy, fact based policy, with cynical political expediency and public gutlessness. The government has no place getting involved in a fight between the billionaires in legacy media and the billionaires in new media, yet it looks like that is exactly what our parliament is doing.

One Nation spoke with Google and we spoke with them again this morning, and it seems now that this matter has been resolved in private meetings with the government where assurances were exchanged. So Australia is now governed behind closed doors, and the people’s house, the house of review, the Senate, is simply here to rubber-stamp what is put in front of us. One Nation does not own a rubber stamp. Our many reservations about this bill remain, even if Google has found a way to work with them. It’s true that there are no clean hands in this debate.

When Facebook banned conservatives last year, the Left, or the control side of politics, applauded the move as the legitimate actions of a private company. Left or Right are useless terms; really it’s control versus freedom. The Left likes to control. Yet, when Facebook banned Australia’s left-wing news media last week, there was outrage. ‘They’re a public utility; they can’t do this to us,’ shrieked the left-wing commentariat. Perhaps Facebook got the idea of deplatforming from Channel 7 and Channel 9, who deplatformed Senator Hanson last year. Conservatives must now deal with the political Left and with a left-wing media that is so convinced of its own moral superiority that the suppression of dissenting opinions is now celebrated. The Left, the control side, have clearly not considered the norms they have created to destroy their opponents and that those same norms could one day be used against themselves.

Google is right on board with this agenda, demoting conservative websites in Google search results simply because they advocate values that everyday Australians still share and value. YouTube has cancelled thousands of conservative channels and demonetised many more to suppress our voice. Google has decided that conservatives and patriots are the enemy of their brave new world and must be silenced. Google propaganda is clearly on display in image search, where they operate to portray our world not as it is but as they wish it to be and judge that it should be. That is not their job. It’s no surprise, then, that many Australians, especially on the conservative side, have left Facebook and Google. They had it coming.

Let me be clear: One Nation is a trenchant critic of the Orwellian nightmare social media has become. Our left-wing legacy news media, though, are no better. Some sections of the left-wing legacy media print very little material that could be described as journalism and a great deal of material that could be described as propaganda. The ABC spent two years conspiring with a foreign power to prepare a story that misled viewers as to the intent of One Nation’s visit to the United States. We demanded the raw footage from the ABC to prove the story was manipulated, and the ABC refused. Truth and honesty are strangers to left-wing controlled media in this country.

One Nation is concerned about the small businesses this bill will hurt. Two examples are the Glasshouse and Maleny Country News and the Koondrook and Barham Bridge Newspaper—small businesses that are resisting the takeover of country news by the media oligarchs and printing truth without fear or favour. These papers are not protected by this bill, which is only concerned with protecting large media organisations, who will receive extra money to continue their buy-up of country news. The National Party seem to be happy with this, once again turning their backs on their rural constituents to woo the urban bubble, marching to the Liberal wets.

Australian Associated Press—AAP, as most people would know them—are not protected by this bill, since their model is copyright based and this bill only concerns itself with financial outcomes. AAP, though, employ 80 staff, and their newsfeed supports 250 rural news organisations. The increased revenue from Google will remain with the legacy media services and not feed back to AAP. This might have something to do with the Murdoch news media’s new wire service, NCA NewsWire. They are just waiting for AAP to fall over so they can have a monopoly on news wire too. This will lead to a further consolidation of news ownership in Australia and yet more power to News Corp. Labor are supporting a process that will lead to more power for Rupert Murdoch. Kevin Rudd will be upset, won’t he! When The Betoota Advocate sounds more like a real news site than an actual real news site does, Australian media must accept they are the agents of their own demise.

Television is also on the nose. The highest rating program on television since the Sydney Olympics was the Australian Open final way back in 2005, attracting 4.3 million viewers. The MasterChef final in 2010 rated 4.1 million. In 2020, the MasterChef final rated just 1.6 million—60 per cent less. Tent-pole programming is attracting half the audience it used to despite Australia’s growing population. When Malcolm Turnbull destroyed community TV 10 years ago, it was to force their million-strong audience back to commercial TV. That strategy has been a complete failure and must be unwound.

Print newspaper circulations are also falling. Listen to these figures, Madam Acting Deputy President. Over the last 10 years, the Herald Sun has gone from 550,000 to 303,000, a 45 per cent fall. One Nation’s great friends at Brisbane’s Courier Mail, who bash us, are down from 211,000 to 135,000, a 36 per cent fall. And, wait for it, The Sydney Morning Herald is down from 210,000 to just 78,000. That’s a 63 per cent collapse.

With a lower audience, our conglomerate media companies are in search of more revenue and now want to take Google’s. Is this the business of the Senate? This bill demonstrates a complete failure to understand how the internet works.

Let me give you an example. A startup media company trying to establish a user base would submit their news stories to Google. In return, that company, that startup, would pay Google so much per click for every person who clicked through to the startup news site. News stories cost between 20 and 50 cents a click in the Google advertising network. Over the last 20 years, Google has sent seven billion visitors to Australian news sites who, in turn, have used this traffic to monetise by showing advertising and encouraging subscriptions. If the Australian news media were paying for their traffic from Google, this bill would run into billions. This relationship, though, benefits both parties equally. So the basic assumption of the bill that there is a power imbalance is simply wrong. It is false.

Legacy media could have opted out, at any time, simply by adding a metatag to their header advising Google and other search engine crawlers to not index a page, section or entire site. News sites are not using that metatag, even though they could, because they want Google to index their stories in order to send them more traffic. Rather than paying Google for that traffic, legacy media now wants Google to pay them. We’re only having this fight now because internet search has reached the top of the exponential growth curve. The market has reached maturity, as have digital advertising and online subscriptions. The $18 billion advertising industry is now equally split between digital and real world, with little opportunity for significant growth in a post-COVID economy.

To read this bill, one would think that real-world advertising and digital advertising were interchangeable. That’s nonsense. They’re not. Online advertising is suited to short messages. Legacy media is still king of longer format advertising. For over 200 minutes of advertising consumed online, 300 minutes is consumed in the real world. Both have their role in the economy.

As with any maturing market, Australian media has narrowed ownership so much it has effectively become a cartel. This bill represents nothing more than the billionaires in the media cartel thinking they have more power than the billionaires in the social media cartel, and, with an election looming, the government has decided to pick a side—because Mr Murdoch picks sides and decides who wins. That is the history of elections, in federal parliament, in Australia. The Liberals and Nationals want that, and Labor can’t afford to let them have it. That is a terrible basis upon which to formulate public policy and legislation. The Treasury Laws Amendment (News Media and Digital Platforms Mandatory Bargaining Code) Bill 2021 is a solution in search of a problem and should never have come before the Senate.

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Big Tech Dictatorship

I had a great first conversation back for the New Year with Marcus Paul. we spoke about Brisbane’s snap lockdown, big tech censoring conservatives and councils sneakily using COVID as an excuse to boycott Australia Day.

Transcript

[Marcus] All right, welcome back. 22 minutes to eight. That is of course, New South Wales Daylight Saving Time. Time to catch up with One Nation Senator Malcolm Roberts. Happy New Year, Malcolm.

[Malcolm] Happy New year to you Marcus. And thank you very much.

[Marcus] You’re welcome. Did you get a break at all?

[Malcolm] I took some time off between Christmas day and New Year’s day.

[Marcus] Good on you.

[Malcolm] How about you?

[Marcus] I had a couple of weeks off, which was nice. Caught up with family as much as I could. And then Annastacia closed the border on me again and I couldn’t get up to see dad on the Gold Coast.

[Malcolm] Ain’t that disgraceful? Just capricious the way that woman works on this, just conditioning people to accept control. That’s all it is. It’s just nonsense.

[Marcus] Donald Trump. I’m looking forward to my wine, so it’s on its way apparently.

[Malcolm] Yes, I ordered it straight after the sixth. So it should be there pretty soon. It was recommended to me by Vic Pennisi, the Southern Downs mayor in Warwick. I don’t drink wine. I don’t drink spirits. The stiffest thing I have is light beer but my wife really enjoyed it. So I hope you enjoy it.

[Marcus] Thank you. Thank you. It was a bit of fun. Banning Trump from Twitter and other social media platforms. I mean, Twitter has benefited enormously from Trump using the platform during his presidency. Shares of Apple, Amazon, and Alphabet, the parent company of Google all shed more than 2% on Monday. They will suffer according to you by this ban.

[Malcolm] Yes, I’m married to an American. I’ve travelled through all 50 states of America. I’ve lived and worked there and studied there and I’ve worked in eight states. I get to know them pretty well. Americans don’t like this kind of behaviour from someone acting capriciously. As you said, it’s quite right. Twitter has benefited enormously from Trump and they didn’t seem to be bothered with him over the last four years and they don’t seem to be bothered with supporting Venezuela’s dictatorship, Iran’s dictatorship and China’s Communist Party. Now that we’ve got a Democrat coming into the White House, they seem suddenly to be concerned about Donald Trump.

[Marcus] I mean, they have protections as an open platform, both Twitter and Facebook, for instance. They’re not subjected to the same laws and rules as traditional media as they claim not to be publishers, but deleting Trump’s whole account of tweets is kind of acting as a publisher, is it not?

[Malcolm] You’re absolutely correct, Marcus. It’s akin to book burning. That’s what it really is. It’s just like burning books. As a publisher, they need to be accountable to the same laws that govern publishers. And that’s why Trump was coming after them to make sure they are publishers. But yeah, they’re acting capriciously just like the Queensland premier. We’ve now heard that there’s interference with the Ugandan Facebook and Twitter account holders ahead of the election today. Ugandan accounts have been linked to the incumbent president. They’d been removed from Facebook. Social media platforms are taking sides in an election by removing these accounts. It’s not the business of social media to decide who is good or bad. Now, some people, Marcus, might say, well, it’s a free enterprise society. You can join Twitter. They can kick you off, whatever. If you make a contract with Twitter to use them, then they don’t cut you off just before an election, which has been the threat from Twitter and Facebook for quite some time that they would cut candidates or even parties off their services just before an election at the last minute when they can’t do anything about it. And that’s exactly what’s happening in Uganda. And it’s exactly what’s happening in America.

[Marcus] Well look, some people say, well, the Murdoch Media seem to favour certain parties. And so why shouldn’t social media giants be able to do the same thing?

[Malcolm] That’s a very good argument. However, as I just said, if you’re gonna take my material, if you as a social media platform are gonna take my material for four or five or 10 years and then suddenly cut me off before an election, that’s not on. Now with Murdoch, I’ve got a choice. We know that he has favoured the Labor Party at times. We came out very strongly in favour of Rudd. I think he came out strongly in favour of Whitlam. And I know that he’s also favoured the Liberal Party at times, but I’ve got a choice. I don’t have to buy The Australian newspaper. I don’t have to watch his television stations. And that’s my choice if I do that. He can switch, like Murdoch’s Fox News in America when they started becoming biassed, just like CNN over the US Election. Reportedly the number of subscriptions at Fox News had plummeted by 50%. So they’re now starting to think about, because Americans had said, we’ve had enough of this bias. So Marcus, I think if you’re paying for a service, you can choose what you want to do. But if I’ve got an established relationship with someone, then they shouldn’t cut me off just before an election because I’m a candidate.

[Marcus] Australia Day not too far away, Malcolm. Some councils seem to be cancelling celebrations, refusing to celebrate the national day saying they are in solidarity with indigenous campaigners. It almost appears like they’re, if you like, blaming or hiding behind COVID 19 to justify the cancellation.

[Malcolm] Yes, you’re right. Some councils are refusing to celebrate the national day saying they’re in solidarity with indigenous campaigners, which makes me wonder because there are many Aboriginals who openly support Australia Day including some prominent spokespeople, male and female from their Aboriginal community. So I don’t know where they’re getting that from. And secondly, somehow as you said, refusing to celebrate and blaming COVID. Greatest Sydney councils including Liverpool and North Sydney, Parramatta and Canterbury Bankstown, are still going to have normal citizenship ceremonies but have cancelled the large gatherings because of COVID. So there’s some genuine concern in there as well, but it’s on Australia Day. We all should come together especially after this tumultuous year we’ve had in 2020, Marcus.

[Marcus] Absolutely. I mean, we’ve been through enough. If we are in this together, why can’t we celebrate together? I mean the division and some of the notoriety of that same, so negative, really isn’t needed at this time. And I do get a little frustrated that every year as it rolls around December, I beg your pardon, January 26, becomes a poster, if you like, for people that like to call it invasion day, et cetera. I don’t think we have the stomach for this year to be honest.

[Malcolm] No, I agree with you mate. It’s usually a beat up from Richard Di Natale when he was in the Senate. He was the one who pushed it. I don’t know who’s pushing it now. I think it’s just become some martyrs within various councils just wanting to make their say. But I agree with you. We need to come united in this country.

[Marcus] Now, finally, there’s another arbitrary lockdown, we know in Brisbane. There are some quite serious concerns of this United Kingdom strain of COVID 19 which is a little more dangerous than the previous ones for goodness sake. But if individual states are paying for jobkeeper, then you say, you bet there will be different decisions. I mean they’re drastic and abrupt closures. I don’t know, sometimes they are needed, but I mean at the end of the day, all it’s doing is wrecking the economy and ruining plans that people have for weddings and other major events in their lives.

[Malcolm] You’re absolutely right, Marcus. And what is really important here, is that the World Health Organisation which is admittedly corrupt, dishonest and incompetent, but even it, even it says that lockdowns are last resort and lockdowns are used to get control of a virus in the early stages. This basically says that Annastacia Palaszczuk in Queensland is admitting she doesn’t have control of the virus. And that’s a significant thing because what we’re doing in this country is we’re not managing the virus. The virus is managing us. One case pops up, one positive test pops up in Brisbane and we lock down a city of one and a half to 2 million people in greater Brisbane? And what happened was that, you hit the nail on the head because we have got to have the economy healthy because a healthy economy is the only way you’re gonna get future health, mental health and physical health. So we have had an insane debate in this country. Should we look after the health or the economy? The answer is you do both. And the leading countries in the world, Taiwan in particular is doing both because you have to protect people’s health but you have to protect the economy to maintain future health, mental and physical. And so we have got a stupid debate going on in this country. It’s not economy or health. It’s both. And that’s how you protect health. The premier was giggling on radio on Monday. I heard her. They were talking about the traffic jams of people flooding out of Brisbane and the premier after destroying small business and destroying families activities over the weekend laughed when she said, that the Gold Coast had great occupancy. There were traffic jams of people leaving Brisbane. I mean, what’s that gonna do for spreading the virus? If such a thing was the root cause of what she was doing. It’s insane.

[Marcus] Absolutely. I agree. I mean, COVID will continue its presence. We need more testing, rigorous quarantining and isolation of the sick and vulnerable. And we need to get back to work as well. The New South Wales Premier Gladys Berejiklian, you say, seems to be in the most measured and pragmatic in response to the complex challenge of managing this pandemic.

[Malcolm] I said that. I don’t have much time for the New South Wales LNP government but I think when it comes to managing COVID, they’ve done the best. But they’ve still done a poor job by world standards. Let’s not kid ourselves. Australia has had over 900 deaths from COVID. And what we’ve got in the country, there’s 25 million people. Taiwan has got 24 million people on a densely populated Island. Sometimes the population density is a thousand times what we’ve got here in Brisbane, for example, and they’ve had earlier introduction of the virus, they’ve had longer with it. They’ve got much more inter-connection with the communist, China, where the virus started and wove in. They’ve had seven deaths. Seven deaths. And what they’ve done is they’ve focused, exactly what we were talking about a minute ago. They’ve focused on the economy and health. And what they’ve got is they’ve got a government that is worthy of trust. I’ve talked to people from Taiwan. They’ve told me that. The government’s not perfect but at least it involves people. It presents data. These people in New South Wales even, and even I’ve said it’s the best, they’re not presenting the data to underpin their plans. And so what we’ve got Marcus, is we’ve got plans all over the country that are completely different. I like the idea of that in the sense that it maintains state sovereignty but it shows me when there’s so much diverse plans that no one’s got the data backing up the plans and people deserve to have that data to know that their leaders are basing those decisions on data.

[Marcus] All right, Malcolm. Great to catch up. We’ll talk again next week. Appreciate it.

[Malcolm] See you Marcus.

[Marcus] One Nation’s Malcolm Roberts. Marcus Paul In The Morning

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