Posts

Bureaucrats vs. Parents

,

I have used Estimates several times to draw attention to the filth being distributed in libraries, material that targets children and is available to them regardless of age. This includes graphic sex-instruction manuals that most adults would find excessive.

We urgently need an intermediate classification for graphic written publications. We have raised this issue for many years; and while the Classification Board seems to agree, there has been no action for almost two years.

During this estimates session, I questioned the Australian Communication and Media Authority (ACMA) on the bureaucrats currently running our classification system. We have three different bodies: ACMA, the Classification Board, and the Classification Review Board, all pointing fingers at each other while inappropriate material continues to be freely available to children.

ACMA admitted in their “Stage 2 reforms” submission that we need to rationalise this mess into one single national regulator. It’s common sense: one body, one set of standards, and actual accountability.

I also asked how these obscene publications could possibly meet “community standards.” The answer? They haven’t done any “community standards” research in years. How can they claim to represent the public if they aren’t even talking to them?

The government says they are “awaiting reports,” yet our children can’t wait.

We need a system that reflects your standards, not the standards of Canberra bureaucrats.

— Senate Estimates | December 2025

Transcript

CHAIR: Senator Roberts.

Senator ROBERTS: Minister, the Australian Communication and Media Authority review of Australian classification regulation written form closed submissions in May 2025. What’s happened since and when will we
get an outcome?

Ms Field: I believe that is the work of the department, not the ACMA. We have not published a paper.

Senator ROBERTS: Let me continue, then. ACMA made a submission titled Modernising Australia’s national classification scheme: stage 2 reforms. It was dated 6 June 2024. Your submission calls for a national
classification regulator to oversee a reformed classification scheme. Is this in addition to the ACMA, the Classification Board and the Classification Review Board?

Ms O’Loughlin: What we were reflecting on in our submission is that classification is undertaken by a range of different organisations and that there may potentially be benefits of rationalising that, because you have the national Classification Board doing publications and film, you have the Classification Review Board. You also have us who have responsibility for classification and broadcasting. What we were saying is: is there a way of looking at that? Is there any rationalisation that could happen?

Senator ROBERTS: My next question was: that’s a lot of bureaucracy, to have three agencies, which most likely will have the outcome of nobody being responsible. Are you talking about rationalising it from three to
one?

Ms O’Loughlin: That’s our proposal.

Senator ROBERTS: One of the duties you suggest for the rationalised body is to conduct community standards research. Community standards are central to the existing Classification Board decision process. Do you
do community standards research at the moment?

Ms O’Loughlin: We do from time to time in the broadcasting space, but we were indicating that, if there was a combined organisation, if I can use that term, there would be a requirement to make sure there was community research done across all those different mediums—broadcasting, film, literature—to inform the decisions of that new rationalised body.

Senator ROBERTS: Are you currently doing that with broadcasting? You are saying that it needs to continue so that the new rationalised entity does not drop that community standards research?

Ms O’Loughlin: The body is actually testing what the community standards are rather than only relying on its own judgement.

Senator ROBERTS: Seeing as you do community standards research for broadcasting, can you provide on notice the most recent round of research and the cost to the taxpayers for that process?

Ms O’Loughlin: Certainly. We haven’t done some for some time, but I’m happy to take it on notice.

Senator ROBERTS: Could give us the date of when it was done?

Ms O’Loughlin: Certainly.

Senator ROBERTS: I want to see how some obscene sex manuals for children could be considered as meeting community standards. I’m horrified/shocked at a publication called Let’s Talk About It. The title probably
should be This is How to Do It. It’s an instruction manual, not an information manual. It’s pornography. I’ve asked many questions in many estimates sessions regarding the failure of the rating system to offer a restricted
classification for printed material, something between the existing unclassified and R18-plus such as we have for violent teenage videogames. What’s ACMA’s position on a legally enforceable, mature-age, 15-plus or similar classification for these graphic sex instruction manuals targeted at children?

Ms O’Loughlin: That’s not part of our responsibilities currently; that is a matter for the Classification Board. I would expect that may be something that will be raised in the stage 2 classification review that’s being undertaken by the department. That would be the place for that to be considered.

Senator ROBERTS: What’s the government’s opinion or view?

Senator Green: I’ll answer your question by saying that the chair is correct; we did have officials here who are working on a review. They were here a bit earlier. Unfortunately, they can’t answer those questions for you
now. Obviously, stage 1 was quite successful. We’re working on stage 2 reforms now. The department has engaged a social research centre and Mendelsons to undertake a functional update of the classification guidelines. The minister awaits the final report from this functional update. Unfortunately, I can’t give you any more information without officials here at the table. As the chair indicated to you as well, the Classification Board itself and the Classification Review Board will be appearing later this evening and can answer questions about specific classifications about which you might be concerned.

Senator ROBERTS: We have to get something done about this.

Senator Green: Of course.

/0 Comments/by

One Nation Will Always Protect the Innocence of Children

The Classification Board is required to protect children from all forms of sexual exploitation, abuse, and pornographic material. This is outlined in the legislation written in 1995. Restricting publications such as graphic novels, in the best interests of children, is not book burning, it’s common decency.

The motion I have introduced to the senate is about classifying books like ‘Welcome to Sex’ in such a way that prevents young children from reading them.

Why? Because it is not legal to instruct children in how to have sex before they have come of age. Basic morality and community standards are reflective of a civilized society and we would do well not to forget that.

Once lost, a child’s innocence cannot be replaced.

The ‘woke’ agenda’s increasing desire to enlist young children in an adult’s world of sex and depravity is nothing short of grooming.

My motion refers the classification to a committee review to create a new category for sexually explicit material directed to adolescents, to ensure kids don’t get their hands on this material without parental supervision.

Transcript

I move: 

That the following matter be referred to the Environment and Communications References Committee for inquiry and report by the first sitting day in March 2024: 

The adequacy of the current classification system for publications to protect children from age-inappropriate material, including: 

(a) the need, if any, for penalties on publishers who fail to meet their obligations under the Classification (Publications, Films and Computer Games) Act 1995 to submit potentially offending material to the Classification Board for review; and 

(b) any other related matters. 

As a servant to the many different people who make up our one Queensland community, I’m speaking this evening in support of my motion to refer the classification system to a Senate inquiry. I’ve circulated a briefing document to explain this motion, and I hope senators have had time to review the material relating to cartoons for adults, otherwise known as graphic novels, in digital and printed form. The Classification Board administers the Classification (Publications, Films and Computer Games) Act 1995. Not every publication, though, is checked, of course. This would not be feasible. Instead, a system of voluntary referral is in place for questionable publications. That’s where the problem is—the system of referral or non-referral. 

A publication called The Boys has been available in Australia since the first issue in 1996. This is the same The Boys that Netflix turned into a hit streaming show. Children, having seen the sanitised Netflix version and then seeing the book version on the shelf of their local library, will, of course, pick the book up and borrow it, unaware of the depictions of extreme violence, rape, public sex and bestiality found in the publication. Even more troubling, all of these things are portrayed in a positive light. For 25 years, this material has been perfectly legal to sell, display and lend to minors of any age. 

A week after the Classification Board appeared before Senate estimates to answer questions from me and Senator Antic, the board reviewed all six volumes of The Boys as a result of a referral from campaigner, family protector and child protector Bernard Gaynor. A citizen fulfilling his responsibility to the community, to the nation, got it referred to the board. Three volumes were restricted and three were allowed to remain on sale unrestricted, meaning available in libraries to children. One of the banned works, episode 5 in volume 1, was titled ‘Herogasm’ and chronicled the sexual exploits of our superheroes. Graphic depictions included orgies and bestiality. This behaviour was presented in a positive light, with smiles, high fives, raised fists and whoops all around. 

Dynamite publishing did not refer their publication to the Classification Board as the law requires. I’ll say that again. Dynamite publishing did not refer their publication to the Classification Board as the law requires. The Classification (Publications, Films and Computer Games) Act 1995 does not prescribe a penalty on a publisher who does not refer a work that may be subject to sanction. That’s an incentive to not submit a work. This is one of the terms of reference of this motion. Penalties may be appropriate for a publisher who failed to submit a work that was subsequently restricted. 

One of the volumes that was not banned depicted the male lead character, Homelander, raping the lead female character, Starlight, complete with protestations, using language that should not be suitable for children. The board declined to restrict the volume because the nudity in the rape scene was not overly graphic. What about the rape? All senators and members of parliament are required to take a course on sensitivity to women. The Classification Board clearly needs to attend the same training. The second justification for not restricting the volume is even worse. It was, ‘The two characters both climaxed, suggesting the sex was not rape but consensual.’ The Classification Board is apparently bringing back, ‘But she came’—the old rape defence. Where are the women’s activists? Where are the Greens talking about women now? They’re nowhere to be seen. 

Another graphic novel currently on sale and on display in libraries unrestricted by the Classification Board is Nagano, which depicts sexual behaviour featuring girls who are actually labelled in the illustration as being seven years old, just in case there was any doubt about who these comics are really aimed at. 

Now we have the book Welcome to Sex. The authors are Yumi Stynes, Melissa Kang and Jenny Latham. It’s published by international publishing house Hardie Grant Children’s Publishing. Much has been said about this publication in recent weeks. For those who have not read it, let me explain a little about this book. The publication is officially aimed at ages 10 and up, with author Yumi Stynes publicly stating that she would have no problem with an eight-year-old reading the book. Certainly some of the information in this book will help adolescents come to terms with their changing bodies and their relationships around that process. If the authors had stopped there, we would have no problem. They didn’t stop there. The second half of this book is nothing short of an instruction manual on how to perform adult sex acts, commencing with advice to young girls to take their own virginity with a hairbrush and then moving onto hand jobs, sex and even anal sex, ending with advice on how to send naked selfies. This is all in a book published for ages 10 and up. How is it legal to advise kids to have sex before they are legally able and to send illegal child pornography and to advise children to ignore the counsel of their own parents? How is this legal? Ten-year-old children cannot have sex and should not be tutored on how to do so. 

It may be that this material is being sold because the Classification Board only has the choice between ‘unrestricted’ and R18+, which is restricted to sale in plain wrappers to adults. In effect, the current classification system has no jump between Cat in the Hat and actual porn. All publications become either one or the other. Legislation written in 1995 simply didn’t envisage this trend of graphic novels that are sexually violent and exploitative material that one could describe as child-grooming material. 

Children are far more valuable than this. I’m asking the committee to decide if there should be more steps in the classification options so material like this can be allowed for sale to adolescents old enough to actually engage in the sexual practices explained in this publication. After all, the Classification (Publications, Films and Computer Games) Act 1995 does require the board to protect children from all forms of sexual exploitation, abuse and pornographic material. This publication is pornographic. Restricting a publication like this is not book burning, as some have suggested, some who are afraid of a debate. One Nation is not calling for the book to be banned. We are suggesting this book should be classified in a way that prevents young children from reading it. That is not book burning. That is basic decency reflecting community standards that say teaching 10-year-olds how to have anal sex is just plain wrong. A legally binding MA15+ classification would achieve that. I ask for the Senate’s support for my motion.

The Vote

After constituents told me children can access disgusting pornography on store shelves & libraries, I moved a motion to refer the book classification system to a senate inquiry so that Australians can have their say.

Our children deserve our protection.

We finally got the Liberal-Nationals to support an inquiry. Labor, Greens, Pocock and the Teals (LGPT) voted to stop an inquiry. The vote was: YES – 25 and NO – 30.

The LGPT brigade think it’s okay for children to access porn and that Australians shouldn’t be able to voice their concerns.

/3 Comments/by