Subjects: The Australian flag; Australia Day celebrations; the rise of antisemitism in Australia; the Prime Minister’s weak leadership; Syria.
E&OE.
TOM ELLIOTT:
Peter Dutton, good morning.
PETER DUTTON:
Good morning, Tom.
TOM ELLIOTT:
Is there a requirement for politicians to fly or to stand in front of the Indigenous flag and the Torres Strait Islander flag, or is that just something that’s become a trend, I guess?
PETER DUTTON:
There’s not a requirement, and I think it’s something that has come into vogue in recent years, and I think we should have respect for the Aboriginal flag and the Indigenous flag, but we only have one national flag.
I think if you look at comparable countries, democracies around the world, I can’t think of one country that a leader stands behind three separate flags, and more importantly, I just don’t think that we can be a united nation and a unified nation without the thought of standing behind anything other than one flag. If we’re split into different groupings or different tribes, we’re not going to be the unified country that I think we need to be.
TOM ELLIOTT:
Well, this is the thing, isn’t it? Because, I mean, the definition of a country usually is the things that draw us together are stronger than the things that drive us apart, and we need to focus on the things that draw us together, and a flag is a very clear symbol of that. But I mean, I guess it also plays into the annual debate about Australia Day and whether or not January the 26th is the appropriate or is an appropriate date for it?
PETER DUTTON:
Well, I think it is, and I think we should be very proud and we should celebrate it. We should be very proud of our Indigenous heritage and we should talk a lot more, frankly, about our migration story. We’re a great migrant country, and you think of people who came here in the post Second World War period from Italy or from Asia or from broader Europe over many decades, people have gone on to contribute in an amazing way to make us the best country in the world. I think we have to do more and to be more conscious of our Australian pride and what we’ve achieved and be prepared to stand up and defend it.
I think Australia Day is a celebration of our country, and I understand the hurt that that brings to some Indigenous Australians, but I think for the vast majority of Australians there’s cause for celebration, that we live in a wonderful country and I think we should be proud of it.
TOM ELLIOTT:
Well, we do live in a wonderful country, but of course you might have to read today that the Simon Wiesenthal Centre in New York has now said that Jews should not travel to Australia unless it’s for essential reasons. That obviously is in the wake of Friday’s firebombing of a synagogue here in Melbourne. Do we need to do more to try and fix our reputation?
PETER DUTTON:
Clearly, we do, and I think our reputation over the last 14 months, really, has been tarnished. I’ve got a lot of Jewish friends in Melbourne who are genuinely talking about the prospect of leaving Australia because they don’t feel safe here, they’re worried what would happen if there was a Labor-Greens minority Government after the election, they’re worried about the level of anti-Semitism in the country at the moment.
We know that the instances of anti-Semitism have gone up by 700 per cent and we’ve got armed guards at Jewish schools and obviously this dreadful terrorist attack that’s taken place, we shouldn’t be surprised by it because the protests that we’ve seen on university campuses have been allowed to go on for months and months, the chanting of “River to the Sea”, the waving of terrorist organisation flags, and there’s been no consequence for any of that.
There’s been an absence of leadership when the clear message from the Prime Minister and from the Premier and others should have been that we have zero tolerance for anti-Semitism and the racism that we see expressed by the Greens and others, and there’s a consequence to pay.
The police have been standing on the sidelines, at the direction of the Government, when, frankly, they should have been arresting these people for the illegal conduct that they were undertaking.
TOM ELLIOTT:
I was horrified 14 months ago, the day after the attacks on Israel by Hamas, there were hundreds of mainly men, on the Sydney Opera House chanting, ‘gas the Jews’. I personally believe there’s been a cover-up of that, as in people saying, ‘oh they weren’t saying, ‘gas the Jews’, they were saying something else’. I know what I heard. So, what would you do differently if you’re elected Prime Minister? I mean, would you have different laws? Would you direct the federal police to enforce the laws we have more rigorously? Or what?
PETER DUTTON:
Well, certainly I would do that. I had the great honour of being Defence Minister and Home Affairs Minister and Immigration Minister in the not-too-distant past, and I think we demonstrated where we could give direction – and very clear direction – for example, to the Australian Federal Police. I established the Australian Centre to Counter Child Exploitation, and the AFP hadn’t been undertaking the operations that I thought they should in relation to protecting children online and dealing with paedophile networks. We put about $80 million into that Centre. I gave direction to the Police Commissioner at the time and the other agencies that were involved in Home Affairs, and we’ve now saved literally hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of children from the hands of paedophiles.
If you give the direction as a Minister or the Leader of the country, then you’ve got enormous resources at a federal level to be able to effect the change or to enforce the law. You’re not asking the police to act outside of the law, but what you are saying is that I don’t want the police there just to keep the peace. If they see instances of crimes being committed, then people will be arrested and prosecuted through the courts. That sends then a very clear message to others who would seek to do the same and commit the same crime, that we just don’t have any tolerance for it.
As I said, the Prime Minister’s been happy to sit there and sort of observe on his television screen what happened on the steps of the Opera House and what happened at our university campuses and what is still happening now with the chants and the doxxing and the visceral hatred of Jews.
You couldn’t imagine that there’s another segment of society that could be treated the way that the Jewish community is being treated at the moment.
I think it’s a message for all Australians that we’re all equal and we shouldn’t tolerate any racism or level of violence.
TOM ELLIOTT:
Just quickly, the regime change which has occurred was astonishing pace in Syria. There are still 40 women and children that, well, will probably claim Australian citizenship in a refugee camp. They’re now saying ‘it’s time for us to come home’. Most of the women are, of course, the brides of Islamic State fighters, they voluntarily went over there some years ago. Should we bring them back, do you think?
PETER DUTTON:
No, I don’t. I was clear about this when I was Home Affairs Minister and I had to deal with this issue then. It wasn’t safe for us to put people into that region to extract even Australian citizens, and the advice to me at the time was that it was dangerous to put even the SAS or to put our people at risk, and I wasn’t prepared to put our diggers at risk to bring some of these people back to Australia.
I think the risk has only compounded since that time, because the children aren’t 4 or 5 years of age, they’re now 12 and 13 and 14 years of age, and I think it would pose a very significant risk to Australia, their return.
I think people – as you pointed out in your earlier remarks – have made a decision as a parent, as a mother or father, that you’re going to abandon your country and you’re going to fight under another flag and you’re going to raise your children according to that indoctrination that they’ve received every day of their life.
My priority, our priority, is to keep Australians safe and do what’s in the best interests of our country, and that’s how I would see it.
TOM ELLIOTT:
Thank you for your time.
Peter Dutton there, the Federal Opposition Leader.
[ends]