Ms O’CONNOR (Hobart) – Mr President. I rise to indicate, of course, that the Greens will not be opposing the Terrorism Legislation (Extension) Bill of 2025. We appreciate the amendment that was made by Professor Razay in the other place that narrowed the time period for the extension from 10 years to five years, noting that there’s a review underway of this framework, just as there is at the national level.
I thought that the Leader for Government’s second reading speech yesterday was quite interesting and nuanced, and I was pleased to hear acknowledgement of the breadth and depth of the security threats that we face here in Australia and sadly – although we like to think we’re immune – in Tasmania, and particularly the recognition of the threat of domestic terrorism. All members in this place will have looked on in dismay, I suspect, at the ‘white Australia’ rallies that were held some weeks ago and again some weeks before that. We’ve seen the rise in this country of neo-Nazi and far-right organisations that have a stated objective to disrupt our society and at some level of course, their purpose is to terrorise our society. If you want to have a look at an example of that, the incident in Melbourne some short weeks ago, where following the white Australia rally, a gang of National Socialist Network operatives led by New Zealand-born Thomas Sewell stormed a peaceful First Nations camp in Melbourne, causing immense distress. In fact, inflicting violence on those people who were peacefully gathered there.
As much as it pains me, as a Green, to say that you do need some kind of preventative law enforcement capacity in place – clearly, we do – given the changing and broad nature of the threat from terrorism, whichever form it comes in. We have had ASIO acknowledge the growing threat of far-right extremism. We have the National Socialist Network recruiting young people through social media, particularly disaffected young men, and it’s a real challenge for us as a society to be very mindful of how vulnerable some boys and young men can be to hate and extremism via rabbit holes that they can go down or be led down on social media. To give you some indication of just how serious the National Socialist Network threat is, I will read to you a little bit from Thomas Sewell shortly, but we had an incident in New South Wales just last week where New South Wales police, for reasons unknown, approved a racist neo‑Nazi gathering on the steps of the New South Wales parliament. This is the same police force that has treated peaceful Palestinian protesters, in some instances, in a very thuggish and dangerous way, leading to injuries of peaceful protesters.
I think law enforcement broadly, nationally, has some work to do to come to terms with the nature and the extent of the threat posed by domestic terrorism. This is a story that was reported on ABC News, 7.30 Report, 13 November 2024. The headline is neo-Nazi leader Thomas Sewell says he could ‘become a terrorist as far-right rhetoric escalates and movement grows’, and he told his supporters he could ‘become a terrorist’, and ‘start killing people’ if Child Protective Services intervene and remove children from neo-Nazi families. Speaking on a podcast, the leader of the neo-Nazi group, the National Socialist Network, told the audience that if children were removed by court order, he would undertake terrorist violence and encourage others to do the same. That should send a chill down the spine of every person.
Sewell’s statements, the article goes on to read, falsely claim that authorities threatened to remove children from families that hold far‑right beliefs in the United Kingdom and he says, and I will end with this quote from him:
If you take my child off me, I am going to start killing people and I am going to encourage every single person that I know to also start killing people that are responsible, starting with probably the police and the judges that ordered for a child to come off of one of us.
He told followers in June. These are very, very dangerous people and there is now a move on the part of the National Socialist Network to establish a political party and at this stage, as far as I read the name, they want to call that party, what a surprise, is the White Australia Party. These forces are racist, misogynist ‑
Ms Forrest – Sexist.
Ms O’CONNOR – Sexist.
Ms Forrest – Ableist, all the ‘ists’.
Ms O’CONNOR – Ableist, all of the above. All the ‘ists’, thank you, member for Murchison. They represent a threat to the peaceful fabric of our society, they also represent a challenge to us in how we counter misinformation, disinformation, right‑wing extremism and where these entities get their support and funding from is a question that I hope ASIO is examining. This is an infection that’s happening in democratic countries around the world. Look to the United States, look to the United Kingdom, countries like Germany and here.
The far right has been emboldened and its mission is to terrorise people and to undermine the foundations of democracy and we simply cannot allow that to happen and it’s part of the reason why a piece of legislation like this which does expand police powers, let’s be realistic, and it now extends that expansion of police powers, is arguably one part of that response, noting that in Tasmania, to date, this legislation has not needed to be invoked and let’s hope it stays that way, because we can’t pretend that the National Socialist Network isn’t here, Mr President. They were gathered on Salamanca lawns some short weeks ago when the Greens had a little office down on the waterfront opposite Elizabeth Wharf. We came to work one day and there were neo-Nazi stickers slapped all over our office. These people are a threat to minorities and they are a threat to our way of life and I am personally reassured that our national security services are coming to grips with the nature of the threat and hopefully working across jurisdictions to counter it and with those few words again, again, I indicate we won’t be opposing this extension of the the terrorism legislative framework as it is today.
