Parliament

 I thank Senator Walsh for bringing this matter of public importance to the Senate. Over the last 40 years, Australia has gone from being one of the most egalitarian countries in the Western capitalist world to one of the most severely unequal—one dominated by business interests. Key to the growth of inequality and precariousness in Australia has been decades of neoliberal industrial relations policy designed to smash the power of organised labour and reorientate workplace organisations in favour of maximising gain for employers and giving them more flexibility to hire and fire workers.

This government is full of the ideological children of John Howard. A fundamental project of the Liberal and National parties is shifting the balance of power from workers to capital. At every turn they will privilege profits of corporations, of billionaires and of rent-seekers over the wellbeing of people and communities. Their policy agenda is the result of laziness, malice and an irrational obsession with free markets and competition. Decades of market-led policy, labour market deregulation and union busting have diminished the quality of work for so many people.

It has become easier over the last 12 months for many of us to forget about, or at least deprioritise, the struggles of oppressed people across the world. With our borders effectively closed and the economic and health crisis having an enormous impact on Australian life, the world beyond our shores is easily forgotten. So today I'd like to reflect on global human rights injustices and fights for self-determination, equity and dignity. There are oppressed people across the world who continue their struggles.

The Nationals claim to have a plan for manufacturing, but all this is is a plan for locking in a climate catastrophe and destroying the future of regional communities, for the corporate profits of your mates. What we need is industry powered by renewable energy, not oil and gas, where we make, re-use and remake durable, ecologically sustainable goods.

If you needed any more evidence that this government has absolutely no interest in grappling with the existential threat of far-Right extremism, look no further than this amendment and look no further than the debate that it contributed to yesterday. It's more nonsensical false equivalences and more nonsensical downplaying of the deadly seriousness of far Right terror. This is really harmful stuff. This is running interference on the side of fascism and hate.

I rise tonight to speak about the global shark fin trade and inhumane practise of shark finning. For some years I have spoken out about shark finning, its inherent cruelty and the need for Australia to reject this terrible practice in every way we can. Shark finning involves cutting off a shark's fins, often while it is still alive, then throwing it back into the sea, where it is left to die painfully. This is a horrendous and a barbaric practice. The shark suffers hugely, usually dying from blood loss, suffocation or targeted by another predator.

I rise to speak on the matter of urgency before the chamber. As senators would know, this is an issue that is front of my mind as the Greens spokesperson for antiracism and as the only Muslim senator in this place.

First, I think the most critical aspect of this urgency motion, which I thank Senator Lines for bringing on, relates to the Prime Minister and Mr Dutton taking action to combat far Right extremism within their own party. In my first speech to the Senate, back in August 2018, I said:

I inform the chamber that Senator Keneally will also sponsor the motion. I, and also on behalf of Senator Keneally, move:

That the Senate—

(a) notes that:

(i) Australia is a hugely diverse country of First Nations people and migrants from every corner of the world,

(ii) far-right political activity is on the rise in western democracies and, last month, far-right extremists stormed the United States Capitol building in a deadly attack,

I rise tonight to speak about the scourge of far Right extremism and its normalisation in our politics and our culture. A couple of weeks ago we saw the end of the catastrophic Trump presidency in the United States. The litany of policy failures, corruption scandals, criminal investigations into senior officers, and a fundamentally racist political agenda was topped off by Donald Trump trying to steal an election and incite a violent far Right insurrection at the US Capitol Building.

This morning the people's climate rally came to the lawns of Parliament House. They came to the people's house today to make sure that politicians are confronted with the reality of the climate crisis at the start of the parliamentary year, because they know that two centuries of colonisation have undone the millennia of management and care of country by First Nations people.