Senator Marise Payne, a 'small-l' Liberal from NSW, has delivered a speech attacking Fred Nile and radio talkback hosts for fanning the flames of racism.
Payne, speaking in the Adjournment Debate in the Senate, defended multiculturalism, calling for leadership to sustain it. She said: "We as a nation have a history that is complex,
multifaceted and varied, but I suspect it is not nearly
as complex, multifaceted and varied as our future will
be. Maintaining and continuing the success of this
bright, tolerant, open and diverse nation will take
leadership—not just the leadership of people who fill
parliaments like this around the nation but leadership
of communities, leadership of the media and leadership
of those who wish to see that sort of nation sustained."
This is the text of Senator Marise Payne's speech in the Senate Adjournment debate.
Yesterday was International Human Rights
Day. I see it as an opportunity to reflect on all that we
have achieved in this country to build a harmonious
society, where difference within the bounds of Australian
law is not only tolerated but embraced and
welcomed. Harmony is diminished only by comments
like those of the Hon. Fred Nile MLC and
some less than responsible media debate and reporting.
Attitudes have shifted in Australia following 11
September 2001 and the Bali bombing, and I want to
reflect on where we are today with respect to Australia’s
cultural diversity and the right to freedom of
religion and expression.
Last Friday in Canberra I attended a conference of
the Federation of Ethnic Community Councils of
Australia, where future directions in multiculturalism
were discussed. On Sunday I was a guest at the multicultural
Eid festival in Fairfield, celebrating the end
of Ramadan, with tens of thousands of Muslim Australians
from dozens of different national backgrounds,
where the emphasis was on the courage,
compassion and service of Islam.
It seems to me that the end of this difficult year is
a good time to make these reflections. I have considered
how we have travelled over the past decade as
part of that assessment. In a 2002 report released last
week by SBS called Living diversity: Australia’s
multicultural future, Australians were surveyed on
their opinions of multiculturalism. The majority expressed
support for immigration and multiculturalism.
Two-thirds of the national sample believe that
immigration has been of benefit to Australia. In contrast,
and interestingly, a recent UK survey commissioned
by the BBC found only 30 per cent support it
in Britain.
Australians are qualified in their support for multiculturalism,
yet they engage strongly with a culturally
diverse lifestyle. The majority of the national
sample support multiculturalism and cultural diversity,
respectively 52 per cent and 59 per cent, but to a
lesser extent than they support immigration. In the
national sample, the younger the age group the more
support there is for multiculturalism—from 46 per
cent in the 55-plus age group to 64 per cent in the 16
to 24 age group, signalling a clear mainstreaming of
multiculturalism in contemporary Australia.
The term ‘multiculturalism’ was originally borrowed
from Canada. I think it recognises and celebrates
our cultural diversity. It accepts and respects
the rights of all Australians to express and share their
individual cultural heritage within an overarching
commitment to Australia and to the basic structures
and values of Australian democracy. Multiculturalism
is the way we address the challenges and opportunities
of our cultural diversity. I think the key to its
success is inclusiveness. This cultural diversity is one
of our great social, cultural and economic resources.
The unity in this diversity is built on the moral values
of respect for difference, tolerance and a common
commitment to freedom and to Australia’s national
interests.
For multicultural Australia to flourish, multicultural
policies should be built on the foundation of our
democratic system like any others, using some basic
principles: firstly, civic duty, which obliges all Australians
to support those basic principles of our society
which guarantee us our freedom and equality;
secondly, cultural respect, which, subject to the law,
gives all Australians the right to express their own
culture and beliefs and obliges them to accept the
right of others to do the same; thirdly, social equity,
which entitles all Australians to equal treatment and
opportunity so that they are able to contribute to the
social, political and economic life of this country free
from discrimination, whether that be on the grounds
of race, culture, religion, language, gender or place of
birth; and, finally, productive diversity, which maximises
for all Australians the significant cultural, social
and economic dividends that arise from the diversity
of our population.
I think the second of those principles, that of cultural
respect, was most recently breached—and, in
my view, outrageously—by the Reverend Fred Nile,
when he suggested a ban on Muslim women wearing
the chador in public places. I do not think his call is
logical; I think it is discriminatory and divisive. It
will do nothing to enhance Australia’s national security.
In fact, it would give enemies of Australian ethnic
harmony one of their key goals: that is, to polarise
our society and make the war against terrorism appear
to be a war against Islam by Western countries,
which it most emphatically is not.
My personal view is that his argument is illogical.
He appears to think that banning the chador will
mean that it in particular cannot be used to hide terrorist
weapons—apparently as a response to the Moscow
theatre terrorist incident. So, equally logically—
or illogically, perhaps—why not ban all baggy and
bulky items of clothing? If his argument is taken to
its logical conclusion then I assume that, equally,
businessmen should give up wearing overcoats and
Catholic nuns who adopt the traditional dress should
not wear habits. Proposals like this are even counter-
productive from a national security perspective.
Rather than uniting Australians in the war on terrorism,
it will have the opposite effect of dividing the
nation and of pitting moderate Muslims against
Christians and other elements of our multicultural
society. If that proposal was ever implemented, the
terrorists would have achieved one of their key aims:
that of dividing the moderate Muslim and non-
Muslim communities of the world.
For many Muslim women the chador is a symbol
of their faith. This is an open, free and democratic
nation and I believe we should respect and protect a
person’s right to express their faith. A clothing based
ban would suggest that perhaps all Muslim women
are potential terrorists and would divide the community,
encourage religious intolerance and leave the
way open for further violations of religious freedom.
Rather than calling for bans, we should be acknowledging
the position in which wearers of the chador,
the hijab, the abaya or the khimar have been placed.
Because they are easily recognisable as Muslims,
they are open to abuse and they face persecution and
harassment within the wider community. It is happening
in my city of Sydney all too often.
I make my remarks on this issue from the basic
principles of liberalism. I quote a former distinguished
senator Sir John Carrick, from an article in
the Australian Quarterly of June 1967:
If Australia is to survive and be free, we must learn to be
good neighbours. We must respect the rights of others to be
different, to be separate and free. Our definition of freedom
should connote our responsibility to respect and defend the
freedom of others. These things demand an understanding
of political philosophy and a recognition that our social
values are not absolutes to be thrust at others. For these
challenges, I believe the Liberal philosophy to be adequate.
The words of Sir John Carrick are also what I stand
for.
The role of the media and the need for the media
to participate in constructive debate in this area is
important and fundamental. But, unfortunately, it is
not uncommon to hear discussion on talkback radio
these days in this area that can at best be described as
distressing and at worst as blatantly racist. There are
discussions that victims of race-hate crimes ‘bring it
on themselves’. While one late-night talkback host
allegedly referred to some Muslims as ‘the raw sewage
of humanity’, the point should also be made that
so-called ‘shock jocks’ often do not make racist or
discriminatory comments themselves but do allow
them to go to air with little or no demur. I think some
leadership in that area is important.
I want to quote the words of the Prime Minister at
the Bali victims memorial ceremony in the Great Hall
on 24 October. He said that we should:
... continue to live the kind of lives that we regard as the
birthright of all Australians. And we’ve also been reminded
of the great tolerance of the Australian people. The Australian
people deeply angered and grieved as they are are
not about to abandon the spirit of openness and tolerance
which is also one of our great hallmarks.
That spirit of openness and tolerance is not one which
is imposed on the Australian people but one which
has been achieved gradually, through waves of
largely post-war immigration and also particularly
through the initial efforts of the Fraser government,
whose major achievements included the re-creation
of the Department of Immigration and Ethnic Affairs
and the establishment of the Australian Ethnic Affairs
Council, both in 1976, and the establishment of the
Institute of Multicultural Affairs to conduct research.
Also, importantly, I believe that the establishment of
the Special Broadcasting Service in 1980 has done
much to take cultural diversity into living rooms
across this country.
Work has obviously continued in ethnic affairs
since that time, and in recent years this government
adopted the New Agenda For Multicultural Australia,
in 1999, and established the Council for Multicultural
Australia, which works to promote respect for our
differences and to promote the social, cultural and
economic benefits of multiculturalism for all Australians
and for community harmony. I particularly want
to acknowledge the very valuable work of Ben Chow
as chairman of the council.
We as a nation have a history that is complex,
multifaceted and varied, but I suspect it is not nearly
as complex, multifaceted and varied as our future will
be. Maintaining and continuing the success of this
bright, tolerant, open and diverse nation will take
leadership—not just the leadership of people who fill
parliaments like this around the nation but leadership
of communities, leadership of the media and leadership
of those who wish to see that sort of nation sustained.
I am pleased to count myself as one of those
people.
Writing about Payne's speech in the Sydney Morning Herald, Geoff Kitney said:
It was the voice of an endangered species and the fact that it jarred that said much about how Australian politics has changed.
On the adjournment in the Senate on Wednesday night Senator Marise Payne spoke in defence of multiculturalism. She spoke in favour of the notion that freedom means respecting the rights of others to be different and to understand that our social values are not absolutes to be thrust on others. She harshly criticised the Rev Fred Nile, the radio talkback "shock jocks" and the succour they give to the voices of racism and intolerance in the community. In an unmistakeable message to her own side of politics, she warned that maintaining a tolerant, open and diverse nation will take leadership.
What struck me was the disconcerting feeling that this speech would probably get Payne into trouble. It was almost as though she was as sharply at odds with the new political correctness of conservative politics, as was Pauline Hanson with the old "progressive" political correctness in her famous maiden speech six years ago.
Payne is a NSW Liberal senator who is recalcitrantly small "l". She is a rare survivor of the long years of purges of the Liberal left who seems determined to defend ideas which have gone out of fashion. She is a voice from a different time in Liberal politics, at permanent risk of being excommunicated.
Few on Payne's side of politics would take the stand she takes in defence of multiculturalism. Nor would some on the other side. As the psychology of the war against terrorism grows in its influence on the national political debate, the sense also grows that what are under attack, and what must be strongly defended, are our social and cultural values. Part of the rallying call for this defence is the belief that these values are superior to those of other cultures and are being undermined by the presence of people from different social and cultural traditions.
The result is that the community becomes more insecure, more suspicious and less accepting. An "us" and "them" mindset strengthens. Loyalty tests start being applied to all sorts of situations, even down to clothing people wear.
...The Government's intention in all of this is to make national security the dominant issue of politics through to the next election to prevent Labor from getting the political debate back on to its domestic agenda: health, education, families.
This will be tough and divisive politics, with nationalism and patriotism being key touch words in the political debate. And it will pose major new challenges for community cohesion and tolerance which will stretch the already straining fabric of multicultural Australia. True believers in the cause, like Payne, are going to have their faith even more deeply tested.
