Social Media Ban or Big Brother Control?

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The government, with support of the Liberals, is proposing a ban on children under 16 accessing social media, justifying the measure by claiming it’s “popular.”  Oh, really? It’s ironic that the same parties that accuse One Nation of populism are now pushing a measure not because it’s workable, but simply because it’s supposedly popular!   

A true conservative party, Mr Dutton, would support parents to supervise their own children in their own homes. A true conservative, Mr Dutton, would not be promoting big government replacing parents.   

The eGovernment is also trialling age-assurance technology, which uses facial scans of every social media user to confirm they are over 16. If there’s any doubt, the system will cross-check the person’s Digital ID for verification to ensure it matches. In addition to facial scans, the “Assurance AI” will monitor keystrokes, audio patterns and “other measures” to determine the user’s age.   

By now you may conclude, as I did, that enforcing a social media age limit of 16 would require verifying everyone’s age using the device camera and their Digital ID—which everyone would be forced to have. So much for Digital ID being voluntary. Even adults will need one to continue using social media.   

In the unlikely event they can actually make this work, children would move to other platforms that are less regulated, less safe and more prone to child exploitation.   

Even more alarming is the fact that conversations would be monitored for signs of age, yet what happens to the voice prints and keystroke logs this system collects?   

To make this work, cameras on devices would need to run constantly to ensure a new user hasn’t hopped on to an existing computer session. This means cameras would always be on, capturing everything – video and audio – that is happening in the room.   

This creates a perfect scenario for hackers to access the feed. 

One Nation opposes this legislation. The best people to monitor and regulate children’s internet use are parents—not a Big Brother government. 

Transcript

I move: 

That, in the opinion of the Senate, the following is a matter of urgency:  

The need to recognise that a blanket ban on social media for children under 16 expropriates parental power, and for the Senate to affirm that parental responsibility rests in the parents, not the Federal Government. 

The government is proposing a ban on children under 16 accessing social media and justifies the measure because it’s supposedly popular. Oh, really? It’s ironic that the same parties who accuse One Nation of populism are now promoting a measure not because it’s workable but, rather, because it’s supposedly popular. 

A true conservative, though, would support parents supervising their own children in their own home. That’s not what Mr Peter Dutton is doing. A true conservative opposition leader would not be promoting big government replacing parents. Instead, he would be making device supervision easier for parents. 

The government, repeatedly, is giving more power to social media giants under the guise, they say, of transparency. They’re not revealing anything. We still don’t see the algorithms of the social media giants—international players who have control over our space. What we’re doing is not making device supervision easier for parents. We’re not making it easier for parents to fulfil their responsibilities as parents.  

It’s time that social media companies—plus Apple, Microsoft and Android—made their parental locks easier and more powerful. So let’s start there. No country in the world has made age limits work, because bureaucrats or social media platforms in far-off countries can’t see who’s using the computer or phone. The only people who can see what the child is doing with their device are the people in their home with them—the parents. It’s a parental duty, a parental responsibility and a parental right to raise their children and to supervise their children. If this proposal from the government goes through, parents allowing their children to watch cartoons and educational shows on free-to-view social media, including YouTube, would be breaking the law. Parents supervising their children would be breaking the law. Watching the same material on Foxtel at $99 a month would be legal. Does that seem right? To me it doesn’t. 

Essential and YouGov polling showed a majority of Australians support higher age restrictions on social media. This is the same Essential poll which found 17-year-olds should be able to buy alcohol and watch pornography and also recommended the age for criminal responsibility be raised to 14. Who did they ask? Are these next in the uniparty’s embrace of populism? My speech earlier today gave information on the unintended consequences of this idea. I will post the speeches together on my website. This problem is as old as the internet, and it’s not going anywhere. Let parents parent. That’s fundamental to raising children. 

We’re seeing the opportunity in education now. States and the federal education department, which doesn’t have a single school, allow indoctrination programs through the national curriculum. Instead of being education, it’s now indoctrination. They’re grooming young children for the globalist agenda. They terrorise children: ‘The climate is changing. The globe is boiling. The world will end. You’ve only got five years to live unless we do something.’ These are the terrorists for young children today—the globalists who are pushing this agenda and this legislation around the world. 

One Nation supports this matter being referred to a Senate inquiry, where technology experts can testify on the harms and unintended consequences of replacing parental supervision with government overreach and government control. We need to let parents parent. Instead of giving more power to the globalist corporations and to the internet behemoths, we need to put the power back with parents and let parents look after their children. As I said before, it is a parental duty, a parental responsibility and a parental right. I am sick and tired, and so are so many parents and grandparents across this country, of the government trying to be a nanny state to protect their kids all while grooming their children for control, whether directly through education or indirectly through social media. What we need to do is actually look at what people need and then act accordingly. One Nation is not in favour of this. We are surprised that the Liberal Party, including their leader, seem to be lining up in support of censoring teens on the internet. 

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One Nation Calls for Inquiry into Unsustainable Immigration

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Australia is in a housing crisis. Tent cities are appearing across the country, from parks and bridges to family cars, as rents soar and home ownership becomes unattainable. I’ve seen these conditions firsthand, and it’s heartbreaking. Since 2020, rents have increased by 40%, and the average house price has jumped to nearly 10 times the average income.

A major driver of this crisis is our turbocharged immigration program. While I value the contributions of migrants—being one myself—the current intake is unsustainable. In 2023 alone, over half a million net migrants arrived in Australia. This relentless surge is straining our housing market, health services, infrastructure, and economy.

The math is simple. With 2.45 million temporary visa holders in the country, about one million homes are occupied by these individuals. Yet, we’re building far fewer homes than we need, leaving more Australians homeless and without hope. This unprecedented immigration inflates demand, driving up costs in housing, infrastructure, and everyday essentials. High inflation, soaring interest rates, and gridlocked roads are the direct results of this unsustainable growth. Meanwhile, our health system is overwhelmed, and working families are left to fend for themselves.

The government’s solution? More immigration. It’s time to prioritise Australians—our families, our communities, and our future. Let’s address the housing crisis with meaningful reforms, not empty promises.

Transcript

Australia is in a housing crisis—a housing catastrophe. Tent cities are appearing across the country in the way many people have never seen before. I have been to them. It’s disgraceful. In almost every major city in Queensland I’ve been to, the tents are there. People are sleeping under bridges, in caravans, in parks or in their family car. In August 2020, the national average rent was $437 a week. It’s now $627 a week. That’s an increase of 40 per cent over just a few years. In 1987, the average house price was 2.8 times the average income. Today the house price is 9.7 times the income. That’s nearly 10 times. What hope have our children got? 

A major driver of the housing crisis is Australia’s turbocharged immigration program. Listen to the facts that I’ll come up with soon, and remember that I’m not against migration. I was born in India; I’m half migrant. Australia has a very proud history of migrants building this country, but at the moment we have too many. Let me give you those figures. Australia’s net overseas migration used to average a bit over 80,000 a year. For the 2023 year, our net intake was an astonishing 547,000 new people. That’s more than half a million new people net. In the nine months to September 2024, 394,000 immigrants were added to the population. That puts us well on track for yet another year of more than half a million arrivals into the country. That’s net. That’s after the people who’ve left have been removed from the count. 

Soon after setting Australia’s immigration record last year, Prime Minister Albanese promised he would cut immigration rates. Instead he increased immigration rates and is on track for a second new record in a row. Before 2020 and excluding tourists and short-stay crew, there were around 1.8 million temporary visa holders in the country. Today that number is 2.45 million temporary visa holders in the country, an increase of a third. Using Australia’s average household size of about 2½ people per dwelling, that means temporary visa holders are taking up one million homes. One million homes are unavailable because of this immigration program. 

The Master Builders Association’s October housing review shows that, in the 12 months to 30 June this year, only 158,000 homes were completed. So much for your housing policy. That’s less than we needed to cover new arrivals let alone the homeless and those sharing who want their own place. Every year that this Labor government is in power is yet another year Australia’s housing crisis becomes worse. That is why it’s beyond a crisis; it’s a catastrophe. The ALP and the Greens can promise more houses all they like. Houses aren’t built out of rhetoric. When Australians are sleeping on the street we have to stop the flow of more people into the country. 

Some of these temporary visa holders have to leave. Let’s start with the 400,000 overseas students who have completed or discontinued their study and have failed the 100-point test necessary for permanent residency. These students are in a limbo which is best solved by returning home and developing their own countries with the skills learnt here. Then there are hundreds of thousands of long-stay visa holders who have failed to learn English and failed to get a job but who nonetheless avail themselves of social security. I’ll say that again: they failed to learn English, failed to get a job and are on social security that the Australian taxpayers are paying for. If someone has been in this country for five years and has failed to earn their own way then their visa must be critically reviewed to determine if Australia is the right place for them. It’s time to put the temporary back into temporary visa holder. Our country is bleeding; stop twisting the knife. 

The unprecedented level of immigration isn’t just leading to the housing crisis; 2.45 million extra people add to inflation. Inflation is caused when too much demand is chasing too few goods. It’s really simple, and 2.45 million new arrivals is a lot of new demand. It’s a hell of a lot. The government’s net zero energy policy has driven up power prices—we can all see that— and reduced the capacity of agriculture and manufacturing to meet this demand, leading to demand inflation. It’s a double whammy on inflation. The Reserve Bank has refused to lower interest rates because, as they have publicly stated, this unprecedented rate of immigration is creating so much excess demand, and they have said that reducing interest rates now would cause inflation to worsen. House prices are at highs. Now we’ve got interest rates high. This is a huge catastrophe. 

Why is the government doing this? As Senator Hanson said, we’ve been in a per capita recession now for six quarters. We should be in a recession, according to the performance of our economy. The only reason we’re not in a recession is that they’re flooding the joint with migrants to bump up the gross domestic product. You see, a recession is defined as two quarters of negative gross domestic product. So the only thing saving the recession tag from being hung around Prime Minister Albanese’s neck and Treasurer Jim Chalmers’s neck is the record immigration coming in to take us over zero so we’re just barely hanging in there. They don’t want to be tagged, the Prime Minister and the Treasurer, who are in office, when the recession hits. Instead they will let hundreds of thousands of people go without what they need, facing inflation and tens of thousands of people without a home. 

Immigration is also affecting our health response. Ambulance ramping is at an all-time high in most states, including in my state of Queensland. It takes time to train paramedics, expand emergency departments and buy new ambulances. The pace of the government’s increase in new arrivals has placed demand on our health system and it simply can’t keep up. Lives are at stake, people are dying, and Labor does not care. It doesn’t care about working families. It doesn’t care about mums and dads working then coming home at night to their family car in a park to see if their kids are still there. That is what this government is doing. 

One of the largest budget costs is more infrastructure, especially on roads and transport. These projects are collectively costing hundreds of billions of dollars. The huge demand for infrastructure materials and qualified people is driving up the cost of infrastructure, adding to inflation. Many of these projects wouldn’t be necessary if we didn’t have an extra 2.45 million people in the country. The people coming to work from the Gold Coast to Brisbane, coming to work from the Sunshine Coast, even Caboolture, Burpengary, Morayfield, every day to work in the city of Brisbane are tied up in a car park or are in stationary traffic for hours—their lives just slipping away. 

We have people sleeping under bridges. As I said a minute ago, we have a mother and father returning after work to see if the children are still in the car in the park in which they live, or a showground or maybe a tent under a bridge. Australia has the world’s richest reserves of minerals, bar none, and we have people sleeping in tents because the Labor government does not care. 

It’s a vicious cycle where the government claims that we can fix the immigration problem with more immigration and that we can fix the housing catastrophe by adding bureaucrats and more immigration—fix housing, the catastrophe, with more immigration.  

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Australia Advocates for Joint Custody Reform in Japan

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Senate Estimates provides an opportunity for us to raise concerns from our constituents. One such issue I brought up was the abduction of Australian children to Japan.

I asked the panel if they were aware of the situation and the Secretary, a former ambassador to Japan, responded by explaining that Australia has been actively working with Japan to update its family law system. He mentioned that joint custody would be introduced in Japan by 2026.  

Senator Penny Wong confirmed this and elaborated on the steps Australia has taken to address this tragic situation where families are being separated.

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It’s Time for Accountability, Transparency and Restoring Trust

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As we head into another election season, Australia’s trust in politicians is at rock bottom. It’s no surprise people feel betrayed by endless promises from the major parties that are never carried out. 

A recent Roy Morgan survey reflects the truth — Australians believe in straightforward, principle-driven politics, and they recognize these values in One Nation. 

It’s time for politicians to be accountable, communicate openly, and restore faith in our democratic process. One Nation stands firm against the censorship bill— because free speech and public debate are vital for democracy. 

Transcript

Ask anyone in the real world what they think of politicians, and the answer is, ‘I don’t trust the bastards.’ And why should they? We’re again about to enter an election season where the Liberal, Labor and Greens parties will make endless promises about things they will never do. If you lie to the people, they won’t trust you, and Liberal, Labor and the Greens have done plenty of lying. It’s telling that in this chamber we can’t call out a lie. I can say that the Labor Party lies, that the Liberal Party lies and that the Greens party lies, yet I can’t say a particular senator has lied in a debate. That’s unparliamentary. Well, Australians are listening to this discussion live right now, and tens of thousands more will listen later on social media. Listening to the comments, Australians think the never-ending lies are what’s unparliamentary. 

Teenagers make a lot of those social media comments, and teens certainly are not fans of the government. The memes that teenagers come up with in picking apart the government are as funny as they are cutting. Has Prime Minister Anthony Albanese started reading the comments on social media? Is that why he’s trying to get teenagers banned from social media? 

Eighty-nine per cent of Australians agree most politicians will lie if they feel the truth will hurt them politically. The Australian people aren’t morons, and they aren’t just seeing things. Many politicians do lie, and they lie all the time. That’s not how it should be. It’s not what I believe in. Ministers stand up in this place and avoid answering simple, direct questions. They give themselves a pat on the back and cheer themselves, thinking they’re so clever for not giving an answer. Well, ministers, out in the real world, no-one believes the spin and the lies. They can see through the distractions and smears from ministers—for example, Ministers Watt and Ayres. People are laughing at and ridiculing you. Ninety-four per cent of surveyed respondents believe that a politician who is caught lying to the Australian people should resign their position. Liars are destroying trust in the democratic process and parliament. This place should deserve respect and trust as a gathering of representatives of the people. Every dishonest answer is a chip away from the health of our country. 

So I say to the other parties: the proof is in the data, and the solutions are obvious from the data. On 18 October, the Courier-Mail in Queensland reported the Roy Morgan survey on political trust. They surveyed the number of people who trusted and distrusted four of the largest parties and looked at the difference to get a net figure. Have a listen to these figures: net trust for the LNP, minus 12 per cent; net trust for the Greens, minus 13 per cent; net trust for the Labor Party, minus 17 per cent. Guess which is the only party with a net positive trust rating? One Nation. It turns out that, if you have principles and you say what you mean, people trust you. Many people agree with what One Nation says. Some people don’t agree, yet everyone knows where we stand. 

If politicians stuck to their guns as Pauline Hanson does and if they listened to the people and stood up and said, ‘This is what I believe in, and I can’t be changed,’ no matter what side of politics you’re on, our country would be in a better place. No matter how embarrassing they are in the short term, honest answers are better for politicians and for the country in the long term. What will it take for politicians from the major parties to understand this? The Australian people are not mugs. They can make up their own minds, and they sure know when you are lying, so it’s time to stop lying. 

The misinformation bill treats people as if they’re all idiots who can’t be trusted with the facts. There’s nothing more damaging to trust and integrity than censorship. Australia doesn’t trust them, so the question immediately becomes: what are the Liberals, Labor and the Greens hiding? The answer is everything, because you stand for nothing. That’s why One Nation will move a motion asking the Senate to throw out the misinformation and disinformation bill this Monday. I’ll say that again. This Monday, One Nation will be moving a motion asking the Senate to throw out the misinformation and disinformation bill—the mad bill, the censorship bill, the one that doesn’t trust the people. To restore trust in politics, politicians must be trustworthy. No-one who seeks to censor the opinions of Australians deserves their trust. While Labor pushes for a censorship regime under the excuse that it’s about protecting your safety, One Nation pushes for you to be allowed to see the true facts and make up your own mind. There is nothing better for getting to the truth and being the arbiter of truth than free, open, public debate. Why do you not like free, open, public debate? 

The ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT (Senator Polley): The time for this discussion has expired. 

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Hong Kong’s Struggle Shows the Cost of Communism

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Hong Kong is a lesson of what happens when communism is imposed on democracy. China assured the citizens of Hong Kong they would be respected, and then promptly broke that promise. The top 10% of income earners in Hong Kong own 40 times the wealth of the bottom 10%, with income inequality worsening every year under communism. This confirms that free enterprise lifts people out of poverty, while communism puts them in it. Communism promises joy and inclusion – while delivering misery and repression.  

China is improperly imprisoning freedom journalist and businessman Mr Jimmy Lai.  China is taking a well-worn path of totalitarian governments  seen throughout history.  We must remain alert here in Australia against the actions of a government with its own totalitarian tendencies.

One Nation firmly stands for free enterprise, small government, and the primacy of the family—unlike Communist China.

Transcript

Hong Kong is a lesson in what happens when communism is imposed on democracy. China assured Hong Kong citizens that they would be respected, and then promptly broke that promise. In Hong Kong, the top 10 per cent of income earners now own 40 times the wealth of the bottom 10 per cent. Every year under communism makes income inequality in Hong Kong worse. It confirms that free enterprise lifts people out of poverty, while communism puts them in poverty. Communism promises joy and inclusion, while delivering misery and repression. Repression leads to everyday citizens having less, leading to more repression, which leads to more inequality, and on it goes. 

China is improperly imprisoning freedom journalist and businessman Mr Jimmy Lai. China is taking a well-worn path of totalitarian governments across history. 

Australia has cause for reflection. We’re discussing this motion in the shadow of a looming Senate legislation guillotine. In a guillotine, the government gets the numbers to do whatever it wants, and it does just that, which is how communism starts—with unchallenged power. Senate guillotines have become commonplace. They should not be. Both parties have silenced democratic debate during guillotines, although it seems that Labor is wearing out its guillotine faster than Robespierre. 

Three days of hearings into the misinformation and disinformation bill heard from expert witness after expert witness, all criticising the government for introducing a ministry of truth tasked with issuing sanctions against any social media platform which resisted removal of what the ministry considered ‘misinformation’. This is how communism starts. The committee report had little in common with witness testimony. The report was nothing more than the government’s ‘truth’. The first target for the Albanese government’s ministry of truth should be the Albanese government. 

I welcome calling out Chinese communist repression, and I look forward to a wider conversation on where our actions in this chamber are leading Australia. 

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Schools Go Woke – Parents Go to Home-Schooling

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In five years there’s been a 111% increase in parents choosing to home-school their children. Despite an overwhelming amount of evidence, the Australian Curriculum, Assessment and Reporting Authority (ACARA) says there’s no problem with woke or politically biased content in the curriculum.

Our children are suffering from these authorities who are telling the education system to lose their focus on the basics like literacy and numeracy. It’s a simple problem to fix, but we can’t begin until people acknowledge the problem exists.

Transcript

Senator ROBERTS: Thank you for attending today. Between 2003 and 2015, national averages in mathematics declined 26.7 points. That’s 5.1 per cent. As of today, almost 50 per cent of Australian students in year 10 are failing science literacy tests. Around 30 per cent of students are not making sufficient progress in both literacy and numeracy, falling short of the NAPLAN proficiency benchmark. In the average classroom, eight out of 24 students—that’s one-third—cannot read at the expected grade level, lacking proficiency. Would you agree that improving literacy and numeracy should be the No. 1 priority of the agency?

Mr Gniel: Just to be clear, I think you’re quoting from some PISA reports there, from between 2003 and 2015—just so I know the reference point for that.

Senator ROBERTS: Normally I’m provided with it, but I don’t have it.

Mr Gniel: That’s alright.

Senator ROBERTS: They’re pretty startling figures.

Mr Gniel: Yes, and to 2015, which was a while ago now. There has been some movement. That’s why I’m asking whether those are PISA results. I think we’re all well aware, as I said previously to Senator Henderson, that there continue to be areas of challenge. You’ve mentioned two there. Of course, literacy and numeracy are the foundation for knowledge acquisition across the curriculum, and they are incredibly important, as you say. As to whether they are the only ones, I would say no, particularly in this day and age. They provide the foundational skills. I think it was in the Shergold review that there was an argument that digital literacy was becoming a third foundational component. That is something that we all need to consider—that the foundations are expanding in terms of what we want our children to learn and understand to engage with society at large at the moment. Part of our challenge is how we support those students with the broader range of skills that they will need in the future, whilst ensuring they have the foundational skills that they will need to support all of that for their entire lives. Just to be clear, yes, literacy and numeracy are foundational skills that are of utmost importance.

Senator ROBERTS: That’s pleasing to hear. Are you aware of any political bias in the educational system or the national curriculum?

Mr Gniel: No. Political bias—I think you’d probably need to give me an example.

Senator ROBERTS: I’ll give you some examples in the next couple of questions. In 2005 the Australian Education Union president, Pat Byrne, spoke about the union’s success in influencing curriculums in the educational sector. She said: We have succeeded in influencing curriculum development … The conservatives have a lot of work to do to undo the progressive curriculum. Are you denying there has been any influence on curriculum development by political partisans? They seem to be taking credit for it.

Mr Gniel: The ministers across the country approve the Australian curriculum, so I think that probably answers your question. You’d have to talk to them about the factors that go into their mind. ACARA provides advice on the curriculum content through extensive consultation and work with experts about what should be the content.

Senator ROBERTS: Do you do research into what could be happening in the curriculum, in the implementation?

Mr Gniel: Yes. That’s part of our remit.

Senator ROBERTS: That’s good. I’ll quote from an article in the Australian from September 2023, ‘Universities deliver “woke” degrees to trainee teachers who demand more practical training’. It says: … lecturers have critiqued the “social and political content” of the Australian Curriculum, mandated by the nation’s education ministers—presumably states—for teaching children from primary through to year 10. A lecture slide notes, “we aren’t even doing a very good job”, tallying up 19 references to social justice, Aboriginal rights, invasion, colonisation, the Stolen Generation, assimilation, social justice and racism. It doesn’t sound like we’re focusing solely on literacy and numeracy; it sounds like we’re getting a lot of distractions that people can make up for in their own interest.

Mr Gniel: I think the curriculum has eight key learning areas already. Of course, mathematics and English are in there. Literacy and numeracy are part of the general capabilities, which, as you would understand, are across all of those eight key areas. You need literacy and numeracy skills to engage with science.

Senator ROBERTS: And even for digital?

Mr Gniel: Correct. Digital is one of those general capabilities as well. Part of the challenge is the breadth of the curriculum and what we’re asking our children to learn. The foundation is literacy and numeracy, but that is insufficient. It needs to be much broader than that. We talk a lot about knowledge acquisition. You’ve heard Dr Donovan here today talk about the best way to do that—the research that’s being done on cognitive load theory and how we get students to learn and understand the content we expect of them through the Australian curriculum.  You’re right: it isn’t just about English and maths; it’s much broader than that. I don’t think anyone would disagree that we need science and digital, as you’ve been talking about. This committee has also asked me previously about behaviour. We do expect teachers to teach personal and social capabilities as part of the curriculum as well. These are important building blocks to pull all of that together, so when they leave school they can work in and contribute to society, a society that is ever-changing.

Senator ROBERTS: What makes us unique as a species—maybe dolphins have it—is numeracy and certainly language, except maybe dolphins and whales. We have sophisticated language, and it seems like numeracy and literacy are playing second fiddle to many other things that are just being shoved into a woke agenda, as that teacher said. In just five years, between 2018 and 2023, Australia has recorded a 111 per cent increase in homeschool registrations. Do you take any responsibility for setting the curriculum that’s driving that shift? In other words, what I’ve heard, anecdotally, from many people in different states is that children came home during COVID lockdowns and they followed a curriculum. Parents were absolutely shocked and said, ‘You’re not going back to normal school. You’re staying homeschooled.’ I know a lot of people are homeschooling their children because of that. They’re not happy with the curriculum at all.

Mr Gniel: It’s not really something I can comment on. We set the Australian curriculum and then, in terms of the states and territories and the individual school systems, they regulate homeschooling. If there’s evidence out there that you’re talking about—I understand that you’re saying it’s anecdotal evidence.

Senator ROBERTS: The 111 per cent is measured, the increase in homeschooling.

Mr Gniel: Sure, but—

Senator ROBERTS: The driver I’m talking about is anecdotal.

Mr Gniel: That’s right. I’m not aware of any research that’s saying the driver is curriculum. I accept that that’s what you’ve heard.

Senator ROBERTS: It might be the states’ interpretation or implementation of the curriculum. I don’t know.

Mr Gniel: Potentially. Yes, that’s right. I guess that’s why it’s hard for me to comment; I don’t have that information.

Senator ROBERTS: Is there any interest from ACARA to go and research that? What do you do research on? Do you research with parents about their satisfaction or otherwise with the curriculum?

Mr Gniel: As part of our work, when we reviewed the curriculum, for instance, there was a public review of that. We took all of that into account when we provided that reviewed curriculum to ministers. So, yes, there’s a forum for the public to contribute to that process.

Senator ROBERTS: A forum but no formal research, apart from a forum that’s one-off when you do a review?

Mr Gniel: They’re an incredibly important stakeholder group, of course.

Senator ROBERTS: Parents? Absolutely.

Mr Gniel: I met with parents associations a couple of weeks ago, and whenever I go to different states and territories I also meet with the local parents associations. That’s across the sectors of government schools, Catholic and independent as well, so I get feedback from them. One of the things I mentioned in my opening statement was the translation of some of that information into other languages. That specifically came from parent groups saying, ‘It’s really important that we have information that’s accessible to all parents, including those where English is a second language.’

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Social Media Ban for Under 16’s: A Gateway to Government Surveillance and Control

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We all know the real intent of the Digital ID agenda. The United Kingdom, with laws similar to ours, has shown alarming developments. In the last two weeks, British police have visited and advised hundreds of journalists and commentators to stop criticising the Starmer government’s policies. Some have even been arrested and imprisoned merely for expressing their opinions.  

The Digital ID, misinformation laws and facial verification systems are all part of the control mechanism that facilitates government surveillance and tyranny. The mask has come off quickly. Only recently, Minister Gallagher reassured Australians that digital IDs would not be compulsory. Yet, without one, life will become impossible.  

Now, there is a proposal to introduce age verification for social media. This would require every user—not just adults, as initially told to us, but also children—to have a digital ID.  

Age verification has never been successfully implemented anywhere in the world. The only way it can function is through a Digital ID with facial recognition, which would require constant re-scanning of the user’s face, potentially every minute, to confirm identity. This setup would necessitate keeping the computer camera permanently on, exposing children to significant privacy risks, including hacking.  

One Nation firmly believes that the best person to oversee internet use is the one present in the room with the children: their parents. We oppose intrusive government and support the primacy of the family in raising and protecting their children.

Transcript: Question Time

My question is to the Minister representing the Minister for Communications, Senator McAllister. During Senate estimates on 5 November, the age assurance verification trial and social media age verification proposals were examined. For those who missed it, let me see if I have this correct. The system the government is considering will require two things: firstly, a digital ID to access social media for all users and, then, to make sure nobody is using a dodgy digital ID, age verification assurance technology, which will scan the user’s face, monitor their key strokes for content and technique and calculate their age. If it finds the person might be underage, it will compare it back to the biometric data in the person’s digital ID and check their identity and date of birth. Is that an accurate, concise explanation of the system being examined? 

Senator McALLISTER: No. I suppose I could sit down, but, no, that is not accurate. We are obviously engaged in an important policy reform process to protect children from some of the harms that they are exposed to on social media. I would be really surprised, Senator Roberts, if you hadn’t heard about this amongst the people that you talk to in your constituency. I think every senator in this place has had a conversation with a parent or perhaps with a teacher who was concerned about the kind of information that children are seeing online and accessing online and the inability of parents to actually engage and protect their children from some of those harms. 

We want Australian parents to actually know that we’ve got their backs. That is the underlying motivation for embarking on the reform. It’s, of course, about protecting kids. We still want them to be connected. We don’t want to punish children. We don’t want to isolate them. But we do want them to operate in an environment that is safe, and that’s the reason that we have committed to bringing forward legislation for a minimum age limit for social media this fortnight. We have worked with a pretty wide range of stakeholders, and we’re very grateful for the support that we’ve received in doing this work. Obviously, the National Cabinet has taken a very strong interest in this, and first ministers in that forum have agreed that the Commonwealth will legislate a minimum age of 16. 

I think one of the implications of your question and the way that you framed it was a concern around privacy, and that’s a legitimate question to ask. We will not put at risk the personal information of Australians, and the regulations will include robust privacy protections for personal information with significant penalties for platforms that breach— (Time expired) 

The PRESIDENT: Senator Roberts, first supplementary? 

I predicted during the digital ID debate that one person could sign a younger person into social media, and the only solution is keeping the device camera on permanently, which is an outrageous breach of trust and privacy. While you’re peeping into the camera feed of all social media users, hackers will have an easy hack to spy on families in their bedrooms, to learn daily routines and to work out when the home can be safely burgled. Minister, in the name of supposedly keeping children safe, are you building a surveillance apparatus for perverts and thieves? 

Senator McALLISTER: No. 

The PRESIDENT: Senator Roberts, second supplementary? 

The government’s solution still requires a camera to be permanently on. There will be continuous surveillance of the computer user in their own home by the government. If a parent has a child on their knee watching a children’s video or a cooking video on social media, will the system lock them out because the child is under 16? Minister, in your brave new world of internet regulation, do parents have any rights over their children’s lives or is the Albanese government cancelling parents? 

Senator McALLISTER: Almost nothing in the set of propositions put forward by Senator Roberts in his question to me were accurate, true or based on anything that has been said publicly by the minister or anyone in the government, and I want to make that very, very clear. Our focus is, in fact, on protecting children from an environment that has not been designed to secure their safety, and the reason that we know that is we hear that all the time from the parents that speak to us. 

Our interest, in fact, is in creating an environment that is supportive of parents who are trying to engage in a constructive way to deal with the information that their children are exposed to. Our interest is in supporting those parents who say, ‘We wish to do better in terms of the harms our kids are experiencing, but we don’t have the tools.’ That is the focus of our legislative— (Time expired) 

Transcript: Take Note of Answers to Question Time

I move: 

That the Senate take note of the answer given by the Minister for Emergency Management and Minister for Cities (Senator McAllister) to a question without notice I asked today relating to age verification on social media: 

We all know the real intent of the digital ID agenda. The United Kingdom has almost the same laws that we have here, and in the last two weeks the British police have visited and advised hundreds of journalists and commentators that they should stop criticising the Starmer government’s policies. Some were arrested and imprisoned for nothing more than an opinion. The digital ID, misinformation laws and facial verification laws are all part of the control mechanism that facilitates government surveillance and tyranny. The mask has come off quickly. Only recently, Minister Gallagher reassured Australians that the digital ID was not compulsory, yet, without it, life will be impossible. 

The digital ID started life under the Morrison Liberal government. As recently as April, the opposition leader, Peter Dutton, championed the Communications Legislation Amendment (Combatting Misinformation and Disinformation) Bill 2024, and the Liberals support social media age verification. Age verification means the government forcing the digital ID on everyone, paired with frequent facial scans from the camera on your device. That means the camera on your internet enabled device will be on permanently. One Nation opposes a world where children become hackers and subversives before they’re old enough to drive, just so they can keep in contact with their friends and relatives on social media. Children will be forced into the dark corners of the web like peer-to-peer messaging, where no protections exist against illegal material, hate, phishing, hacking and sextortion. Adults will no longer express their opinions for fear of that 4 am United Kingdom-style raid from the thought police. Australians should have the option of a regulated private verification service if they see fit, because mandating digital ID is an unacceptable infringement of personal sovereignty. The government running the scheme and having all your data in real time is absolutely terrifying. 

Senator Hanson and I tried to move a Senate inquiry into the referendum to enshrine freedom of speech in our Constitution—it was opposed. One Nation will repeal the digital ID and related bills. We will protect free speech, protect the rights of parents and defend the human rights of all Australians. 

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NAAJA Crisis: Leadership Turmoil and Funding Mismanagement Allegations

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At the recent Senate Estimates, I inquired about the recent turmoil at the Northern Australian Aboriginal Justice Authority (NAAJA), which has seen six CEOs appointed over a two-year period. One of the CEOs was found by the Federal Court to have been unfairly dismissed and chronic staff shortages have led to the suspension of legal representation, leaving approximately 75 Aboriginal individuals unrepresented in court. I questioned how someone with a history of domestic violence could be appointed Chairman of the Board and still remain a Director of the agency. The answer – this individual was elected by the other Directors.  

Currently, a grant controller has been appointed to oversee the funds being given to the NAAJA to ensure they are spent appropriately. The grant controller is part of an external firm, adding another layer of bureaucracy to prevent misuse. Refunds of unspent funds are under review and an audit decision is expected by late November.  A new Annual General Meeting (AGM) is scheduled for later this year. I asked why the government opposes full audits. Senator McCarthy denied any misuse of funds, though community members claim that money is not reaching the grassroots level. Performance audits will be provided to me on notice.

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Minister Makes ABYSMAL Defence of Net-Zero

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When government discounts expire, Australia will be facing their highest electricity bills ever.

This is despite claims that wind and solar are the cheapest forms of electricity.

With the largest amount of wind and solar on the grid, electricity prices have never been higher – go figure. Australia is incredibly rich in resources and should be an electricity super power. 

Instead, we have Minister Ayres and the once respected Commonwealth Scientific Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO) who continue to destroy our country.

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Defence Claims No Housing Issues for Troops in Townsville

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Defence generals tell me that, despite a large number of troops being relocated to Townsville during a housing crisis, there’s no problem with finding accommodation for our diggers. This claim comes despite Townsville having a “dangerously low” rental vacancy rate of just 1%.

If you or your family are experiencing difficulties in finding accommodation after being directed to move to Townsville, please email my office as I’d like to hear from you.

Transcript

Senator ROBERTS: How many extra people have been moved to Townsville? What numbers will Townsville increase by and are there adequate homes in Townsville?  

Senator McAllister: I think, as part of your answer, Lieutenant General Stuart, you might respond to the first part of the senator’s question, which was about making diggers homeless. You may wish to include a response to that in your answer.  

Lt Gen. Stuart: That’s just not a factually correct statement. We’re not making soldiers homeless. We have a plan that’s been worked through with our team mates in the Security and Estate Group, who are our liaison with Defence Housing, and manage the on-base accommodation. And, of course, we have a very strong relationship with local government in Townsville. It’s a staged plan, over the next three career management cycles, the first of which is—  

Senator ROBERTS: What’s a management cycle—how long?  

Lt Gen. Stuart: It’s a posting cycle—every 12 months. The moves occur roughly between December, January and February. This coming posting cycle will see the first of those soldiers that have volunteered, or have been asked to, go to Townsville to have those skills that we are building in the brigade there. To go to your point about shortages in some of our numbers, we are well under our authorised strength in Townsville. So the additional numbers don’t actually fall above the authorised strength in the next two years. That is notwithstanding the fact that the rental market in Townsville is quite tight.  

Senator ROBERTS: It’s tight all over Australia—almost at record levels because of massive immigration. Immigration has doubled the previous records, so I understand the dilemma. So what you’re saying is that you understand the housing pressures, but you’re managing that?  

Lt Gen. Stuart: Yes. 

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