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Social Media Ban is an Attack on Parents’ Rights

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The Labor-Liberal Uniparty has been advancing this bill based on a  case where bullying on social media led to a tragic suicide. In submissions on this bill, it became apparent that banning children from social media would cause as much harm as good. The best response to these tragic cases would be to empower parents to better manage their children’s use of social media.  This can be achieved by enhancing parental lock technology, making it more powerful, easier to use, and free (the best Apps available are commercial).   The Government ignored concerns raised by experts in their submissions and testimony, and pushed ahead with a bill that introduced a blanket ban for under 16.

Let’s be clear – this is a ‘world-first’ because the rest of the world knows such a ban is counterproductive.

Tech-savvy kids will get around the ban, and that’s where the real harm begins. The ban does not cover chat rooms in video games, which lacks the supervision present on social media platforms. Peer-to-peer chat apps are making a comeback, and some children may even turn to TOR, which is not supervised at all and by it’s design, is almost impossible to supervise. This bill will have the outcome of exposing kids to even worse forms of bullying.  

One Nation and the Greens united to stop Labor’s guillotine. We forced the government to remove the bill banning under 16’s on social media and extend scrutiny until February. Then, incredibly, the Liberal Senate leader, Simon Birmingham, moved to get the bill back in the guillotine process.  Barely hours later, Simon Birmingham informed the Senate that he was leaving. It’s clear he knew he was leaving and this was his parting gift.

I want to thank Senators Alex Antic and Matt Canavan for crossing the floor to vote against the Liberal-Nationals-Labor guillotine.  

One Nation will continue to fight against the social media ban, returning power to parents and families.  

Included are comments around Digital ID, which—despite claims to the contrary—will inevitably become part of this outrageous power grab.

Transcript

My remarks are directed to the minister but also to people listening at home to the Senate and to researchers and historians that will look back at this vote today in an attempt to understand what the hell the Senate was thinking. The amendment the government circulated, no doubt with the approval of the Liberal Party, answers that question. The Online Safety Amendment (Social Media Minimum Age) Bill 2024 can act to force every Australian to be the subject of a digital ID in the name of keeping children safe—and that’s what my question is about.  

The government accepted widespread public concern that the bill was designed to force everyone to get a digital ID and promised to include an amendment to specifically rule that out. In this government amendment that you’ve moved, SY115, new provision 63DB(1) excludes use of government issued identification or use of digital ID. That is great, except 63DB(2) provides that, if social media platforms can come up with an alternative means of assessing age that does not involve digital ID or government documents, they can—wait for it—accept a digital ID identification. In effect, this amendment specifies that a social media platform cannot use digital ID by itself but it can use digital ID as part of a more comprehensive verification. There’s no need to guess what that could be; this bill contains the answer: age-assurance software. The company which has been awarded the tender for the age-assurance trial is a British company called Age Check Certification Scheme. whose main business is provision of digital IDs backed by age-assurance software. 

TikTok has used age-assurance software to remove one million underage accounts from TikTok in Australia. This software can tell if a person is, for instance, under 12. That’s useful. The smaller the gap between the user and target age—16 in this case—the less accurate it is. This software can’t tell age within six months, and there’s no way of knowing a person turned 16 on the day of their application. You just can’t tell that from face scan. Accessing social media on your 16th birthday and, most likely, for months afterwards will require a second identifier containing the child’s facial scan and their date of birth, which is a digital ID, which this company specialises in. You’re setting them up. 

I have criticised this bill as an opportunistic attempt to capitalise on the public desire for better regulation of social media to force all Australians to get a digital ID. I’ll say that again. I have criticised this bill repeatedly, as have others, as an opportunistic attempt to capitalise on the public desire for better regulation of social media to force all Australians to get a digital ID. This amendment requires a change in my language, which is now that this bill is an opportunistic attempt to require every child, once they turn 16, to get a digital ID if they want to access social media. What age does the government’s digital ID start from? Sixteen. What a coincidence! This wasn’t the intention all along? That’s misinformation. 

This amendment exposes the original intention of the bell. Your amendment exposes the original intention of the bill, which was hidden in what looked like a poorly drafted bill. It wasn’t poorly drafted; it was deliberately dishonest, and the short committee referral, which the government fought against, has exposed the deceit. The truth is now out there, and the decision before the Senate is a simple one. A vote for this bill is a vote to require every child to get a digital ID on their 16th birthday. 

Compulsory digital IDs aside, there are many other reasons not to pass this bill. I will now share with the Senate and with posterity the words of Australian Human Rights Commission on the bill. One Nation fully supports the commission’s position, which deserves to be included in the Hansard record of the debate: 

Social media is a vital platform for young people to share their ideas and opinions, engage in dialogue, and participate in social and cultural activities. It can be a valuable educational tool by providing access to diverse perspectives, news and learning opportunities, as well as vital information about health, well-being and safety. A blanket ban risks unjustly curtailing these freedoms. 

Social media is integral to modern communication and socialisation. Excluding young people from these platforms may isolate them from their peers and limit their ability to ability to access much-needed information and support. This is particularly important for young people from marginalised, vulnerable or remote communities. 

These are the words of the Human Rights Commission. 

The social media ban will rely on effective age assurance processes being adopted, which means that all Australians may be required to prove their identity in order to access social media. This may potentially require all Australians to provide social media companies with sensitive identity information, which poses a risk to our privacy rights in light of recent examples of data breaches and personal information being stolen. 

Technological workarounds – such as VPNs and false age declarations – may undermine the effectiveness of the ban. Additionally, a ban will not address the root causes of online risks or make the platforms safer for everyone. 

The workarounds to this measure have not received enough debate. The bill carves out gaming sites, many of which have a chat feature. Children will move over to chatrooms and gaming sites which are not supervised. Tor—or, more accurately, onion routing—will provide another avenue for communication which is designed to make supervision exponentially harder than on mainstream social media platforms. I have advice from a leading internet security company that peer-to-peer social media, which again is harder for parents to supervise than current social media platforms, is making a comeback. As a result of this legislation, children will be exposed to more harm, not less. I had a call from a constituent— 

Senator Hanson-Young: You are right. 

Senator HANSON-YOUNG: It’s not often Senator Hanson-Young tells me I’m right. A moment ago, I had a call from a constituent who had called their local Liberal member of parliament about this bill and was told, ‘Oh, it’s okay; you can just sign up for your children.’ With age-assurance software, that will not work. With Digital ID connected to age-assurance software, the social media platform will know what you’re doing. Don’t be telling people: ‘It’s nothing. You can defeat it. You can still talk to Grandad on Facebook.’ You won’t be able to. Children may be able to use VPNs, virtual private networks, and the new PPNs, personal private networks, to appear to be in another country. That really won’t work either. The keystroke logging that accompanies the age-assurance software will assume someone pretending to be in Canada but interacting with Australian accounts is probably using a VPN. 

Minister, why did you say that this won’t lead to Digital ID when your amendment says exactly that? 

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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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Australian’s Data Must be Protected

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With a Digital ID framework established, our data is more important than ever. Why does it seem like the government is willing to hand Australian data centres over to foreign interests?

The government is more interested in serving their donors, who are connected to multinational corporations, than in looking after Australians. Only One Nation will put Australians’ interests first and protect their data.

Transcript

We have to wonder whether this government is capable of stopping any bit of Australia being sold to foreign multinational corporations, or is it all just part of its digital ID plan? We’re going to find out when the Foreign Investment Review Board makes its decision on the $24 billion buyout of Australian-founded data firm AirTrunk. AirTrunk is the largest data centre platform in the entire Asia-Pacific region. A conglomerate of multinational investment firms and foreign pension funds is about to buy it. It wasn’t that long ago the government somehow let China buy a 99-year lease to control the Port of Darwin, Australia’s most northern and strategically vital port. Less than a year ago, the Albanese government decided to keep letting China own the 99-year port lease. Many are still dumbfounded. How could we ever let this happen? 

As data becomes as valuable as gold in an increasingly digital world, we may one day look back at the sale of AirTrunk in the same way. Data is fast becoming an essential utility for the entire world. All the opportunities a digital world presents are clear yet the risks of profit-hungry corporations and increasingly tyrannical governments abusing digital identity outnumber the benefits. 

In a digital identity world, where privacy protections are paper-thin, sovereign control of our data centres is a matter of economic and national security, and personal security. Unfortunately, except in the most severe and blatant cases, the Foreign Investment Review Board has a track record of not appreciating the importance of Australians owning Australia. We can anticipate that the Foreign Investment Review Board will rubber-stamp this deal, like so many others. The data centres that Australians’ sensitive data passes through and sits in will become foreign-owned. Let’s put Australians first and ban foreign ownership of sensitive companies.  

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Digital ID, Independent Media and the Future of Conservatism in Australia

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I recently joined Melinda Richards on TNT Radio to discuss pressing issues facing Australia today. I emphasised the importance of independent media.

Our conversation turned to the Digital ID bill, which echoes the Australia Card proposal from the 1980’s—a proposal Australians firmly rejected.

We also discussed the erosion of conservative values within the Liberal Party and the urgent need for strong leadership to uphold these conservative principles.

Transcript

Melinda Richards: I’m joined by Senator Malcolm Roberts, one of the few politicians in Australia standing up for Australians and puts Australians first and his country first.  Thank you again, Senator Roberts for joining me today.

Senator ROBERTS: You’re welcome and thank you for doing what you do on TNT because we need an independent news media.  Part of the problem is that the governments are owned by major corporations who are in the media and that the messaging is false.

Melinda Richards: Yeah, it’s interesting.  I just spoke about that this week that the government has now invested nearly $33 million into Channel 10 and had a little bit of a rant about that.  And having government owned media is the worst idea that could possibly be put forward to a supposed free society.  Senator Roberts, I wanted to talk to you about also the Australia card.  You’re of the age, and I’m of the age, where we can remember the Australia card being proposed by Bob Hawke back in 1985 and he was intent on doing what the digital ID is going to do now.  Of course, the digital ID would be 1000 times worse because we have the technology now, but back in the 80s, Australians said a resounding no to the Australia card and then they talked about it again a couple more times and Australians said a resounding no each time it came up.  So of course, Australians probably would say a very loud, resounding no to the digital ID.  Should this have gone to a referendum to the people?  Because of course, this is going to be the biggest change that society’s going to have in the next coming decades.

Senator ROBERTS: Well, that’s one way certainly of doing it.  We’ve got a One Nation policy – Citizens Initiated Referendum, which means that the people – it operates in some countries, Switzerland for example, and it brings accountability to the federal parliament.  That’s where a citizen can say I don’t like a bill, he or she can make a petition, get sufficient signatures.  Then the bill is put to, even if it’s been passed by the parliament, is put to the people and the people can say go to hell, remove the bill. 
They can also hold politicians accountable and say we don’t like what you’re doing, Melinda, you’re out.  You know that’s what we need, accountability.  So yes, it should be put to the people.  But the Australia card is a really important lesson because I didn’t pay much attention to it at the time.  But as I understand it, Melinda, that was about making sure that people receiving welfare payments from the government, which is really from the taxpayer, were accountable and there’d be no cheating.  And we see a lot of cheating on welfare these days.  So that’s the intent.  But even with that intent, the taxpayers say no, I’d rather lose my money than have the government watching over us.

Melinda Richards: We’d rather have people cheat then have people track US, have people follow, follow the ID number, have our ID number continuing to go through different aspects and parts of our society.  The people of Australia at the time understood the implications.  Are we a little bit more apathetic now or is it just that we are not really understanding what is being passed through parliament because it’s not being talked about much in the mainstream media?

Senator ROBERTS: You’ve, you’ve nailed it.  The mouthpiece media, the legacy media, the Big Brother media, whatever you want to call it, do not talk about it because their masters are wanting this Digital ID to go through because they’ll be part of the corporations that it’ll be widened up to in the future.

Melinda Richards: I mean, we’re still looking at the money train then.  We’re still looking at the people that are going to profit from this by controlling us and then pushing through different things and different subsidies and different parts of bills and ideas and things that we won’t even have a say in either.

Senator ROBERTS: That’s correct.  Remember the three words, two points – control and wealth transfer.  This is what it’s about.  We’ve got the identity verification, which is a bill that went through earlier, a couple of months before, or a few months before the digital ID bill – that was about enabling biometric data to be used. Digital ID bill came up.  The Misinformation-Disinformation bill was introduced by the Morrison Government, and it has been retracted or withdrawn – paused in its process through this parliament.  So that’s coming up as well.  That’s where they will control what you say and what you then do.  So, this is all heading for control and enabling wealth transfer.  Because we also know, thanks to my questioning at Senate estimates, that the Reserve Bank of Australia has been working on a digital currency and has been tying that up to work overseas on a global digital currency.  I mean the Reserve Bank admitted it.  So, this is putting everything in place for social credit score.  And there were several amendments considered in the – it wasn’t a debate – in the passage of the bill through – the hijacking of the bill through the parliament.  And not one word of debate was allowed on any of those amendments.

Melinda Richards: That’s incredible.

Senator ROBERTS: Yeah.  And then the media doesn’t even report this going on.  But this is typical of what the UNI party is doing.  It’s not just the Labour Party.  All of these bills, including the Digital ID bill, were introduced by the LNP, the Liberal National Party government.

Melinda Richards: I mean, do you think this is a really big problem for the conservative movement in Australia?  I just had Andrew Cooper on earlier today talking about CPAC, talking about where the conservative movements going in Australia, particularly in light of what’s just happened in the UK election.  I mean, the digital ID has got to be something, hasn’t it, that that the politicians, the conservative politicians in Australia and the conservative citizens of Australia should now be rallying behind almost as strongly as they did with the Voice referendum.  I mean we know with the positive outcome that happened there that when we do rally, when we do understand things, when we look a little deeper into what’s going on, we can actually get a great result.

Senator ROBERTS: You’re absolutely correct.  And there are a few conservatives, true conservatives in the Liberal Party, but most of them are in One Nation and Libertarians these days.

Melinda Richards: Yes.

Senator ROBERTS: Alex Antic, for example, he drafted a bill that’s called, I think the Repeal Digital ID Bill.  He invited genuine conservatives to cosign it and co-sponsor it.  So, he invited me, Pauline Hanson, Ralph Babet, Gerard Rennick and Matt Canavan.  And so, the six of us are all co-sponsors of the bill.  And the bill’s very simple.  It just says repeal the Digital ID bill – that’s it.  And then there’s the consequential amendments, which is repealing any changes of the digital ID caused in other legislation.  So, it can be done.  You look at the Liberal National Party, Gerard Rennick is one of the best senators and he’s been put in an unwinnable position pre-selection.  You look at the true conservatives, Kevin Andrews from Victoria – gone, not pre-selected.  You look at the senators they’ve appointed recently, they’ve been from the left wing of the Liberal Party.  You see Connie Fierravanti-Wells, Eric Abetz – genuine conservatives sidelined and taken out of federal politics.  So, what we see now is a Liberal Party that is a clone of the worst parts of the Labor Party.  You’ve got factions now within the Liberal Party, you’ve got very, very few Conservatives and so what we’ve got now is a Uni-Party and we know that every major energy bill, for example, climate and energy policy was introduced by the Liberal National Party, not the Labor Party.  The Labor Party came in and ramped it up and that’s what they’ve done across the board.

Melinda Richards: Yeah, that’s right.  And it’s been a shocking revelation for a lot of conservatives over the last probably 15 years or so that the conservative movement is not being represented by the Liberal Party, the Liberal National Party and this has been a bit of a wake up call for the conservative movement in Australia and certainly in the UK – they’ve woken up. It took them 3 elections.  I think we need a strong conservative leader in this country to bring us back to some of our core values.  And there are things that the conservative movement is going to have to, as I said earlier, grab a hold of and fight back pretty strongly.  And the group of politicians you mentioned, Senator Roberts, you are the true heroes of our political movement at the moment in Australia because you are putting Australians first.

Thank you so much for joining me today, Senator Roberts.  I certainly hope we can talk again very soon.  You’re listening to Melinda Richards on TNT.

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Our Dystopian Future of Digital ID Prisons

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The ink isn’t even dry on Minister Gallagher’s Digital ID Bill, yet abuses are already surfacing. Digital ID is supposed to be voluntary, with an alternative method of identification available, however this is not happening.  Federal and State Government departments, alongside crony corporations, are mandating Digital IDs and failing to offer paper alternatives. This blatant disregard for their own legislation reveals the government’s true intention: to force everyone to get a Digital ID for greater control.

Thanks to Minister Gallagher and Prime Minister Albanese, we’re falling into a dystopian future of digital prisons.

Transcript

In the break, opposition leader Peter Dutton joined Prime Minister Anthony Albanese to support a uniparty age ban of 16 on social media. When Minister Gallagher introduced the digital ID, she promised that every Australian over 16 would need a digital ID and that it would be voluntary. The ink was not dry on that legislation when the uniparty advanced this idea for a compulsory social media age limit, a simple idea raising many red flags. The issue is not who signs into social media; the issue is who’s using the account. This requires the device camera to always be on, to check the user’s image against their digital ID to prevent, for instance, younger siblings from taking over the session. Penalties for spreading misinformation, or opinions, as they used to be called, can then be levied against the correct person, with a photo of you making the post to prove it was you.  

The uniparty campaign to stamp out wrong-think on social media will require a camera in every adolescent’s bedroom, running every moment their computer, tablet or phone is in use. Hacking into cameras is easy. This proposal will be a paedophile’s paradise and will increase crimes against children. Using social media in public— cafes, public transport, shops—will be a nightmare. Social media companies will need to run artificial intelligence to work out which image is the person operating the device and which is someone in the background. 

To answer the question, ‘Is this person over 16?’ will require every Australian’s biometric data. Who knows what else this identification and surveillance AI will do without our knowledge? The uniparty that introduced this bill under Mr Morrison and passed it under Mr Albanese will produce unintended consequences that far outweigh any benefit. One Nation believes in the primacy of parents over the state. Parents must be free to raise their children as they choose, not as the government dictates. 

Transcript

Senator ROBERTS: My question is to the Minister for Finance, Senator Gallagher. The Digital ID Act was passed with the promise that it would not be compulsory, per section 74(1). Your act includes a provision that alternative methods of establishing identity must be provided, in section 74(1A). My electorate office is receiving complaints from members of the public who are being required to obtain a digital ID in order to, in one instance, get their own medical report as part of a job application. This was a real-world application, not an online application. Minister, what options are available to a person who is not offered an alternative method of identity verification, as the act requires? Where can people complain, and what penalties are imposed on an entity who fails to follow your legislation?  

Senator GALLAGHER: I thank Senator Roberts for the question. As you’d know, Senator Roberts, the digital ID legislation has not come into effect yet. It doesn’t come into effect until 1 December this year. Essentially, we’ve legislated the existing system, which was unregulated. That’s what we’ve done with that legislation.  

There is a requirement, in the legislation, to continue to provide alternative opportunities or ways for people to engage with government for their personal use. Of course, businesses already engaging with the tax office do use the myGovID system, but, for your personal use, the law is very clear that there must be alternative ways provided for the community to engage with government. That has been made very clear across government. 

I would say that, if you want to forward me that constituent’s issue, even if it’s de-identified, I’d be very happy to look at it, but we have been very clear that it is a voluntary system, it is a safe system and it is a secure system. It’s simply a means of verifying yourself in a way that gives you control of your own documentation. So, instead of having all your ID documents photocopied or emailed around the place, you are the one verifying your identity and you’re able to hold those documents to yourself. It’s actually a much safer way of engaging with government than paper based systems, and I am very hopeful that more people will take it up once the legislation and the regulator are in place. Of course, once that legislation is enacted, there will be a regulator. The ACCC will perform that role. So there would be the ability to make complaints and have those complaints investigated. 

The PRESIDENT: Senator Roberts, first supplementary? 

Senator ROBERTS: The entity responsible was the Queensland state government. Will you now instruct the Queensland Labor government to follow the legislation and ensure an alternative option is allowed or will you do so after the legislation is enacted? 

Senator GALLAGHER: The legislation does enable a national digital ID system, or ecosystem. There are private sector digital IDs and there are also state government versions. But what the legislation means is that those state governments can apply for accreditation through the national system, and we are hopeful that they will do that. In fact, in a meeting I had on Friday with states, they are all certainly indicating that they will be part of that national system. But, for a state based system which has its own processes for engaging on rates and other things, that is a matter for the Queensland government and would have to be taken up with the Queensland government. 

The PRESIDENT: Senator Roberts, second supplementary? 

Senator ROBERTS: Minister, was the failure to include penalties for not providing alternative verification options a failure of this government or was the imposition of a mandatory digital ID the plan all along? 

Senator GALLAGHER: The legislation is very clear. It’s a voluntary system—that is, people, for their personal engagement with government, have the right to choose whether they use a digital ID or they use the more traditional way of engaging with government. In terms of penalties, the legislation does set up the ACCC as the regulator of the system. That would be the way that complaints and other issues would be assessed. So there is a system in place. I don’t have the legislation right in front of me, but we were very clear that putting the digital ID ecosystem in legislation is actually about ensuring that it is safe and that consumers’ needs are fundamental, are front and centre and are protected through a regulated system. At the moment, I have a digital ID, but it doesn’t exist under a regulated system. All that the legislation did was take a lot of what’s happening now outside of a regulated system and regulate it. 

 

Transcript

Senator ROBERTS: I move: 

That the Senate take note of the answer given by the Minister for Finance (Senator Gallagher) to a question without notice I asked today relating to digital ID. 

The Digital ID Act was presented to the Senate and to the Australian public as a convenient way to establish identity and that it would not be compulsory. It has taken precisely two weeks to discover that’s a lie. Already federal and state government departments are demanding digital IDs be created for the most mundane tasks. A constituent of mine in Queensland who attended a health clinic to undergo a physical before starting a job with the Queensland government for which a medical was mandated was told he couldn’t have the results of his physical until he got a digital ID. This is a real-world transition. The clinic knew who he was because he had to prove his identity before starting the physical. The digital ID requirement came from the Queensland government. In this case, there’s no earthly reason for a digital ID except that the public service have taken it upon themselves to impose a digital ID on every person in the country. Without penalties, there will be no attempt to provide the alternative method of verification that the minister promised. 

COVID proved the power of using employment for the purposes of blackmail, and it’s a lesson the government has embraced. The digital ID website, digitalidentity.gov.au, rolled out the new webpages for the digital ID within days of the legislation passing. The public education campaign on TV and online started within just a few days. The regulations upon which so much of the bill relies are finished and on public display already. All the ducks were in a row to introduce a digital prison in Australia before the Senate even voted and well before the new law’s implementation date in December. No wonder the government did a dirty deal with elements of the crossbench, guillotined the debate—there was no debate—and delivered government the powers they crave. What a disgraceful display. What an abuse of the social contract between the government and its requirement to act in the best interests of the public. One Nation will repeal the digital ID and legislate privacy protections for all Australians. 

Question agreed to. 

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The Triad of Tyranny is About Control

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I’ve just co-sponsored a Bill to repeal the Digital ID Bill passed by the government.

This is why it is so essential to get rid of this dictatorship tool.

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Brisbane Rally: Say NO to Digital ID

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I am strongly opposed to the Digital ID bill, which I see as a tool for authoritarian control that threatens our freedom and privacy. I believe this bill is part of a larger agenda aimed at identifying, controlling, and potentially punishing those who oppose government policies—a shift that feels like a return to feudalism and serfdom. Although initially presented as voluntary, the Digital ID is gradually becoming mandatory for everyday tasks, as more government departments require it for various services.

I’m deeply concerned that this system could lead to significant privacy violations, creating a live data file tracking people’s movements and activities that could easily be used to control and exploit citizens.

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The Tyranny of a National Digital Identity

Regarding the government’s not so voluntary National Digital Identity – you are not alone. We’ve been receiving many similar messages and emails from across Australia. 

Three bills were rammed through the Senate, creating dangerous legislation for Australians who value their privacy, security, and civil liberties. The Identity Verification Services Bill, which permits the use of biometric data to locate and track citizens was passed into legislation. The Digital ID Bill was also passed in the Senate with almost no debate and was rubber-stamped in the House of Representatives. The Combatting Misinformation/Disinformation (Censorship) Bill received strong pushback and has gone quiet for now. Instead, we saw an attack on free speech from Australia’s eSafety Commissioner. 

  

Labor is forging ahead in lockstep with other countries to implement the World Economic Forum’s digital economic agenda.

There have been many different digital identity systems floating around in the government. The Digital Identity Bill was designed to create one Digital Identity to rule them all. Among some last-minute concessions in the legislation, the government has said that its new Digital ID can be deactivated. That’s irrelevant however when banks and other institutions will make it mandatory. In fact, Section 74 of the bill states that Digital ID is voluntary, but sub-sections 2,3,4,5,6,7 and 8 list a series of exceptions. All of which means it can be mandated under the flimsy provision of “appropriate to do so”.   

The Australian Government’s proposed ‘Trusted Digital Identity Framework’ (they actually used the word ‘trusted’ in the first draft of the bill) is not a stand-alone policy. It sits inside the extensive Digital Economy Strategy 2030 worth $1.2 billion at the time of the 2021-2022 Budget. It will be accessible and used both in government and private settings. This legislation relies on legacy identification mechanisms which guarantee a role for Big Tech companies in the Government’s proposed ‘identity ecosystem’.

Unfortunately, the interests of ‘Big Tech’ and ‘Big Government’ are becoming increasingly aligned. Both parties have a vested interest in pervasive surveillance, data mining and matching: one for profit and the other for control. This represents an unhealthy alignment of State and Corporate interests, with everything that entails.  

The new raft of identity legislation creates a brand-new identity record for Australians, originated by Government and validated by Government, and commercial entities. This legislation goes much further than the MyGov digital ID. It puts all your identity eggs into one digital basket and will place more Australians at risk of being hacked.

A much better alternative would be an identity system based on the user owned and operated technologies developed by the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) that rely on cryptographic tools and decentralised identifiers to prove ‘trustworthiness’ online, as well as identity – if that is what’s needed. These tools allow for direct, peer-to-peer proofs of trustworthiness and identity verification, without the need for Government or Big Tech involvement. So why is the Australian Government persevering with such a poor-quality identity solution?  You might ask yourself, “Why do we need another digital identity system when we already have myGov ID?”  The short answer is that this legislation is not designed to serve the interests of ordinary Australians. It’s been designed by foreign Big Tech firms and international governance bodies like the WHO, UN, IPCC and WEF to serve their interests. These organisations profit handsomely in terms of money and power from the capture and exploitation of personal data, and they don’t want that model to change.  

The most serious risk associated with this legislation is scope creep. Like Australia, most developed nations around the world are implementing Government Digital Identity systems that are remarkably similar to those already operational in China and India.  Over-identification is a feature of both the Chinese and Indian Digital ID legislation and there is a real risk that biometric mechanisms of identification will become a mandatory aspect of every transaction Australians make online and off.

I first drew Australia’s attention to this dangerous and dystopian legislation in 2021 “1984: the Bill” – The Trusted Digital Identity – Malcolm Roberts (malcolmrobertsqld.com.au). I’ve been opposed to the government’s digital identity since it was first proposed under the coalition, when Australia aligned with the World Economic Forum’s goals for a global digital economic strategy. This is the reason government-legislated Digital Identity was created in the first place. Read my article in the Spectator (click here) for more about the bureaucratic bungling behind this legislation.

The government did not come up with the Trusted Digital Identity on its own to solve the issue of outdated government databases. As stated by the policymakers in their accompanying documentation, the Trusted Digital Identity is the brainchild of the World Economic Forum and their global digital identity roadmap.  Unlike the Voice, which sought to change the constitution, legislation can at least be undone with a change of government.  

It’s important to keep pushing back against these authoritarian measures. The best remedy will be at the ballot box during the next federal election. 

If One Nation had had just one more senator in parliament, many of those abhorrent, dystopian bills that were rammed through the Senate with little or no debate would not have been passed.

Make your vote count at the next election.

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How to Contact Your Federal Members of Parliament

Has anyone ever showed you how to find the contact details for your local Member of Parliament so you can tell them how you feel?

Watch this to find out how anyone, anywhere in Australia can discover who their local MPs area and their contact details.

Members of parliament are there to service you — make your opinion heard.

Transcript

Fish says, what is the best way to apply pressure to our local representatives? Call them.

First of all, go to their office and say you want a meeting with your representative. You want a meeting with your representative.

Here we go. Identify where he or she is. Google it. Members. Put in your postcode. Find the MP, click on the MP, go down and get the number. There you have the number. You’ll also have the address of their electorate office. And you’ll have their email. Emails are almost useless.

This is the hierarchy I use. I recommend and I’ve done it myself. Visit their office, knock on their door and say you want a meeting. It shows real commitment from you and real strength from you that you’re turning up in person. Demand a meeting. Be polite, but be firm. They’ll give you excuses as to why the member can’t meet with you. Don’t put up with it. Do it again a second time. Leave your name, give your contact details, you want a meeting.

The second best way is to call them and demand a conversation. Just request it all very respectfully. And then the third one is write a letter, a paper-based letter signed. It doesn’t have to be typed, just has to be neatly written or typed, signed with a handwritten signature. put in the post and sent and if you really have something that you want evidence they’ve received it, put it registered post. It’ll cost a few dollars but that’s what I used to do. I’ve written thousands of these letters in paper and some some people have told me how much they appreciated my letters and some people tell me how much they didn’t appreciate my letters, but turning up is the best way.

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My Article in the Spectator Australia: Digital ID Dystopia

“With the Digital ID Bill passing through the Senate, the bombardment of promotional material has begun – even ahead of the Lower House rubber stamping the Bill in May.

Government services have moved to drown-out serious safety, privacy and liberty concerns … “

Read More
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