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Nice try guys but I don’t think anyone’s buying it

Scott Morrison and Christian Porter gave a press conference today to announce their response to the Ruddock review into religious freedom and the formation of a National Integrity Commission.

In explaining the need for religious freedom legislation and a Religious Freedom Commissioner at the AHRC, Scott started out by telling us what a religious country Australia is as 70% of people nominated a religion in the 2016 census.  It’s part of who we are.

And how the percentage of migrants identifying a religion was much higher.  Multiculturalism.

And blessed be the atheist who must be equally protected from discrimination.

When pressed to give examples of religious discrimination today, Scott floundered until Christian helpfully stepped in recounting how a person who had expressed opposition to marriage equality on Facebook got sacked and had to sue for unfair dismissal.  Which was kind of ironic as he was announcing the government’s support for religious schools to sack teachers if they express support for marriage equality.

Scott then remembered that someone had been blocked from entering a meeting somewhere because of their religion…then remembered they want to enshrine the right of religious groups to stop people from entering their premises so kind of mumbled something about exemptions.

After the thousands of submissions and wide consultation that led to the Ruddock review recommendations, they will now flick pass the five substantive ones to the Law Council to review the review for long enough to make it another government’s problem.

This wasn’t going quite as well as they’d hoped so they proudly announced their Christmas present to the Australian public – a National Integrity Commission….well two of them actually, but they won’t hold hearings or publish conclusions.  They will just investigate stuff and then pass it on to the DPP.

“What kind of stuff?” a reporter asked.  “Do you mean like Michaelia Cash’s office tipping off the media about a police raid?”

“No, no…  This will just be for aggravated criminal offences.”

“But that is a criminal offence.”

“Yes…errr…ummm…If criminal behaviour was shown to be ongoing….ummm…if it was say….ummm benefitting from giving out contracts for example….er….if it was aggravated behaviour….”

HELP ME.

PM to the rescue to tell us how bad the NSW ICAC was and that this will not be a political witch hunt like the NSW ICAC where good men’s lives were destroyed.  People were labelled as criminals but many of the findings were overturned by the courts.

Gee….I seem to remember Dyson Hayden saying some pretty damning things very publicly about the thugs and criminals in the union movement which fizzled off into nothingness.  Not to mention Peter Slipper.

If they said it once, they said it a hundred times – this wasn’t anything to do with Labor who just have a press release.  This was a body of work that began last January and that had been methodically discussed and worked through with the Cabinet.

Except, it was less than a month ago – November 19th to be exact – that Christopher Pyne said on Sky News….

“Look, we have a number of different bodies which are already over-sighting federal politicians.  The new Independent Parliamentary Expenses Authority, of course the Australian federal police, which has its own particular division which deals with fraud and so on in public office.  It’s the easiest thing to do is call for another organisation costing money, giving it extra powers.  I don’t think that’s necessary at the national level and it’s just another way of Bill Shorten trying to distract people from the real issues that matter around jobs, the economy, national security, border protection.”

Nice try guys but I don’t think anyone’s buying it.  The U-turn left skid marks.

 

18 comments

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  1. Diannaart

    I don’t believe in sky fairies and my right not to believe is now to be protected? Really? I would rather feel safe on public transport, walking home at night or even saying something against domestic violence without being abused.

    I don’t believe I have had issues due to my not believing something.

    As an atheist, I will continue to NOT darken the doors of churches, synagogues, mosques or holy yurts. No problem.

    I will continue to ask god-believing folk who traipse all the way to my door for their addresses seeing as they know mine ‘n all. I try to conduct myself as reasonably as I can, however not one of the god-believers has offered their addresses, I do get a few nervous laughs though.

    As an atheist, will my right to peaceful existence mean god-believers are to be banned from promulgating on my doorstep? Or is this not what Morrison intends?

    And what about religious LGBTQI people? Will they be protected for their sexuality AND their religion?

    And how much is all this going to cost?

  2. Kaye Lee

    Porter went straight to Sky News after the press conference. When asked if he could think of an example of something that should be investigated by the Integrity Commission, he couldn’t wait to say Sam Dastyari. Could I nominate Stuart Robert?

  3. Kaye Lee

    As for the cost diannart, a new Commissioner on the AHRC will cost about half a million a year if Tim Wilson was anything to go by.

    “…. racking up $77,763 in expenses in his first year on the job. These were in addition to his $332,000 salary package and $40,000 accommodation allowance.”

    Then we have two new bodies under the Integrity Commission……who knows? They usually cost tens of millions but I get the feeling they don’t want them to be busy considering how restrictive they are being about the type of stuff they would investigate.

  4. New England Cocky

    Uhm … if I remember my history correctly the usual involvement in church has been about 30% of the European population Australia since 1788, wiht occasional increases during stressful periods (like world wars, bank induced economic depressions and revolving governments).

    What a great place to announce this “Godsend”; SKY News, which has about 3% of the listening/watching viewer audience.

    Makes you wonder what all the fuss was about …….oh yes, elections in 2019 ….. at last!!!!!

    It’s time.

  5. Kronomex

    “Nice try guys but I don’t think anyone’s buying it. The U-turn left skid marks.”

    More like, and badly paraphrased, from Bottom Live: Hooligan’s Island – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3FKQw6FyP2A

    Richie: Is Scummo’s skid mark showing?
    Eddie: Not so much a skid mark, more like a sort of a half mile stretch of the Maginot Line.

  6. totaram

    Meanwhile, another disgraceful action by the AFP, with regard to a refugee who is now threatened with deportation to his home country which are out to get him. Hakeem al-Araibi is arrested in Thailand because the AFP alerted Thai authorities that he was travelling there, while they should not have acted on the Interpol notice, when he is a refugee granted asylum.
    They have already had many Australians arrested and actually EXECUTED in Bali when they could easily have waited until they arrived in Australia and arrested them. No one is asking why this was done. Strangely, the parents of the two who were executed have kept quiet and done nothing.
    These people are a complete disgrace. They are yet to find out who alerted the Press to the raid on Union offices ordered by Michaelia Cash, but they are very good at getting Australian citizens into trouble in foreign parts. Complete scum.

    I strongly believe the whole outfit should be disbanded and reconstituted from scratch. Simply make them all redundant and get them to reapply for their positions all over again, with a proper vetting process to see how badly compromised they are. We would probably be much safer without them.

  7. paul walter

    Interestingly, the integrity and religious freedom issues were also visited at different intensities on the Drum and 7′ 30 Report s this evening.

    With “Religious Freedom” we again see an example of the employ of jargonese to mask a diametric opposition of intent to the one the proposition ingratiates itself into public awareness with.

    When we talk of “religious freedom” we are not talking about the right of qualified teachers to teach so much as the right of bigots to sack those they they cannot tolerate, as Xtians should. It derives of a very skewed theological interpretation that ignores the more fundamental teachings of the NT, as to tolerance for want of a better word.

    What I find far more interesting at the moment is the suppression of detail concerning the conviction of a high ranking religious figure involved in a recent case involving offences involving (in some cases) children.

    Also this.

    https://www.abc.net.au/news/2018-12-13/australias-secret-backing-for-nations-fighting-bloody-yemen-war/10600912?section=politics

    Involves the indefatigable and brilliant Dr Kellie Tranter, but to fully understand this issue you must watch 7.30 itself, doing one of its less frequent hard news items, this one linked to the Yemen atrocity, if only to witness an example of breathtaking black humour or cynicism from the Defence Minister, Christopher Pyne, involving Human Rights.

    This show also hinted that the government will employ Gerard Henderson’s forum to sneakily announce the move of the Australian Embassy in Israel to Jerusalem.

    Integrity Commission?

    What euphemism is this?

  8. Paul Davis

    Those aussie designed shoot em up vehicles that Poople was trumpeting look ideal for riot supression. Bet our army will deploy them when parliament is suspended and elections postponed to protect our democracy after “the emergency”.

  9. Steve Flora

    Yes, Diannaart … every time the mention of the phrase “Freedom of Religion” comes up, and so urgently want it to be immediately followed by the second pillar of “Freedom From Religion” … the latter should be at the very least equal to former, if not slightly above. We have all too often seen the effects of a religion being in control and the absolute havoc it lays about upon those people NOT of the majority religion in control of a society.

  10. Kaye Lee

    Steve,

    Which is why I would prefer it not to be in our public schools – especially when we hand kids over to people who have zero training in education. Religion is about personal beliefs – they should be instilled at home and at church if that’s the way you feel. Schools are places of learning, not indoctrination.

  11. Patagonian

    This from the same government that tried to get rid of the Human Rights Commission? The fact that they cannot see their rank hypocrisy is very frightening.

  12. Miriam English

    This “government” and their accidental prime minister become more tiresome by the day.

  13. helvityni

    Paul Walter, watched 7.30, grim viewing…

    Reading ABC online this morning, 17 NSW police charged for domestic violence, usual stuff from our sportsmen, who threw the baby in the sea, mum or dad…. another Liberal Lady politician losing a winnable seat…. stopped reading….

    Is our ABC getting bolder, I always admired Kellie Tranter…something positive in that depressing mix.

  14. helvityni

    …also Paul Walter, did you watch The Drum on Wednesday, Professor Michael Biercuk , who has been here nine years (American), is often told that he has taken a job from an Australian…he obviously was the best candidate for the position….not even an educated white man can avoid being accused of choking our roads, filling our trains and buses…

    Why not blame the obvious lack of planning….?

  15. paul walter

    Thanks Helvi. With the ABC, the thing that actually surprised me a little was 730 getting into some hard news. Pleasant change.

    Congrats to totaram for picking up on theHakeem Al Airabi case.

    I think the government is feeding him to Bahrain as part of its anti asylum seeker stance.

    Passing strange they can blather about the “rights” of church schools not allowed to persecute gays but can send a good young fella back to a foreign dictatorship torture chamber.

  16. ajogrady

    Another L/NP “Clayton’s” policy by this corrupt and inept L/NP “Clayton’s”government.

  17. Hefina

    Just one look at Morrison and I see on his face he tells lies , he is as nasty as Trump.gets people around him to tell lies .
    I wouldn’t trust the government ,
    All of a sudden because of the up coming election ,they are throwing money around. Building this and that. Now a freight is being built in Victoria, we need a royal commission into this Lib/Nat Government.they are up to no good.

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