Former Home Affairs boss: Government sat on anti-Semitism laws; Bondi massacre might have been avoided

A former top government official alleged the Albanese Government chose not to implement tough anti-Semitism laws for years that might have prevented the Bondi Beach massacre.

Former Home Affairs Department secretary Mike Pezzullo said the government likely had kept the proposed laws, which include a new federal racial vilification crime, “in bottom drawers” for years and questioned why they were not implemented before 15 people were murdered at a Jewish celebration one month ago.

“There is no way that that package, in its form … could have been developed in the time that’s occurred,” Mr Pezzullo told a parliamentary committee on Wednesday.

“Are these important now? Yes, they are … but they were also important two-and-a half years ago. Why has this been rushed now when it should have been staged and put into place at least two years ago?

“The Royal Commissioner might well form the view that that horrific event was tragically avoidable.”

The suggestion by one of the nation’s top security experts that Australia’s worst terrorist attack could have been prevented could be hugely damaging for Anthony Albanese, who refused for almost a month to appoint a royal commission to investigate the attack and the broader problem of anti-Jewish hatred.

With Parliament scheduled to vote on the new laws next Tuesday, a rebellion is brewing within the Coalition over the planned restrictions on free speech and the right to operate fringe political groups.

Coalition leader Sussan Ley called for laws to protect the Jewish community almost immediately after the December 14 terrorist attack. But several leading opposition figures expressed concerns the Combatting Antisemitism, Hate And Extremism Bill goes too far, and some said they will cross the floor and vote against it.

“If these laws are drafted too broadly, they won’t just catch extremists; they’ll chill free speech and punish the wrong people,” Foreign Affairs spokeswoman Michaelia Cash told The Nightly.

Nationals senator Matt Canavan and Liberal senator Alex Antic said they planned to vote against the proposed laws, joining Perth MP and leadership aspirant Andrew Hastie.

Senator Canavan compared the planned banning of the neo-nazi National Socialist Network and the Islamist group Hizb-ut Tahrir to the failed attempt to outlaw the Australian Communist Party in 1951 by the then Liberal-National government. That move came to be seen by most historians as a government overreach driven by paranoia.

“These laws are a shoddy and rushed affront to democracy and free speech,” Senator Canavan wrote on social media Wednesday morning.

Senator Antic said he opposed all sections of the bill, which give the government the power to ban organisations regarded as a security threat by ASIO.

“We have enough laws on the books in this country as it is,” he told Andrew Bolt on Sky News, while calling it “the worst assault on freedom this Parliament has ever seen”.

Nationals leader David Littleproud has complained the laws, which will allow the government to buy thousands of guns that will be have to be surrendered, unfairly targets sporting shooters.

New One Nation MP Barnaby Joyce called for Islamic fundamentalism to be explicitly targeted by the laws, which he said were written to broadly to avoid upsetting Muslim voters.

The former Nationals leader complained the new criminal racial vilification offence ignores the primary threat the law is designed to fight because it is based on race, colour, national or ethic origin and does not mention radical Islam.

“We have a clear example of Islamic fundamentalism inspiring the murder of innocent Australians in a public place,” he told The Nightly.

“What we have done not to offend anyone - to offend any person of the Islamic faith - is create this legislation that has this wide remit. We don’t have a problem with Anglican fundamentalism or Buddhist fundamentalism or Hindu fundamentalism or Catholic fundamentalism or atheistic fundamentalism.

“Otherwise there is a presumption that there is evilness presiding in all places, and that’s ridiculous.”

Labor Senator Raff Ciccone, who chairs the committee leading the three-day snap inquiry, accused critics of being inconsistent in the calls for action.

“I want to make sure that I work with my colleagues across the aisle,” he told Sky News on Wednesday.

“But I mean, some colleagues have also called for us to have the Parliament recalled sooner. So on one hand, they want us to come to Parliament and pass laws, and then, on the other hand, we get attacked for trying to pass laws and go through a process.”

No Christian, Muslim protections

There is frustration in the Opposition that Ms Ley has been unable to increase support for the Coalition despite criticism of Anthony Albanese’s handling of the massacre. The first published political poll of the year, conducted by Demos AU for Capital Brief, estimated Pauline Hanson’s One Nation’s support at 23 per cent, the same as the Liberal-National Coalition.

While Opposition leaders have said they want the new laws passed at a special sitting of Parliament next week, the concerns raised by some backbenchers demonstrates that the Coalition is split over laws that would criminalise some forms of speech and potentially force extremist activists underground.

One of Senator Canavan’s complaints is that it will become illegal to intimidate people on the basis of race, including Jews, but the protection will not extend to Christians, Muslims or other religions. “What amounts to ‘intimidation’ is not defined,” he said.

The Jewish group that helped formulate the law, the Executive Council of Australian Jewry, complained on Wednesday about one section that protects people who might be promoting racial hatred if they are quoting from a religious text, including the Koran, which one notorious Sydney Islamist, Wassim Haddid, used to spread abuse about Jews, the Federal Court found last year.

“This is a very wide loophole that would be exploited to render the introduction of this offence ineffective,” the executive council’s co-chief executive, Peter Wertheim, told a parliamentary committee Wednesday.

Mr Wertheim said his racial-discrimination lawsuit against Mr Haddid might not have been successful under the wording of the new law.

Anthony Albanese has referred critics to the Old Testament of the Christian Bible, which contains assertions considered offensive today, including advocating rape and mass murder.

A Muslim group, the Australian Federation of Islamic Councils, raised concerns about the exclusion of religion from the vilification law “despite the documented and rising threat of Islamophobia”.