Riverina MP and Deputy Prime Minister Michael McCormack has condemned a QLD Senator’s call for a reintroduction of the White Australia Policy.
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Katter’s Australian Party Senator Fraser Anning used his maiden speech on Tuesday to advocate for a plebiscite on non-European and Muslim migrants as a “final solution to the immigration problem”.
Senator Anning’s apparent reference to the Nazi Holocaust of millions of people drew criticism from across the political spectrum, including from his former party leader, Pauline Hanson.
Speaking in favour of a motion by opposition leader Bill Shorten to reaffirm a commitment to non-discriminatory immigration, Mr McCormack said Australia was united in “condemning those words spoken in hate”.
“The things which unite us are greater that those which divide us,” Mr MrCormack told Parliament on Wednesday.
He began his remarks with a reference to the Australian National Anthem’s lines on “for those who’ve come across the seas”.
Mr McCormack said Senator Anning’s use of the term ‘final solution’ was “dreadful” as the effects of the Holocaust were still being felt and would continue to be felt throughout human history.
“To utter those words anywhere, let alone in the house of democracy is purely dreadful, is evil,” Mr McCormack said.
Katters Australian Party leader Bob Katter said he ‘loved’ Senator Anning’s speech.
"Absolutely 1000 per cent I support everything he said. His speech was absolutely magnificent. It is everything his country should be doing. It was solid gold,” Mr Katter said on Wednesday.
Senator Anning has refused to apologise or step back from his comments, and denied that his use of the phrase ‘final solution’ was a reference to the Holocaust.
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Mr McCormack told Parliament about his experience during a citizenship ceremony in Wagga recently.
“A lady from South Sudan, when we gave her the certificate of citizenship she hugged me, and she wouldn’t stop hugging me beacuse he husband had been in a refugee camp.
“I had worked hard, along with the wonderful staff in my electorate office to get him over here.
“I was privileged to have been born in Australia but she came here by choice, and we got him here through hard work and determination so that he could share a life with his beloved.
“The tears rolled down her face. She was so grateful that they could be a family again but she also acknowledged that she was a citizen of this great country.”
Mr McCormack also related a meeting with Home Affairs Minister Peter Dutton in which he was asked if Wagga could take in Yazidi refugees who were fleeing ISIS terrorists in Syria and Iraq.
“In a nanosecond I said ‘yes’,” Mr McCormack said.
“I called the mayor and said we’re going to get 55 Yazidi families and he said ‘that’s great’, because Wagga is an all-embracing regional community like so many others.
“I think sometimes regional Australia gets a bad rap for not welcoming people but they do.”
Mr McCormack said there had been only one letter to the editor in The Daily Advertiser opposing the Yazidi refugees, and it its writer had been widely criticised.