A Neo-Nazi assaulting a woman with a homemade flamethrower—this isn't 1930s fascist Europe; this is happening in Australia in 2021. At a Gosnells shopping centre, near Perth, a man with a Nazi symbol on his forehead used a flamethrower to assault an innocent mother who was shopping with her daughter. The WA police said that, after blasting flames at them, the perpetrator said he was doing this because they were Indigenous. This attack is horrific. I hope that the mother and the daughter are doing okay and that they are getting all the support that they need and deserve.
Neo-Nazis are emerging as one of Australia's biggest security threats. ASIO's director-general, Mike Burgess, has said that cells of right-wing extremists are regularly gathering in Australia to salute the Nazi flag and disperse their hateful ideology. Yet this government's response to the threat has been inadequate, to say the very least. This rise of right-wing extremism, this rise of racism—these things are not happening in a vacuum. Not enough is being done to tackle racism and stamp out right-wing extremism. So I once more call on the Morrison government to finally establish a national antiracism strategy with a zero-tolerance approach to racism at its core.