Wednesday, 1 July 2026

Federation Chamber 

Mr Tim Wilson MP: How bad does antisemitism have to be for the Australian government to act? Since 7 October 2023, we have seen a cascading series of problems of antisemitism in our community. It's been consistent. It's been successive. We've seen a fundamental failure of leadership. We've seen a failure at every point to condemn the acts of antisemitism in our country at a scale that should never have been permitted. We saw it on 8 October on the steps of the Sydney Opera House. It doesn't matter what version of history you want to interpret, there was no place for people simply screaming out and demanding to take retribution for horrific acts overseas. We saw it on 10 November in 2023 out the front of Central Shule in Caulfield South in the Goldstein electorate. The failure of leadership continued to cascade all the way up to the worst terrorist attack on our nation's soil, on the beaches of Bondi.

That's why I made a formal submission to the Royal Commission on Antisemitism and Social Cohesion documenting these incidents in detail and on the record. That's because law alone won't fix this. We need leaders willing to properly diagnose the problem and set the standard of behaviour our country has been missing, a lack of standard which, sadly, our government has allowed to fester. I really hope this parliament will read the evidence and make judgement calls on the recommendations from the final royal commission, because we want an Australia where everybody feels that they are part of our common journey and building a better nation for everybody.