Paul Keating has slammed Angus Taylor’s migration crackdown as cowardly and racist in a scathing attack accusing the Liberals of embracing “dumb bigotry” for votes.
The Liberal leader made headlines this week when he warned that migrants from Liberal democratic countries were a better fit for Australia.
“For too long, we’ve turned a blind eye to a reality of immigration and integration: Those who migrate from liberal democracies have a greater likelihood of subscribing to Australian values compared to those migrating from places ruled by fundamentalists, extremists, and dictators,” Mr Taylor said.
While Mr Taylor did not specify any nationalities, his remarks was interpreted by some as a call to restrict immigration from Muslim countries in the Middle East.
That prompted former Prime Minister Keating to weigh in with a brutal take-down of the Liberal leader.
“The Liberal Party, battling an extreme version of itself – One Nation, has again fallen back to its default political policy: racism,” Mr Keating said.
“The blight of Pauline Hanson is that her dumb bigotry offers a fantasy.
“The fantasy that Australia in the modern age can return to a monoculture.
“A monoculture which fails to acknowledge or accept that a continent of our scale is able to turn its back on the multilateralism of neighbouring states or on the vitality of their societies.”
Mr Keating said that Mr Taylor had demeaned himself by adopting the new policy.
“By adopting racism with its shabby appeal to differentiation and primal instincts, Angus Taylor marks himself out as a political leader unworthy of the leadership of a party that has managed Australia for the greater part of the last century and which celebrated the country’s unifying values,” he said.
“Racism is not simply immoral and abhorrent, it is absurd.”
Liberals’ migrant crackdown
Mr Taylor has vowed to deport 65,000 visa overstayers if he is elected, warning that overseas students and asylum seekers are exploiting the system.
He’s also singled out Palestinian refugees from Gaza as a national security risk.
“They come to our country from a society run by the barbaric Islamist terrorist organisation Hamas – an organisation that has sought to indoctrinate and radicalise their entire population to accept fanatical violence as normal, especially the genocidal slaughter of Jews,” Mr Taylor said.
“In that vein, the cohort of Gazans let into Australia following the October 7 attacks presents a clear risk to our country.”
Around 1500 Palestinians from Gaza have arrived in Australia since the October 7, 2023 attacks, with over 2,500 to 3,000 visitor visas granted to Palestinians during the same period.
However, Mr Keating said the Liberals’ policy was abhorrent.
“Angus Taylor, announcing a policy at primary odds with an immigrant nation, says a Liberal government under his leadership will adopt Trump ICE-style policies to weed and ‘boot out’ people who fail to adhere to ‘national values’ and who are responsible for the erosion of national culture including the Balkanisation of communities,” he said.
“And, to hammer the point, sitting beside Taylor at his policy launch was Mr Racial Opportunism himself: John Winston Howard, late of anti-Asian migration in 1988 – the picket fence suburban racism of his first round as Liberal leader, and the wilful anti-humanitarianism of his electorally-driven Tampa atrocity of 2001.
“Angus Taylor, for base political reasons, has elected to walk away from the best instincts of the Liberal party – the party of Robert Menzies, of Harold Holt, of Malcolm Fraser, of Andrew Peacock, of Brendan Nelson, of Malcolm Turnbull.
“The two-party system has served Australia well over the last century and more. But more than that, it has superintended the development of a country where notions of equality and justice have underpinned the flourishing of one of the most open and decent societies in the world.
“How dispiriting for the rest of us is Angus Taylor’s cowardice in not even attempting to stand and argue for principles that have been integral to Australia’s strength – principles his party has long championed.”
Trump-style ICE agents
Speaking on 2GB radio, Mr Taylor did not rule out US style ICE agents roaming the streets.
“You know, like a team, with vans and armed police and all that sort of thing. Is that the sort of thing you look at?” host James Willis asked.
“Well, we’re talking about a very different thing here. “They’re talking well over 10 million people,” Mr Taylor said.
“We’re talking about 65,000. So, I don’t. We’re not, we’re not even remotely close to that sort of scale.
“But, it is absolutely right that if someone has exhausted all legal avenues for protection, that they’ve lost their visa, that they’re no longer a legal resident in this country, they should go.
“And we should enforce that and we should use whatever we have to, resources we have to, to make sure they leave the country.”
Aussie values pledge
The new hard-right policy agenda follows the rise of Ms Hanson’s One Nation party, which has now overtaken the Liberals according to some opinion polls.
“Australia has a proud history of welcoming migrants from across the world,” Mr Taylor said.
“But something has changed in more recent times. Immigration numbers are too high. Immigration standards are too low.”
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