Topics: Labor’s online safety mess, a failing social media ban and Albanese’s crude podcast disgrace.
Stephen Cenatiempo: Time to talk federal politics with the Shadow Minister for Communications, Senator Sarah Henderson. Morning, Sarah.
Senator Henderson: A very good morning to you, Stephen.
Stephen Cenatiempo: That is the problem here, isn’t it? It’s not necessarily that the ideas or the intention is bad, but it’s just the delivery of this government, and as I say, economic illiteracy. They just don’t understand what their policies are going to achieve.
Senator Henderson: I think it’s much worse than that. Their ideas are terrible. Their mismanagement of the economy is sending our nation backwards, and the scheme that you just mentioned is being very, very poorly managed. No means testing. Anyone can access the five-deposit scheme, including non-citizens, it’s an absolute joke of a scheme, that the way the government is now running it, and of course young Australians are paying the highest price in many respects because of the way that the housing market is crashing. It’s just a disaster, what has happened after this budget of broken promises and lies, and it’s just another indication that this government does not know what it’s doing in so many different respects, including on the housing crisis.
Stephen Cenatiempo: Let’s talk about that in your portfolio, because I’ve been critical of the government social media ban since well before it was implemented. In fact, I was critical of it when Peter Dutton originally came up with the idea, but it’s clearly not working. The government’s now doubling down on a bad policy.
Senator Henderson: The social media ban is not working because Labor rushed this policy. It was poorly designed, badly implemented, and we know that because they’re now scrambling to try and fix it. We do want to see it work, but the amendments that the government has brought forward to the parliament to amend the Online Safety Act are not tough enough. It is very clear this minister, Anika Wells does not know what she is doing, she is not competent, as the social media ban is failing, the only thing they have done in four years.
The government is not taking action on the horrific algorithms which are causing so much mental health harm, on giving parents access to safety tools, safety enhancements on actual devices, on apps, and of course on taking really strong action on issues like blocking live streaming to prevent horrific child sexual abuse. So, this is a minister completely out of her depth. She should have spent a lot more time at home doing her job rather than running around the world rorting taxpayer’s money time and time again. Everything this minister, Anika Wells, touches turns to mush, and the social media ban is just one more example.
Stephen Cenatiempo: I want to touch on something, and I editorialised about this, this morning, that instead of talking about cost of living and energy crisis, and all the things that average Australians are talking about. We spent the last 24 to 48 hours talking about the Prime Minister, some stupid comments on a podcast. Now, I know that you’ve led the charge on this, and I get the issue of demeaning against women, but you know this, particularly when it comes to this shag, married date, or whatever it was, a lot of people engage in these conversations, men and women both, but surely the real issue here is the dumbing down of the office and going on this podcast in the first place.
Senator Henderson: That’s exactly right. Not only were his comments disrespectful to women, highly embarrassing, but they demean the office of Prime Minister and Australians, Stephen, expect judgement, they expect respect and character from their Prime Minister, not this sort of crude banter, and then this half-hearted one-line apology, which is completely insufficient in my view, that doesn’t cut it, because he should also apologise to the women he dragged into his crude locker room talk, including the Japanese Prime Minister. He made some really revolting comments.
Stephen Cenatiempo: It’s funny, I want to touch on that, because I think that was far worse than the whole Kylie Minogue thing.
Senator Henderson: I’m not going to go into it, hook line and sinker, other than to say he made some very denigrating comments about the fact that she had brought, as a gift, some melons from Japan to signify changes in free trade and the like, and this is Japan’s first female Prime Minister, and he made some really crass, tawdry joke about a couple of melons, and it’s just completely unacceptable. This is our nation’s leader speaking about another head of state, one of our closest allies, and I’m sorry, but this Prime Minister needs to apologise to the Japanese Prime Minister, to the other women that he dragged into this awful crass banter that he engaged in. But what it does say, Stephen, is that look really Australians deserve a lot better than this, this is highly embarrassing, and this is a Prime Minister who does not respect the office of the Prime Minister, and the whole thing is just completely untenable.
Stephen Cenatiempo: I think there’s a broader problem here, even if he did respect the office of Prime Minister. What it tells me is, and we know this from, well the last four years, that this is a bloke who’s not across his brief, but it would appear that neither of the people in his office. Because surely somebody, if you’re in this position and you’re asked to go on a podcast, surely somebody in your office watches a few episodes first to get a feel for what it’s going to be like.
Senator Henderson: Look, I’m not reflecting on Nicky Osborne, who is a comedian, she’s very good at what she does. She absolutely skewed the Prime Minister. She had him on toast, and obviously there were some very poor judgments made by the Prime Minister’s office as well. But what about the senior Labor women? We’ve heard from them for years, lecturing others about standards and respect, but when the Prime Minister conducts himself like this, senior Labor female ministers like Katy Gallagher and Tanya Plibersek either go missing in action, explain things away, or turn a blind eye.
And as for Tanya Plibersek, brushing this off, saying millions of Australians love Kylie Minogue, I mean what a joke, grow up. This was just completely unacceptable, and for these women to show such double standards after the way they’ve conducted themselves is just, this selective outrage, this so-called outrage machine, it just shines more light on the really tawdry nature of this Labor government.
Stephen Cenatiempo: I even saw Stephen Conroy, the former Labor senator on TV last night, trying to defend their merely mouth one line apology that didn’t even refer to the incident.
Senator Henderson: That’s exactly right, and that’s why I have made it very clear that that is woefully inadequate.
Stephen Cenatiempo: Sarah, always good to talk to you. We’ll catch up in a couple of weeks.
Senator Henderson: Senator Sarah Henderson, the Shadow Minister for Communications.