Rowan Dean: I’m pleased to say that we’re joined by the Shadow Communications Minister Sarah Henderson. Sarah, great to see you. Thanks so much for coming on the show this morning. Well, let’s kick off. I don’t know if you watched Rita’s expose there of one of your colleagues in the Parliament. What did you make of it?
Senator Henderson: Well, how could I miss that, Rowan? Look, I just want to start by saying, One Nation and ourselves, the coalition, are aligned on one critical mission, and that is to get rid of Labor. That is our mission because this government is driving our nation off a cliff. Australians are poorer. They are doing it tough, and of course that is also because of the Prime Minister’s shocking lies in relation to the budget. No negative gearing, no capital gains tax changes, and now look what Australians are enduring: a crushing housing market. So many people walk into the supermarket, Rowan. They can’t even buy the week’s groceries. It is just appalling what Australians are enduring under this government. That’s why we are on a mission to get rid of Labor.
Now, let me just say, in relation to Andrew Hastie and the One Nation cartoon, I do believe they should take it down. I’m exercising my free speech. That is my view. I don’t think what this cartoon has said is right. Andrew Hastie is totally correct to raise objections, as he has. Barnaby has apologised. I also think Pauline should apologise and take down the cartoon.
James Morrow: But on the question of freedom of speech, Senator, I want to talk a bit more about that, and very glad to have you here to exercise your freedom of speech while we still have it, because I’m very concerned about this digital duty of care legislation that they are trying to push through here, specifically wording in the legislation about giving the minister the right to take down what is nebulously described as harmful content. Now we have seen people like Andrew Lee bell the cat and say, “Oh well, you know, people are becoming more right-wing because of the internet at the moment. This seems like the most blatant political stitch-up, but am I wrong?
Senator Henderson: Well, James, it is. This is a serious threat to free speech. But I just want to firstly address the issues or the concerns you raised about the Liberals at the beginning of the program, because I just want to remind you that apart from the very strong stand we have taken on reversing Labor’s [toxic] taxes, driving down immigration, fixing the housing market. Just in the last couple of weeks, apart from taking a very strong stand against Labor’s digital duty of care bill, we’ve also passed an amendment to a bill which will lift the terrible cap on allied health for veterans. Michaelia Cash will bring back her sex discrimination amendment into the Senate next week. We’ve reversed the widows’ tax. We’ve announced the criminalisation of the burning of the flag and the desecration of war memorials. We are doing so much to stand up for our values under the leadership of Angus Taylor. So, I just want to remind your viewers about our hard work, and of course, we’ve made it very clear we will oppose this draconian legislation, which is a serious threat to free speech and continues Labor’s insidious agenda of controlling what we say and what we see online.
James Morrow: And Senator, I just want to play a little bit of Laura Jay’s interviewing Annika Wells, the communication minister. Have a look at this.
Laura Jayes: The duty of care legislation is so broad it could capture more than social media, though. It could capture news websites. No.
Anika Wells: well, sorry. Yes, it does. The digital duty of care. My apologies. Does go to all online services, news websites are not a function and feature of an online platform.
Laura Jayes: Yes, they are. They’re on online platforms.
Anika Wells: How are they affected?
Laura Jayes: Because if you were turning off the algorithm, that would change how news websites would be seen, would it not?
Anika Wells: Well, you as a user would be making a choice about whether you wish to follow the algorithm or whether you wish to follow your following feed.
James Morrow: This is this is the person who is supposed to be deciding harmful content. It would only be worse if she pulled out the ooshies to start explaining it.
Senator Henderson: Well, James, can I just make the point? We want to see kids safe online. The government must do much more, and I took forward to some amendments in that respect. We think that parents deserve the safety tools on the platforms like you know Apple, Google, and Microsoft offer, so that they can do more to protect their children online. We want to see algorithmic transparency, which of course is what Elon Musk has done on the For You feed on X. We haven’t seen that on other platforms.
So, more needs to be done. But this legislation is a backdoor way of reintroducing the disinformation and misinformation bill. It’s all about shutting down any online service. And it is frightening that it includes, as Laura did a great job nailing Anika Wells to the mast on this. It is frightening that it includes news websites, which of course means they have the power to shut down any commentary, any news report, any media organisation, any opinion. I mean, this is abhorrent legislation. One of the worst things I’ve ever seen in the Parliament. And as Angus Taylor and Matt Canavan and myself made very clear when we held our press conference, we are going to fight this every step of the way.
Rowan Dean: Fantastic.
Rita Panahi: But the Liberals flirt with this a bit too much for my liking. The support for the ban on under 16s, for example, the support for algorithm changes, which quite often I think are also just attempts to censor speech that the Uniparty, for the want of a better expression, don’t like. How do you manage that? How do you walk that fine line? And could you please also speak about this notion of the government funding activists who campaign on this issue, and then changing or proposing legislation that will fix an issue that they’ve manufactured essentially, and pretending like it’s some grassroots campaign when it’s been well-funded activists who’ve been pushing that barrier all along.
Senator Henderson: Well, Rita, there are various issues you’ve raised, and they’re quite separate. So, on the algorithm, of course, if you have a non-profiled algorithm, as is the law in the EU, then you can make some choices about what you want to see online. But we have reservations about this. We think there is a legitimate debate to be had about whether what sort of algorithm you have. And it’s ridiculous to say you can turn the algorithm off because even if you are following your own followers on a feed, the algorithm will decide how that content is served because an algorithm is just a set of rules which decide how content is served. Abd that’s why I moved an amendment in the Senate which was rejected by Labor and the Greens in relation to algorithmic transparency, because this also includes what’s being censored, what’s been suppressed, what’s been pushed down. And I congratulate Elon Musk for being transparent in relation to his algorithm on the For You feed.
But why aren’t we seeing this on the other platforms? So much more work needs to be done on that. Yes, on the social media ban, we supported it and the intent, but this is not working. It’s been very poorly designed and badly implemented, and as a result, children are less safe online than they were before the law changed. And so, I think much more needs to be done to keep kids, in particular, safe online. And the government has not done that hard work. It is basically in this new digital duty of care bill has included a whole range of harms like terrorism material, child sexual abuse material. They are already prohibited. They are already banned either under the criminal law or under the Online Safety Act. So, this idea that the minister can decide, oh, we’re going to ban this type of harm, or this type of harm, including they’ve even referenced in relation to children, you know, material that is hostile to women or gender equality. What does that even mean? I mean, it’s just ridiculous. It is an open door to the government doing anything they want.
And if you see what the eSafety Commissioner has done, some of the decisions that she has made, including trying to shut down the likes of Celine Baumgarten when she raised concerns about a queer club at a primary school, we need to make sure that our laws strike the right balance. And that’s why there’s a fair bit going on in my space in recent weeks. That’s why we opposed additional powers for the eSafety Commissioner because what the government has done is give the eSafety Commissioner the power to impose fines of up to 21.8 million dollars without judicial oversight. So there are big fines, but previously the eSafety commissioner had to go to court, commence court proceedings, and now she can impose these massive fines without any judicial oversight. And we think that’s wrong.
Rowan Dean: Sarah Henderson, please keep up the fight on behalf of all Australians. It was the e-safety commissioner who told us that you know free speech, or told Davos that free speech in the new age of the internet, that’ll have to be a secondary issue. It’s terrifying what you mentioned. We know that what Rita was talking about earlier-the culture wars. This is how Labor intends to win the culture wars by banning things. In my opinion, if they can go after the transgender thing, what’s to stop them saying, “Oh, climate change is a dangerous area” What’s to stop them saying, “Oh, discussion of immigration is dangerous” All of that stuff. So please, Sarah Henderson, on behalf of all Australians, please, you have to win this fight. Thanks so much for coming on the show today.