Family First National Director and NSW lead Legislative Council candidate Lyle Shelton has called out Prime Minister Anthony Albanese for breathtaking hypocrisy in attacking NSW Police over the removal of Muslim protesters illegally praying — while his own Labor governments criminalise even silent prayer near abortion clinics.
"Anthony Albanese says he is 'concerned' about Muslims being moved on after unlawfully praying outside Sydney's Town Hall when the NSW government had designated Hyde Park as an appropriate place to protest Israeli President Isaac Herzog's visit," Mr Shelton said.
"Yet under laws supported and expanded by Labor governments in New South Wales, Victoria, Queensland, South Australia, the ACT and Tasmania, a Christian can be fined or arrested for simply bowing their head in silent prayer on a public footpath near an abortion clinic — not blocking traffic, not harassing anyone, just praying silently."
In NSW, so-called "safe access zone" laws make it illegal to engage in prayer or communication deemed to influence a woman within 150 metres of an abortion facility — even if it is silent and peaceful.
"Pro-life Christians are not blocking roads. They are not defying police directions. They are not causing violent skirmishes. They simply pray quietly for the most vulnerable members of our society — unborn children — and for women facing crisis pregnancies," Mr Shelton said.
"Mr Albanese, who publicly identifies as a Catholic Christian, should be defending the right of Christians to pray for society's most vulnerable — the unborn and their mothers — instead of supporting laws that criminalise them protestors, kill babies and harm mothers."
Mr Shelton said the Prime Minister's intervention against NSW Police undermined the rule of law and is further evidence of Labor's two-tier approach to protestors.
"No one is above the law. If protesters illegally refuse reasonable directions to relocate to a lawful venue such as Hyde Park, police have not just the right but the duty to enforce public order," he said.
"It is the height of hypocrisy for Mr Albanese to demand 'full explanations' when police enforce the law against one group, while remaining silent as Christians like Cathy Clubb are fined, arrested and dragged before courts for silent prayer."
Family First is calling for the repeal of abortion "buffer zone" laws that suppress freedom of religion and freedom of speech.
"In a free society, peaceful prayer that obstructs no-one should never be a crime," Mr Shelton said.
The unlawful Islamic prayers were led by Sheikh Wesam Charkawi, who was suspended from his support worker role at Granville Boys High School last year for supporting the infamous Bankstown nurses who allegedly said they would harm and even kill Jewish patients.
Mr Albanese should not be supporting an illegal prayer meeting conducted by a radical Sheikh who defends alleged violence against Jewish patients in Australian hospitals.
