As you've been hearing this week, many different voices in the community with questions and concerns around the proposed hate crime and gun control reforms. The Combating Antisemitism, Hate and Extremism Bill 2026 is seeking to tackle the how and the why behind last month's terror attack at Bondi Beach. The how being, in part about access to weapons, the why being hatred, antisemitism and violent extremism. Of course, both the how and the why are both now at the heart of a national royal commission into the events of December 14th. The Prime Minister, Anthony Albanese is calling for national unity and bipartisanship and a spirit of consultation, saying his phone line's open and he's happy to negotiate.
Prime Minister, lots of people are saying that this legislation is already in trouble. The Opposition Leader, Sussan Ley is calling it half-baked and pretty unsalvageable. Are you concerned you'll be recalling the Parliament early with nothing to show for it by this time next week?
ANTHONY ALBANESE, PRIME MINISTER: Well, two points there. Firstly, the first order of business will be a condolence motion for the 15 innocent people who lost their lives in this antisemitic terrorist attack. So that will be an important moment of national unity and it's important it be acknowledged.
When it comes to the legislation, the current Liberal Party are making the Peter Dutton era look pretty constructive. They called for the return of Parliament, now they're against it. They called for hate speech laws, now they're against them. They want it until they get it and then they're against it. It's all been performative. They're so obsessed with opposing everything they've started opposing themselves. And part of the dynamic here is the internal chaos that is there in the Coalition where the shadow cabinet hadn't even met as of yesterday to consider any of these matters. I'm still yet to hear any proposed changes from the Leader of the Opposition or from anyone else in the Opposition. They're all out there making their own statements and it is in stark contrast to what they were saying last year, which was each and every day in the lead up to Christmas, they were demanding that Parliament be resumed and demanding that Parliament pass these laws in December. And now they're pretending that none of that happened. I mean, Menzies talked about the forgotten people. The modern Liberals hope that you've forgotten what they said just last week.
CROWE: You said that they're opposing themselves, the Opposition. A lot of people saying that there is widespread opposition, including within your own party, about some of the, of the substance of this, of the omnibus bill. And the issue at heart for a lot of people is that the bill bundles together the how and the why that I was talking about. Why not split the bill? Because it sounds like you could get the gun reforms through right now with the support of the Greens and then perhaps extend the consultation period on the hate reform speeches. Here's Greens Senator David Shoebridge with Dom Knight on 702 Mornings earlier today.
DAVID SHOEBRIDGE, GREENS SENATOR: The balance of the legislation is deeply, deeply troubling. And the legislation starts from an inherently divisive situation where they, the Labor government, is proposing, you know, laws to protect just one religion from hate and vilification, just Judaism, leaving every other religion without protections and also failing to protect all those other vulnerable groups in our community.
CROWE: Why not give yourself a chance of some success and get those gun reforms through, split the bill and then maybe get an extension for people to keep debating the hate speech element of this?
PRIME MINISTER: Well, what David Meagher had to say at the funeral of his brother Peter I think is very relevant. He said that 'an antisemite without a gun is just a hate filled person, but an antisemite with a gun is a killer.' We do need to deal with guns. This is modest legislation, but it's important. It will stop, through changing customs law, the importation of some dangerous weapons, technology changes it needs to keep up with that. I've spoken with states and territories as well about making sure that we exclude non-citizens from being eligible to get a gun licence - that will be important as well. And it will finance, or the law will authorise, the National Gun Buyback Scheme. So that's important.
CROWE: But on the buyback, Prime Minister, you might have a fight on your hands there as well because I understand Queensland is now joining the Northern Territory and rejecting the proposed 50/50 split when it comes to who will pay. Is there any wiggle room there? Would you, if it comes down to who pays, is the Federal Government in a position to say, all right, who cares who pays, let's get it done?
PRIME MINISTER: Well, taxpayers in the Commonwealth pay if that occurs. Look, what we will do is engage constructively. I've met with David Crisafulli just yesterday about a range of issues. We'll continue to engage with states and territories, but this is a moment that calls for the sort of unity that we've seen in other national events, whether it be the issue of the Port Arthur massacre, the Bali Bombings that saw a considerable loss of Australian life. Here, of course, the siege that took place at the Lindt Cafe at Martin Place in Sydney. The country didn't play politics at that time. Labor was in opposition. Labor was constructive and lent support, for example to John Howard and Tim Fisher who deserve credit for what they did on gun law reform. Quite clearly, the fact that there are now more guns in Australia than there were at that time indicates that there is some action required and customs legislation and those reforms are common sense. Just as working through the issues of hate speech and other issues which are there. We gave lots of notice of Parliament coming back. We released the draft legislation, it's just an exposure draft, so we've said we're up for changes. For sensible proposals going forward, but they have to actually put those proposals forward.
CROWE: On that though, even the smartest woman I've ever spoken to, professor emerita in constitutional law, Anne Twomey, didn't have time to fully get across what's being proposed, as you say, in this initial draft. The deadline for submissions was yesterday. She put hers through, but she felt like maybe she would have liked more time. Why not extend the period for submissions? Why not extend a period of consultation, why not slow the whole process down? Why does this need to go through next week?
PRIME MINISTER: People were calling for the Parliament to be resumed. The front page of every paper, the Herald and the Telegraph. That is now completely changed.
CROWE: I know, but given -
PRIME MINISTER: Completely changed. It was a national event -
CROWE: I understand.
PRIME MINISTER: It was very significant. We took, we responded, I think, in a considered, orderly way. We didn't rush back before Christmas. The New South Wales Parliament has already passed its laws, but it doesn't have the same constitutional issues that we have which is why we took the time to develop the laws. Which is why we released an exposure draft. Now we'll give consideration to what the legislation is that will be introduced on Monday. We'll take on board comments that have been made. But we still wait for the Coalition that demanded that this occur. Not just Sussan Ley, but David Littleproud, James Paterson, all of their people day after day with this drumbeat about how this was absolutely urgent. And now, once we have actually done it, they are now saying somehow that it isn't urgent after all.
CROWE: I can hear your frustration on that, but it's not just political leaders and your political opposition who've got some issues and are asking for more time because there's an open letter to you today, 27 religious leaders that expressed deep concern about the bill's potential to impact religious freedom and expression. The Christian, Muslim, Sikh, Buddhist and Scientology groups, they say the laws could threaten reasonable religious discourse. They warned against calls to remove a defence from the draft laws for those citing religious texts. I understand that the Executive Council of Australian Jewry wants that left in. No Jewish groups have signed this letter. Is that not a case, I mean, that's all apart from, I understand what you're saying. And you had David Shoebridge this morning saying he felt that some of what's been going on politically has been unfair. So that aside, what about the other people calling for just a bit longer? Why would, what's the problem with waiting a couple of weeks? I understand you've recalled the Parliament, everyone's back. But the Parliament will be back again. You're back. What's the rush? Why next week?
PRIME MINISTER: We have recalled Parliament because there was requests across the board, not just from parliamentarians, but from community members as well, for us to bring forward this action. That is what we have done. We'll give consideration next week. We don't have a majority in the Senate. We rely upon either the Coalition, that said, indeed demanded that this occur, or The Greens Party. I must say that Larissa Waters has engaged constructively as the leader of the Greens, as has Allegra Spender. Many of these issues are not new as well. There has been, one of the complaints is 'why wasn't this done beforehand?' We have had, for example, the report of the Special Envoy on Antisemitism that requested anti-vilification laws to be implemented. So, it isn't like this is a completely new idea. What we have done here is to have a process, there'll be a Senate committee process as well on Monday. And so we are asking for some form of goodwill on behalf of - the Coalition in particular, the alternative party of government, needs to actually show that it's up to the task of acting like an alternative government, which is to engage constructively. Now, they haven't had any internal processes. They haven't engaged at all constructively with us. They said on the 5th of February, Sussan Ley said in meetings with me about these processes that they had proposals ready to go, 'why weren't we just bringing back Parliament back immediately?' When I said that we would have our proposals ready for release on the 12th, that is last Monday, and then that they'd be debated a week later. So if people have genuine proposals, they should put them forward, by all means, release them publicly.
CROWE: It's Friday afternoon right now. Do you think that's going to happen by next week? You've got the condolence motion on Monday. What will you do if you don't get some bipartisan support here to get this through? What do you have at your disposal to make it happen? Or is there an option to pause it and just let everyone -
PRIME MINISTER: Well, the Parliament is the master of its own destiny. And we don't have a majority in the Senate, that's just a fact. But what we do is engage constructively. We've been pretty successful at getting our legislation through the Parliament. We've engaged across the crossbenches. We engage with the Coalition when they're prepared to engage, but they seem to have retreated back into just saying no to absolutely everything and saying no to themselves. You've had a range of people, one of the problems that I think is there is whether Sussan Ley can speak for the Opposition as well.
CROWE: Well on that, I believe Andrew Hastie wants to do nothing until the Royal Commission has happened, the Federal Royal Commission, and put no legislation in until after that. So, there are a range of views across the political divide. Prime Minister, I'll let you go, but before I do, a day of mourning, a National Day of Mourning next Thursday. Will there be some specific events around this day or will it be a thing where communities are working out their own way to mark a day of mourning?
PRIME MINISTER: Well, communities will mark the day of mourning with respect, in their own way. And I know that a range of organisations right across the country are certainly doing that. Not just the Jewish community, but others as well. We're engaging with the leaders of the Jewish community about what they want to see people do. There will be one significant, substantial event held as well, which people have been invited to. That will be attended by, particularly by the families of those who lost their lives in this tragic event and also those people who are injured, and the community leaders as well - that will be held in Sydney next Thursday.
But also we'll be putting in place the protocols, such as every flag around Commonwealth facilities and state and territories have agreed to do that as well, will be flown at half-mast. And it will be an opportunity for people to really think through and remember the significance of such a tragic loss of life from this terrorist attack, which, of course is the worst terrorist attack on Australian soil and something that targeted the Jewish community, which has caused such grief and suffering.
CROWE: Prime Minister, thank you for your time today.
PRIME MINISTER: Thanks very much.
