Labor is calling on the federal government to establish a parliamentary inquiry to examine the threat of right-wing extremism in Australia.
The party will seek a vote in the lower house on Tuesday pushing for the matter to be referred to the Parliamentary Joint Committee on Intelligence and Security.
Australia’s security agencies have repeatedly warned that their workload is increasingly being directed towards countering the activity of right-wing extremists.
But Australia remains the only country within the five eyes intelligence network to so far avoid listing any right-wing extremist groups as banned terrorist organisations.
Labor’s Home Affairs spokesperson Kristina Keneally said the time has come to reassess Australia’s response to handling the threat posed by far-right extremists.
“We know that right-wing extremism is on the rise in Australia and around the world,” she told SBS News.
“When we are faced with a growing and real threat – we should ask ourselves, arethe laws that we have and the tools available fit for purpose.”
The proposed inquiry would examine the nature and extent of the right-wing extremist movement in Australia, including its objectives, capacity for violence, geographic spread and links to other international groups.
The inquiry would also examine what steps the Commonwealth could take to disrupt and deter hate speech and the use of hate symbols online.
“Right-wing extremism is different, their ideologies are different – their methods are different, the way that they organise themselves is different,” Senator Keneally said.
“We need to ensure our laws and our policies fit that threat.”
The push comes after Senator Keneally and Labor’s legal affairs spokesperson Mark Dreyfus wrote to Attorney-General Christian Porter and Home Affairs Minister Peter Dutton last month requesting they consider a bipartisan referral of the inquiry to the intelligence and security committee.
Labor says they have not received a response to the letter.
Right-wing extremism on the rise
The Australian Security and Intelligence Organisation recently said up to 40 per cent of its counterterrorism caseload had become linked to right-wing extremism.
This has included warnings far-right groups have attempted to exploit the coronavirus pandemic to recruit new members and push its ideology.
Australian Federal Police Commissioner Reece Kershaw has also identified a “steady increase” in operations directed towards right-wing extremism.
Deakin University terror expert professor Greg Barton said the idea of the parliamentary inquiry was a “sensible” one.
“The Christchurch massacre was a wake-up call but since then we’ve had the COVID-19 pandemic, he told SBS News.
“This is really timely – what’s happened elsewhere in the world speaks to the need to do this.”
He said evidence also showed young people were becoming increasingly targeted by far-right extremists seeking to expand their ideology online.
“We see an increase in far-right extremism in Europe and the US and then the unique circumstances of 2020 mean we really need to stop putting this on the do-later tray and get on to paying attention now,” he said.
The United Kingdom, the United States, Canada and New Zealand have all moved to ban certain extremist right-wing groups or individuals in their jurisdictions.
New Zealand is also expected to publicly release the Royal Commission report into the Christchurch mosque shootings – committed by a shooter inspired by right-wing extremism – on Tuesday.
Mr Barton said while moving to ban groups in Australia presented a challenge because of the fractured nature of right-wing extremist cells – it should at least be considered.
“Even just talking about doing that, having a serious inquiry sends a warning to those involved in those circles that they should limit their behaviour,” he said.
“It may in itself be useful to intimidate and put on notice the fact that we are not going to tolerate this open recruitment … there is a lot more that we could be doing.”
Home Affairs Minister Peter Dutton last week warned against “silly, stupid and petty” arguments seeking to draw a distinction between the threats posed by different forms of extremists.
“I just don’t care what their ideology is what I focus on is a threat, and I’ve been clear about this in the past, and any suggestion to the contrary is a nonsense,” he told reporters.
