Anthony Albanese has delivered a pointed message to voters of One Nation.
The Prime Minister was asked about One Nation senator Malcolm Roberts’ comments about COVID-19 vaccinations, published by The ABC on Saturday morning.
The Senator from Queensland claimed half of pregnant women who received the vaccine experienced a miscarriage.
There is no evidence that vaccinations increase the risk of miscarriage.
Mr Albanese on Saturday said Senator Roberts “had a history” when it came to peddling conspiracy theories.
“Senator Roberts has had a history of promoting conspiracy theories, saying things that were simply not true in many cases, saying things that are dangerous, such as being anti-vaccination,” the Prime Minister said.
“I’ve seen all sorts of conspiracy theories, including Senator Roberts describing the United States as the world’s largest terrorist organisation... our major ally.”
Mr Albanese then delivered a pointed message to those “toying” with the idea of voting for One Nation.
“Bear this in mind for people who are toying with one nation, that this is someone who’s not one of their random candidates,” he said.
“This is a guy who’s been elected and re-elected and endorsed and re-endorsed multiple times by Pauline Hanson and One Nation and his views are not worthy of the being a senator, but he’s elected.
“This is the risk that people take when they vote for people who are on the fringes of politics in this case, someone who has had a long history of supporting conspiracies.”
The comments came during his weekly fuel update.
Australia has 46 days worth of petrol, 39 days of diesel, and 34 days of jet fuel.
Mr Albanese said the the country had 6.5 billion litres of fuel in Australia in total across all fuel types.
“This is the highest total amount of fuel in Australia since we introduced our fuel stock holdings,” he said.
“We have 55 ships on the water to Australia right now and 3.2 billion litres of fuel locked in to be delivered over the next four weeks.”
The Prime Minister said it was important for Australians to continue buying fuel, as and when they need it, but not hoarding.
Prior to the fuel update, Mr Albanese responded to the special envoy’s report on Islamophobia, alongside Aftab Malik.
A reporter asked the group about One Nation leader Pauline Hanson’s comments on an April Podcast, where she said that “a lot of (Islam) is based on terrorism”.
Mr Albanese initially side-stepped the question and threw to Mr Malik, who said that “Words have consequences”.
“While One Nation continues to wage a war against one million Australian Muslims and two billion Muslims, we will respond with in kind as we will wage peace upon peace. We’re not interested in getting into these arguments,” he said, before suggesting the Prime Minister respond.
Mr Albanese said he saw that Senator Hanson had said Australia had “got it wrong” when it moved away from the White Australia policy.
“Modern Australia is made up of - with the exception of First Nations people - people who’ve come from all over the world to make Australia their home, to have a better life for themselves but importantly for their children and grandchildren, generations to come,” he said.
“And with that comes respect for who people are, the right to practice their faith in peace and security, but also loyalty to Australia.
“And that’s what I see from people right across the board who are proud to be Australian.
“We saw that recently with the wonderful Socceroos who represent the richness of Australia. They’re proud of who they are, where they’ve come from, but also proud to wear the Australian jersey and Australians were proud of them.”
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When pushed further on Senator Hanson’s comments, Mr Albanese said she had been causing trouble for decades.
“Pauline Hanson has been undermining social cohesion for 30 years,” he said.
The Prime Minister highlighted the Senator being disendorsed from the Liberal Party in the lead-up to the 1996 election and said that the party, with Angus Taylor at its helm.
“The test for Angus Taylor is will he rule out preference deals and arrangements with One Nation going forward? Will he stick with mainstream Australian politics?” he said.
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