I'm very happy to stand with the member for Bruce and all of my Labor colleagues in recognising some facts. The key fact is that we are a proudly multicultural nation. Until recent times we have also been travelling people.
Read MoreThe northern and western suburbs of Melbourne are the fastest-growing parts of Australia's fastest-growing city, but their infrastructure needs have been sadly and sorely neglected under the Abbott-Turnbull-Morrison governments.
Read MoreThis bill, the Migration Amendment (Prohibiting Items in Immigration Detention Facilities) Bill 2020, would very significantly increase powers over people held in administrative forms of detention under the Migration Act, and—I make this point very clear at the outset—all of those people in immigration detention.
Read MoreIt's so important that this parliament is deliberating right now, going about its work on behalf of all Australians, and it's particularly important that the parliament can hear the voices of the communities that make up the city that you and I both love—that I think all of us in the chamber love—Melbourne.
Read MoreI haven't been to Beirut, but the images of that beautiful city shattered earlier this month deeply affected and shook me, because Lebanon and Australia enjoy such a close and important relationship, and that is thanks to the extraordinary contribution to this nation by so many Lebanese Australians.
Read MoreIt's often said, and rightly so, that the measure of any society is how it treats its most vulnerable members. Some of the most vulnerable members of our society are older Australians, older Australians who have made a great contribution to this nation, who find themselves in their later days in aged-care facilities.
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