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An Australian senator is protesting new hate speech legislation, likening lockdowns on free speech to COVID-era overreach.

People First Senator Gerard Rennick made the COVID comparison during a spot on Sky News with Rowan Dean.

Rennick slammed fear of free speech laws, comparing them to Joe Biden’s woke White House bullying Meta into censoring accounts that didn’t comply with “COVID-safe” government propaganda.

This happened, he said, to people who tried to speak out about being injured by the vaccines, and to those who warned about the dangers of those vaccines.

Debate isn’t hate, Rennick explained.

“The best way to deal with disagreement, provided you act in a respectful manner, is debate.

“The worst thing you can do is shut down counterpoints of view, because that’s the basis of democracy.

“We should live in a plural society that tolerates different worldviews, and above that, we should all be committed to the future of Australia.”

When voting against Australia’s rushed 6 February hate speech legislation, the federal senator from Queensland declared:

“Let the facts make the case!

“Labor and the Liberal National Coalition are introducing laws that prevent free speech in this country.

“I came to Canberra to serve the people, not control people, and that’s what [this law] is all about,” he continued.

Distraction

In a fresh rebuke of both major parties, Rennick described the latest hate speech legislation as a deceptive “political stunt”.

This stunt, he said, is designed to direct attention away from the gross ineptitude of the current government, and hide the opposition’s lack of sound policy alternatives.

“The major parties don’t have any real solutions to the real crisis in this country, which are cost of living, the energy crisis, and the housing crisis.”

Rather than address these problems, the government is playing the race card, he added.

“They’re dog-whistling, and playing games with race when they should be focused on solutions.”

Protesting the free speech restrictions, Rennick scolded the government for creating a new draconian gag order.

He then told them to use existing laws, not force through new ones.

“We have laws that deal with violent acts and sedition. We don’t need more laws in this country that target certain statements against a certain group on the basis of violence.”

Targeting the subjective chaos at the heart of hate speech legislation, the People First senator said,

“Here’s the thing: How do you identify a hate symbol?

“You know someone’s terrorist is another person’s freedom fighter.

“How do you identify what someone thinks about a certain particular ideology?

“Who’s right and who’s wrong?”

Senator Rennick then threw verbal broadsides at the government for wanting to criminalise dissent rather than debate the issues.

Rennick’s flat-out “hell no” to hate speech legislation was yet further evidence of his brass-balls tenacity in the defence of liberty.

Speaking with Caldron Pool, the anti-lockdown senator pointed to his maiden speech, and People First, saying he is as committed as ever to constitutional reform.

High on the list of key priorities is enshrining freedom of speech into the Australian Constitution.

Sensible Policies

People First states that the immigration rate is too high.

They will lobby to reduce immigration to less than “100k for work visas only, with conditions to encourage settlement in regional areas.”

People First says it will also lobby to prioritise trades in education.

This is over useless degrees that offer students no real return on their investment, which would end up forcing taxpayers to support Gender-Queer Critical Theory.

Additionally, People First says it wants families to take more responsibility for aged care, the disabled, and child care.

Such as, Rennick explained, using incentives to encourage grandparents to look after their grandchildren, instead of mums and dads having to rely solely on a daycare system hijacked by far-left political activism.

On education, People First said they are committed to a “competition of ideas”, and are opposed to the current collective hive mind “being set by career bureaucrats”.

This means ending the National Curriculum, thus taking the “burden away from teachers to comply with dictates from the government bureaucracy.”

As such, People First said they will hand “responsibility for curriculums back to the state and schools.”

On energy, the party wants to end Net Zero and remove Australia from the Paris Agreement.

This would coincide with “removing all funding and references to climate change.”

Other key policies include raising the tax-free threshold from $18,200 to $40,000, making superannuation voluntary, and taking a DOGE-like axe to the bureaucracy.

Responsible use of public assets, he said, isn’t just good for national security; it could help take pressure off taxation, particularly personal income tax.

People First’s defence policy is deterrence, led by sound diplomacy and smart investment in relevant military assets.

As Rennick asserted on X, People First aligns with United States President Donald Trump’s “peace driven by diplomacy, not war.”

A definite standout is People First’s policy on the issue of abortion.

When asked, Senator Rennick replied, “People First were against abortion in principle. Except where the mother’s life is in danger.”

As an alternative, he added, the party will be “looking to make adoption laws easier to give mums more options when they’re not in a position to keep the child.”

While not a definitive rundown of every policy, Rennick’s People First Party has tabled clear policies that will resonate well with Australia’s silent majority.

Most notably, Australians who were ostracised and jaded by their governments, turning “two weeks to flatten the curve” into totalitarianism.

The Libertarians have a run for their money.

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Republished with thanks to Caldron Pool.