Remember this?
We were all collectively horrified. And all sides of politics had the good sense, and the decency, to say so.
But time heals all wounds…
The Australian Federal Police have been working for two months to identify 30 people who were killed when their boat smashed into rocks off Christmas Island on December 15 last year. On Saturday the WA coroner released 17 bodies for repatriation, after they were successfully identified by the Australian Federal Police. Today the first round of funerals will take place in Sydney. Five of the victims’ bodies have been sent overseas for burial.
Thirteen unidentified bodies remain in the care of the WA Coroner.
Opposition immigration spokesperson Scott Morrison had time to formulate this talking point:
“The minister has made a decision to incur quite a significant cost here, and we need to know how much…
…if people wanted to attend the funeral service from Sydney, for example, who may have been relatives of those who wanted these funeral services, well, they could have held the service on Christmas Island and like any other Australian who would have wanted to go to the funeral of someone close to them, they would have paid for themselves to get on a plane and go there.”
Lay off it, Scott.
Utterly repugnant stuff from Scott Morrison.
Combined with the appalling trash of ACT senator Gary Humphries tabling a submission to parliament to ban all Muslim immigration for ten years.
I’m beginning to wonder if this “race to the bottom” isn’t a sign of a deeper inner conflict in the Liberal party.
Clearly, they need a new generation of sewer rats to replace the ageing Kevin Andrews and Phillip Ruddock.
Contemptible a**holes. 🙁
Hopefully Mr Morrison and his leaders get suitably hauled over the coals for this base response. I dont care what you’re politics are, I expect Australia to stand for something a bit more edifying than this.
Maybe we could have used the money Mr Joyce managed to waste by driving his govt car into a flooded roadway. His excuse – there wasn’t a flood depth sign on his side of the crossing. I would have thought that might be enough reason to think twice but apparently not……
Dear editor: No, give Scotty plenty of rope. And publicise Gary Humphries submission, maybe we can vote him out next time.
This makes me so sad – what kind of a world are we living in that anyone would find something like this comment acceptable? Whatever happened to basic human dignity and compassion? We live in such a lucky community (for most part) that surely we can afford to bear the cost of providing these poor souls some dignity in death.
Disgusted doesn’t even begin to describe my attitude towards Mr Morrison
Presumably Mr Morrison will also be calling for Australians given free travel as part of an emergency consular response to be required to pay for the service, just as individual ordinary Australians do when the media is not all over the issue.
Where are Petro Georgiou and the Judiths (Troeth and Moylan) when you need them?