I remember Pauline Hanson's words on being elected. She claimed that she would represent white people. That sounded very racist.

Andrew Jakubowicz favourite word is "racism". And why not? He probably makes a tidy living promoting it and for this reason must talk it up.

Australia is a tolerant country. This is well demonstrated over many decades of immigration. Newcomers may well be eyed with some suspicion and even resentment by sections of the community. This may well be exacerbated by aspects of the mode of arrival or how they present. So what? Is that much different to the 'aussie' family who move to a new town or the kid who changes school? NO! If the newcomers show RESPECT for the status quo and a desire to fit into their surroundings, generally acceptance is swiftly forthcoming.

As far as I am concerned, and seemingly the MAJORITY of Australians, immigrants who wish to integrate, contribute and flourish are welcome. Users, abusers and separatists are NOT. Last time I checked we were still a democracy and freedom of speech was a right. If the TRUTH can't be spoken least it offend - God help us all!

Dear runner,

The chaplains are not consciously wicked. I'm sure they think they are doing good, and they do some good. However, they simply have no business in the public schools which are for all children regardless of religion or lack of it. School children should not be subjected to superstition.

A wise man said:

Good people do good things. Bad people do bad things. For good people to do bad things it takes religion.

david f

'Good people do good things. Bad people do bad things. For good people to do bad things it takes religion. '

your philosophy is flawed as good and bad can not be defined by a moral relativist.

davidf, I think you would be very hard-pressed to find evidence for your claim that Hanson said she would represent white people. She consistently said that she wasn't racist because she wasn't opposed to Asian immigration but just the rate of it. Personally, I felt that she was racist because she was singling out Asians for discrimatory treatment in an immigration policy that was otherwise non-racist.

It is a tribute to how far Australians have moved away from racism that views even more extreme and blatant than Pauline Hanson's were bi-partisan policy up until the mid-1960s. The major parliamentary parties were all committed to 'White Australia' and the voters kept voting for them. The shift has been gigantic. At its height, Hanson's party was but a marginal party that received only ten percent of the vote.

A cursory glance of the document released to Andrew under FOI suggests to me that the reason for withholding it may have been due to methodological problems rendering it unreliable (to put it politely), but I'll try to make time to elaborate on that later on.

We Australians are not the racist ones, it's those who come to our country, knowing full well who we are and the laws we have in place, yet when they arrive, they want to either change our laws, and or, have us follow their customs.

They should all be told before the arrive, This is Australian mate!