Thursday, 4 August 2022

Members statements

Australasian Union of Jewish Students

Mr SOUTHWICK (Caulfield) (09:37): We talk a lot in this house about the future and our leaders of the future, and it is my pleasure to recognise our AUJS leaders—our Australasian Union of Jewish Students leaders—here in the gallery today who are part of a political exchange program. I want to acknowledge the member for Box Hill for working with me in organising this program; we have been doing this for a number of years. I particularly want to thank Eddie Lichtig, Natalie Gunn and Noah Loven, who have been instrumental in organising this program. It is about equipping these students with the tools they need to ensure they can have a strong voice on campus.

We have taken up the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance definition at the federal level in combating antisemitism. We, the opposition, took this to the Parliament as a strong stance to combat antisemitism. The government joined us in doing that. We believe this should happen on campus too. Jewish students should have the right to define what antisemitism is. This will be one of the things we will be talking about today. Antisemitism should not and cannot be tolerated on campus.