E&OE TRANSCRIPT
RADIO INTERVIEW
2CC WITH STEPHEN CENATIEMPO
Topics: Australia Day; International Holocaust Remembrance Day; Middle East Conflict
28 JANUARY 2025
Stephen Cenatiempo, Host: Time to talk federal politics with the member for Fenner, the Assistant Minister for Competition, Charities and Treasury, Andrew Leigh. Andrew, good morning, Stephen.
Andrew Leigh: Great to be with you.
Cenatiempo: Is this the first?
Leigh: No.
Cenatiempo: We've spoken this year already, haven't we?
Leigh: We have indeed, yeah.
Cenatiempo: Okay, well, hoping. Yeah.
Leigh: I love summer so much. I don't mind saying Happy New Year a few times.
Cenatiempo: No problem. Let's talk about Australia Day first. The Australia Day long weekend. What did you get up to?
Leigh: So, I was out and about in the community, including an event with the Muslim community and an event with the Jewish community. It really speaks to Canberra's multiculturalism that both of those communities had events. The one yesterday in particular, International Holocaust Remembrance Day, was part of the announcement of a National Holocaust Remembrance Centre, which will be located in Forrest, near the heart of the parliamentary triangle. That's really important because on the 80th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz, we need to remember the horrors of the Holocaust and keep on reminding successive generations. We can't take it for granted that young Australians will know the stories of what was done in World War II. Reeducating each generation is an important legacy that we hand on to those who follow.
Cenatiempo: Look, I am well and truly supportive of the establishment of a Holocaust Education Centre, but I often think these things are a bit tokenistic and we should be talking more about school curriculum and teaching kids at a more fundamental level about the horrors of the Second World War and what happened.
Leigh: Yeah, I think the school curriculum is important, but those Holocaust Remembrance Centres can be extraordinarily powerful. I've been to the one in Israel and the one in Washington D.C. in the United States, and nothing really prepares you for the shock of seeing the artefacts there, seeing the stories, getting a sense of the sheer scale of the Holocaust. Six million is a number it's hard to wrap your head around. And so the power of those centres really is in instilling in people a sense of how the Nazi party rose to power, the steady erosion of democracy, the horrors that were perpetrated. And then also those Holocaust remembrance museums often will finish off with references to other genocides, such as the Rwandan genocide. A reminder that we need to be eternally vigilant against these horrors rearing their ugly head.
Cenatiempo: That's why I think we need to be very careful about how we throw the word genocide around. I mean, the fact that it's thrown around with regards to what's happening in the Middle East at the moment, I think, diminishes real genocide, which is what we actually saw. During the Second World War and some of those other incidences you're talking about.
Leigh: Well, you've had 40,000 people killed in Gaza, including many children, which is why Australia, and 150 other countries have consistently called for a ceasefire. I'm really pleased to see that ceasefire in effect and each hostage that's released is, of course, a blessing to those families. So, we need to be condemning the killings wherever they occur, and also here in Australia, condemning Islamophobia and antisemitism. I know both of those communities are feeling very much under pressure right now, which is why the government is doing so much through envoys, through investments in protecting religious.
Cenatiempo: Well, Andrew, let's be honest here. I mean, the Prime Minister hand picked an envoy on antisemitism who, you know, was screaming for a National Cabinet meeting, and it wasn't until there was another firebombing attack that the Prime Minister acquiesced. I mean, when Gillian Siegel came out and said, we need to have a National Cabinet to discuss a national approach, the Prime Minister said no.
Leigh: Well, that National Cabinet has taken place. It's set up a national database to track antisemitic crime and other antisemitic incidents.
Cenatiempo: Yeah, but only after the government was embarrassed into calling it.
Leigh: Well, the government has consistently worked with states and territories on this. Stephen, I'm not sure what point you're making. The National Cabinet took place.
Cenatiempo: The point I'm making, there's been a lack of leadership for 15 months is the point I'm making.
Leigh: We've done more on antisemitism than any Australian government in the past. The work that we've done in investing in places of faith; in setting up this national Holocaust Education Centre and setting up the envoy, these are actions which former governments did not take, and which are unprecedented and reflect our deep concern about the antisemitic attacks taking place in our community. Now, I spoke to members of the Jewish community yesterday...
Cenatiempo: Well, they didn't tell you that.
Leigh: They expressed to me that regardless of where you stand on the Middle east dispute, and it's certainly a complex one, there is absolutely no place for antisemitism in Australia and that the work that we do here is fundamental to social cohesion. It's incumbent on all politicians not to be fanning the flames of hate, but to be ensuring that we're reinforcing the values of our secular, multicultural democracy.
Cenatiempo: Andrew, good to speak to you. We'll catch up again in a couple of weeks.
Leigh: Likewise. Thanks, Stephen.
Cenatiempo: Andrew Leigh, the Assistant Minister for Competition.
Ends