‘Don’t need more brothel madams’: Bernardi slams Mali’s migration speech
Exclusive:The leader of One Nation in SA says the Premier’s priorities on migration need fixing – and responds to questions over employing overseas workers at his own Coffin Bay business.
South Australian One Nation leader Cory Bernardi says Premier Peter Malinauskas is pushing an “anti-Australian agenda” in the SA leader’s high-profile speech in Sydney earlier this week.
Bernardi – an outspoken figure in SA politics who recently had his Facebook account banned after a series of social media videos in which he labelled young protestors “losers” and “incels” – claimed the Premier’s priorities needed to be refocused on state debt.
Speaking to InDaily from Melbourne, where he is attending the first-ever NFL game played in Australia, Bernardi said the Premier “needs to address his insistence on copying Victoria’s crippling mountain of debt and the bloated public service”.
“He must be the only bloke in Australia who thinks Australia’s skilled migration program doesn’t need reform,” Bernardi said.
“We don’t need more brothel madams and dog walkers, which count under Labor’s skilled migrants.
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“Peter Malinauskas is now trading his personal popularity to push an anti-Australian agenda.”
Asked how restricting immigration would affect Bernardi’s own business that employs overseas workers on Eyre Peninsula – Oyster HQ at Coffin Bay – Bernardi said: “We employ anyone willing to work”.
“I wish more Aussies would make themselves available,” he said.
Asked about Bernardi’s comments, a state government spokesperson said: “Only last month S&P Global reaffirmed South Australia’s AA+ credit rating, the second highest in the nation, citing the state’s ‘solid financial management’.”
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Bernardi’s comments follow the Premier’s headline-grabbing speech at the Sydney Institute’s annual lecture on Wednesday night.
He used the opportunity to demand the nation’s “strong migration program” be preserved, and blasted political opponents, saying there was a “political race to the bottom” to slash migration to appease One Nation.
“This is not unfortunate – this is madness,” the Premier said, adding that South Australia in particular needed more skilled migrants to work on nation-building projects like the nuclear-submarine project and to help build more houses. He also pointed to overseas students being charged to attend Australian universities and this helped fund important research.
He also took aim at opponents on the left, labelling them “self-righteous” and “sanctimonious”.
“The intense self-righteousness, sanctimony, and piety that underpinned the “great awokening” may have tilled the soil for the inevitable countercultural movement on the far right,” he said.
“Now of course, those counter-cultural anti-woke warriors have become no less belligerent or self-defeating as those of the far-left.
“All the culture war crusaders miss the challenge entirely, and in time, I’m convinced most Australians will wish they’d just give it a rest.”
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