Former prime minister Paul Keating has launched a scathing attack on Opposition Leader Angus Taylor, describing the Coalition’s new immigration policy as racist and accusing him of being unfit to govern.
The criticism follows the release of the opposition’s long-awaited policy, which proposes removing migrants who do not align with Australian values.
While it does not specify nationalities, Taylor said those from western, liberal democracies were more likely to align with Australian values.
“By adopting racism with its shabby appeal to differentiation and primal instincts, Angus Taylor marks himself out as a political leader unworthy of the leadership of a party that has managed Australia for the greater part of the last century and which celebrated the country’s unifying values,” Keating said in a statement.
“How dispiriting for the rest of us is Angus Taylor’s cowardice in not even attempting to stand and argue for principles that have been integral to Australia’s strength – principles his party has long championed.”
Taylor defended the policy, saying Australia’s immigration system should remain non-discriminatory but place greater emphasis on values.
“I always suspected that Paul Keating didn’t support Australian values, but now he has dropped any pretence,” Taylor said.
“To suggest it is ‘racist’ to put Australian values at the centre of our immigration policy shows just how out of touch he is with Australians, as is the Labor Party.
“This is the immigration policy we have to have. Immigration numbers are too high. Immigration standards are too low. And both must change.”
Keating also said the proposal was politically motivated, linking it to growing support for Pauline Hanson.
“The Liberal Party, battling an extreme version of itself – One Nation – has again fallen back to its default political policy: racism,” he said.
“The blight of Pauline Hanson is that her dumb bigotry offers a fantasy. The fantasy that Australia in the modern age can return to a monoculture.”
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