“Re: Posie Parker,” letter to Andrew Giles MP, Minister for Immigration, 19 March 2023

From: Isabelle Moreton
To: Andrew Giles MP, Australian Minister for Immigration

[This is a public copy of an enquiry sent to Minister Giles through the contact form on his departmental website. I have copied it to his parliamentary office to increase the chance that he receives it.]

Dear Minister,

You will no doubt be aware that Kellie-Jay Keen-Minshull, professionally known as Posie Parker, an anti-transgender activist from the United Kingdom, was recently permitted by your department to enter this country in order to conduct her Let Women Speak tour, a series of public speeches vilifying transgender people.

You may also be aware that at her appearance yesterday 18 March in Melbourne, Victoria, Ms Keen-Minshull’s rally attracted support from members of the National Socialist Network, who unfurled a banner referring to transgender people as “PAEDO FREAKS” and engaged in violence against trans community advocates and allies who were counter-protesting (see Attachment 1, News Corp Australia). Anti-trans activists have since stated full alignment with their literal-actual-self-identified-Nazi co-belligerents on the matter of trans people’s existence, with one widely-quoted anti-trans protester writing that “Nazis and women want to get rid of paedo filth. Why don’t you?” (see Attachment 2, Angela Jones).

There is recent precedent for this. Ms Keen-Minshull’s rallies have historically been attended by fascist violence (see Attachment 3, Tacoma News Tribune). At a recent rally in the United Kingdom, a speaker engaged by Ms Keen-Minshull quoted Adolf Hitler’s Mein Kampf in a positive light, invoking Hitler’s antisemitic conspiracy theory of the “big lie” to refer to the fact that trans women are women (see Attachment 4, Pink News). In January 2021, Ms Keen-Minshull herself publicly called for men with guns to be stationed in women’s toilets to use force, if necessary, to keep trans women out (see Attachment 5, Pink News). Vilification of transgender people and promotion of fascist violence are consistent features of Ms Keen-Minshull’s events; functionally speaking, they are the whole purpose of her sordid career.

It was obvious that this would happen, and there can be no serious dispute that even before 18 March it was evident that Ms Keen-Minshull did not pass the Migration Act 1958 (Cth) character test, with particular regard to at least s 501(6)(b), s 501(6)(c)(ii), s 501(6)(d)(iii), s 501(6)(d)(iv), and s 501(6)(d)(v).

Trans community advocates and allies, including your colleague the Member for Brisbane, petitioned you prior to Ms Keen-Minshull’s arrival to prevent this from happening by cancelling her visa (see Attachment 6, Star Observer), which — given her obvious and blatant inability to satisfy the character test — the Act s 501(2) and 501(3) gave you the ministerial discretion to do. You did nothing. To the best of my ability to determine, you did not acknowledge that you were contacted at all.

  1. Why did you not act?
  2. In 2018 and 2019, during the previous Government, one of your Liberal predecessors as immigration minister, Mr David Coleman, cancelled the visas of Proud Boys founder Gavin McInnes and Holocaust denier David Icke (see Attachments 7, ABC News, and 8, ABC News). How ought Australians to understand the fact that despite your co-chairmanship of the Parliamentary Friends of Amnesty International and your previous tenure as convenor of the Labor Left, in practice your ministerial discretion is evidently somewhere to the right of the man who was Scott Morrison’s choice for your job?
  3. The purpose of a system is what it does. You and your Department are both components of the system. So far the system has been characterised by you needing to “carefully consider the complex and specific circumstances” of letting in the Nadesalingam family while Tharunicaa’s teeth were rotting out of her head, while rolling out the red carpet for Posie Parker. Do you think that the purpose this suggests for your Department is one with which Australians sympathise? Do you think we ought to?

I expect you to respond at your earliest convenience.

Yours,
Isabelle Moreton

Attachments

[I sent these as PDFs. However, they are all online resources so I am linking them here.]

  1. Anderson, A. (2023, March 18). Shocking Nazi salutes during clashing demonstrations over anti-trans speaker Posie Parker. news.com.au. Retrieved 19 March 2023.
  2. Jones, A. [@angijones] (2023, March 18). Nazis and women want to get rid of paedo filth. Why don’t you? [Tweet]. Twitter (via Archive Today). Retrieved 19 March 2023.
  3. Sailor, C. (2022, October 28). Pepper spray, shouting as people clash at anti-transgender rally in Tacoma on Wednesday. The News Tribune. Retrieved 19 March 2023.
  4. Perry, S. (2023, January 16). Gender critical activist quotes Adolf Hitler in speech against trans rights at Posie Parker rally. Pink News. Retrieved 19 March 2023.
  5. Milton, S. (2021, January 30). ‘Gender critical feminist’ Posie Parker wants men with guns to start using women’s toilets. Pink News. Retrieved 19 March 2023.
  6. Thomas, S. (2023, January 20). Gay Brisbane MP asks Australian Government to cancel British anti-trans activist’s visa. Star Observer. Retrieved 19 March 2023.
  7. Doran, M. (2018, November 30). Proud Boys founder Gavin McInnes denied visa to tour Australia with ‘The Deplorables’. ABC News. Retrieved 19 March 2023.
  8. Doran, M. (2019, February 20). Conspiracy theorist David Icke banned from entering Australia ahead of speaking tour. ABC News. Retrieved 19 March 2023.

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