Liberal party members in Western Australia are hoping to force Malcolm Turnbull to recommit to repealing section 18C of the Racial Discrimination Act at the next election.
They also want his government to abolish the Human Rights Commission, deploy more troops in WA’s north, and move Australia’s embassy in Israel from its major population centre of Tel Aviv to politically-sensitive Jerusalem, put a floor on GST payments going to WA, halve foreign aid, and allow free movement of people between the UK, Australia, Canada and New Zealand.
These are some of the policy proposals that will be considered at the WA Liberal party’s state conference this weekend, emanating from the party membership.
If the proposals are adopted, they will be sent to the prime minister’s office for consideration, where he may table them for discussion in a cabinet meeting or knock them back (with an explanation).
Members will also push for state council in WA to establish a “Waxit” committee to examine the option of Western Australia seceding from the rest of the country, to become an independent state.
The push to formally recommit the Turnbull government to reforming 18C of the Racial Discrimination Act (RDA) comes five months after the Senate blocked the government’s attempt to replace the words “offend, insult or humiliate” with “harass” in the provision banning racially discriminatory speech.
In the immediate aftermath, Liberal senator James Paterson, a former deputy executive director of the Institute of Public Affairs, called for the Coalition to take the changes to the next election, and WA Liberal MP Ian Goodenough said the Turnbull government should seek a “fresh electoral mandate” for reform.
Guardian Australia understands the 18C proposal may have broad cross-party support on the weekend, with the vote to occur in the presence of Turnbull and the deputy Liberal leader, Julie Bishop.
The West Australian Young Liberals are planning to propose a motion calling on the government to abolish the minimum wage and acknowledge that it can use “other mechanisms to ensure minimum living standards in order to reduce unemployment and increase workplace participation”.
The Young Liberals also want the federal government to preserve Advance Australia Fair as Australia’s national anthem and to oppose any efforts to amend its wording.
The WA Liberal party’s policy committee will propose its own motion, calling on the federal government to ensure its support for a two state solution to the Israel-Palestine conflict be contingent on the Palestinian leadership’s “unconditional recognition of Israel as an independent sovereign state”.
Another motion will call for the government to move Australia’s embassy in Israel from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, as US president Donald Trump was considering doing.
The party’s Brand division will also propose a motion calling on the state council in WA to consider the implications of Western Australia seceding from the commonwealth.
They want WA’s state council to establish a committee “of up to six esteemed members”, comprising three former members of parliament and three members of state council, to be chaired by a member of the state executive, to examine the option of WA becoming an independent state.
They want the committee to answer the question “should we try [to secede]”, with a response to be referred to state council no later than July 2018.
In preparation for this weekend’s state conference, the policy committee of the WA Liberal party published a journal of articles.
Tony Abbott has written an essay for the journal in which he takes a veiled swipe at Malcolm Turnbull, arguing that serious policy changes will only occur in Australia when “someone who’s prepared to do them will actually get elected”.
Historian Keith Windschuttle, the editor of Quadrant Magazine, has also contributed an article to the journal, titled The Break-Up of Australia.
Windschuttle has warned the long-term agenda of Australia’s Indigenous “political class” is to form an independent Indigenous government, or governments, that will control “more than 60% of the Australian continent”.
“It means the 140,000 people now living on traditional Aboriginal lands will be the owners of 60% of the entire continent, while the remaining 24 million of us are left with less than 40%,” he has warned.
