Oz lawmaker lands Liberal Party in another race row
April 6th, 2011 - 6:09 pm ICT by ANI
Melbourne, Apr. 6 (ANI): Conservative Australian lawmaker Bernie Finn has landed his Liberal Party into another race row with comments about the Muslim community.
Finn wrote on the social media site Facebook that he failed to understand “how concerns about a religion that seems to sanction decapitation can be construed as racism”.
In a rowdy question time, Labor attacked Finn’s comments as racist “dog whistle” politics.
But Finn defended the comments as having nothing to do with racism.
“No religion is specific to a skin tone or colour. Some people need to get a hobby as they have too much time on their hands if they were concerned with those comments,” he said.
According to the Herald Sun, Premier Ted Baillieu refused to condemn the Liberal MPs who denounced Islam on Facebook.
The Facebook comments followed a Herald Sun story earlier this week reporting that many Muslims live in ghettoes because of racist fears.
Baillieu yesterday told Parliament that multiculturalism is vital for Victoria but refused to respond to his Upper House colleague’s comments as he had not seen or heard them.
Speaker Ken Smith refused to allow Labor to table a copy of the Facebook comments. (ANI)
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