Media Release

KAP Leader and Federal Member for Kennedy caused an uproar in Parliament today when he questioned the Minister for Immigration about the Government’s immigration policy, which is detrimental to migrants from our homelands; following the defacing of a mosque in Mareeba.

On Friday vandals spray painted the word "Evil" across a Mareeba mosque – an act that Mr Katter described as an “intolerable act against people that are second, third and fourth generation proudly Australians”.

“The mosque has been part of our Mareeba community since the 1950’s and many of our community members are highly respected, hard-working and exemplary Australians.

“A number of organisations in the Tablelands region have been led by people of the Islamic faith from Albania.

“This attack certainly doesn’t reflect the attitude of the wider Mareeba community and targeting our places of worship is simply offensive,” said Mr Katter.

Mr Katter questioned whether the Government would continue with restrictive policies of skills and family reunion which limits our migration intake from our homelands to only 30,000 out of the 170,000 intake per year.

“We need to consider that from this intake, nearly one in 10 of these derive from countries associated with terrorism.

“With visa over stays and section 457’s visa holders we see 400,000 people coming to Australia.

“Our Australian population grows annually at 150,000 and our employment grows by only 180, 000.

“Can the Minister assure us that he’ll review these extraordinary policies that have created divisions, tensions and ugliness?” Mr Katter said.

Mr Katter was cut short and nearly thrown out for interjecting during the Minister’s response, in which the Minister defended the Government’s immigration intake record.

The Minister agreed that the defacing of the Mareeba mosque was an “abomination” but maintained that the Government’s immigration policy would remain unchanged.