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September 14, 2026
SENATOR JAMES PATERSON
SHADOW MINISTER FOR DEFENCE
SENATOR FOR VICTORIA
TRANSCRIPT
INTERVIEW
NEWS24 SHARRI WITH SHARRI MARKSON
Monday, 14 September 2026
Topics: Pauline Hanson’s smears on Indigenous Australians, Anthony Albanese's mum and Andrew Hastie, immigration policy, Chinese-linked firm on ADF security panel,
E&OE…………………………………………………………………………………………
SHARRI MARKSON: Well now let's bring in Shadow Defence Minister James Paterson, live in Canberra. James, I'm going to get to some areas in your portfolio in a moment, but I want to start with your view on the comments that Pauline Hanson made about Anthony Albanese's mother.
SENATOR JAMES PATERSON: Sharri, I've been highly, highly critical of the Prime Minister. Not just his policies, not just his conduct in office, but often including on his character and on this programme many times. But there's a line. And families have traditionally, for good reasons, been outside that line. It is completely unnecessary and inappropriate to target someone's deceased mother as part of a political attack on them. Lord knows we've got enough material to hold Anthony Albanese to account for his failings, to argue the case for why he shouldn't continue to govern this country after the next election without resorting to defamation of the dead.
MARKSON: I just want to get your thoughts on her remarks that emerged today, that Indigenous Australians are "primitive" and that all they've ever done are some paintings.
PATERSON: It's just extraordinary, Sharri, to hear an elected political leader speak like this about their fellow Australians. There are genuine issues in Indigenous communities, particularly remote Indigenous communities. And my colleague, Senator Jacinta Nampijinpa-Price, has spoken courageously about how some cultural practises contribute to those problems and has been vilified for many years for her courage of speaking out about that. But culture and race are very different things. You can be critical of cultural practises without saying there's something deficient about someone's race. And as is often the case with Senator Hanson, she takes a genuine issue and then goes far too far with it and obscures the genuine problems in a way that makes it harder, not easier for them to solve. So, I really think she should reflect on that and apologise. And I also wonder whether Barnaby Joyce and David Farley and other One Nation colleagues are willing to defend this. I mean, Barnaby is often sent out to do the clean-up job after Pauline Hanson, when she makes comments like this, when she goes too far, I really wonder whether even he could front up tomorrow and find an excuse for this.
MARKSON: She also refuses to take down the cartoon accusing Hastie of a traitor. She says his skin is too thin. That he's making a mountain out of a molehill. Your view?
PATERSON: Well, I think it is revealing that in this instance, Barnaby Joyce could not defend that. He doesn't agree that it was appropriate to call Andrew Hastie a traitor in that video. And I want to make clear, I think disingenuously, some people have said that the argument from Andrew Hastie and colleagues, including me, is that you can never criticise him because he's a veteran. That's not the argument at all. In fact, he's a serving politician. You can criticise him for anything you like and on any grounds. But please do not question the loyalty of a decorated former soldier to his country, someone who signed up after 9/11, after he saw the Twin Towers fall, to the army to fight Islamist terror. Who's not only a veteran but a combat veteran who had to say goodbye to his wife multiple times, not knowing whether he would ever return. Say whatever you like about Andrew Hastie, but don't smear him and every other veteran as a traitor to their country.
MARKSON: Just a quick follow up to that. I mean, Hastie is considered future leadership material, as are you, James. Are you worried that One Nation is targeting him specifically in Canning?
PATERSON: Well, I find it very difficult to understand. Pauline Hanson says her number one objective is to get rid of Anthony Albanese and the Labor Party, to remove them from government. How does targeting Andrew Hastie help achieve that goal? There's a lot of Labor seats, 90-odd, in fact, around the country, that Pauline Hanson could spend her time and energy on. Could spend the money that they've fundraised from donors on the promise that they want to fire the liar, Anthony Albanese. Why do they spend so much time trying to get rid of Andrew Hastie? That doesn't take us one step closer towards our objective of getting rid of a very bad government.
MARKSON: Just quickly on their migration policy details revealed in the Daily Telegraph today, they're planning to ban migrants from 26 countries. This includes, one of those countries is Ukraine. What do you think about blanket bans instead of more specifically analysing each individual and making sure that they do abide by Australian values?
PATERSON: Under Labor, it's very clear that the numbers have been too high and the standards have been too low, as Angus Taylor says, and we need to urgently toughen up on both fronts. We need to bring those numbers down and we need to increase standards. But we need do so in a way that's actually going to enhance Australia's national security, make us a safer country and is consistent with our values. We need do it in a smart and targeted way by looking at the values of the individual migrants. Instead of this really amateur hour suggestion from One Nation. I mean, there have been times where Israel has had a do-not-travel advice from DFAT. Are we saying that we wouldn't want Israelis to come to Australia? I mean, the United States at times, New Zealand at times depending on the circumstances, and Ukraine, as you say, are do not travel. And there are countries that wouldn't be on that list of 26 that should be banned that nonetheless may have people that are problematic. I mean, we've talked for years about the problem of Islamist extremism in fellow Western democracies like the United Kingdom. I want to make sure that we go after the character of people and their values, not the country of origin, which is just a really crude tool for addressing this problem.
MARKSON: Just finally, James, the Albanese government has appointed to a security advisory group a company which previously sold Chinese developed anti-drone tech. What are the risks here?
PATERSON: This is a really important story by Stephen Rice in The Australian that identifies that a company that has been on this panel but also contracted to deliver counter drone capability to defend our bases from drone incursions may have Chinese origins in the source of their technology. Now, it's a problem for a range of reasons, but the most obvious one is that incursions onto those bases are often by Chinese drones. And in the future, one of our potential adversaries who might try to defeat that counter-drone technology is the People's Liberation Army and the People’s Republic of China. We don't want them to have an insight into the defensive drone technology we're putting on our bases. So, we need much better answers from the Department of Defence about why they chose this company and what due diligence they did to make sure that it actually can protect our bases, and why it was preferable to the Australian drone defence industry companies, of which there are many.
MARKSON: Yeah, important questions. And no doubt you'll be taking the government up on those. James Paterson, thank you so much.
ENDS