During his appearance on Sky, Hastie also accused the government of being too “passive” in its management of the return of the cohort of Australian women and children with links to Islamic State.
“[The government’s] job is to protect Australians, and these people betrayed their country. They joined one of the most murderous terrorist organisations of this century, and now they’re coming back, and the government’s saying, ‘Oh, we’ve got nothing to do with this’,” the Liberal frontbencher said.
“Well, they do have a job, and that is to protect us and to manage the risk that these people pose, and so I think it’s important that Tony Burke, the minister for home affairs, takes a more active role. He can’t be as passive as he has been. We need to see some action, and we need to see this government taking these risks seriously.”
