KAP leader Bob Katter has defended his colleague Fraser Anning after the Queensland senator sparked outrage by calling for a return to the White Australia Policy.
Mr Anning, who replaced One Nation’s Malcolm Roberts but since joined Katter’s Australia Party, used his maiden speech in Parliament on Tuesday to call for a complete shutdown of Muslim immigration.
Read more
In a bizarre press conference on Wednesday, Mr Katter told reporters he "1000 per cent supports" Senator Anning's comments.
"It was a magnificent speech, solid gold," he said.
“90 per cent of Australia have been waiting for someone to say it and believe it.”
Senator Anning drew fire from across the political spectrum for calling for a “final solution to the immigration problem”.
File image of Federal MP Bob Katter
AAP
The phrase “final solution” is commonly associated with Nazi Germany's persecution and systematic genocide of the Jewish peoples of Europe during World War II.
Energy and environment minister Josh Frydenberg, who has Hungarian heritage, said Senator Anning should retract his comments and "go and visit a Holocaust museum".
Read more
"Like a number of colleagues in this place I have relatives who went through the Holocaust," Mr Frydenberg told reporters at Parliament House on Wednesday.
"His comment about the final solution to immigration was insensitive, was ignorant, was divisive and was hurtful."
Mr Katter said Mr Frydenberg “should be ashamed of himself, absolutely ashamed of himself, and ashamed to call himself a member of his own race” because the Coalition government had accepted thousands of migrants from the Middle East and North Africa.
