Chris Bowen has accused Sussan Ley of “disgusting” conduct and politicising the Bondi antisemitic shooting, claiming the Coalition was putting partisan point-scoring over national unity after Australia’s worst terror attack.
Ley, whose Coalition has launched increasingly extraordinary political criticism blaming the government for the terror attack, defended her personal sledge on the foreign affairs minister, Penny Wong, for not having “shed a single tear” about the shooting.
Anthony Albanese accused the Coalition of seeking “political product differentiation” in their response to the attack. Bowen said the opposition leader was “not the arbiter of grief” and did not get to dictate how other people mourned.
“I thought that was a disgusting element of an increasingly partisan pile-on in the wake of a national crisis,” Labor’s energy minister told the ABC.
“Australia has in the past come together at moments like this, whether it be the Lindt cafe or Port Arthur, and oppositions have chosen not to make political points. This opposition is trying a different path.”
Ley on Tuesday said she was unashamed of her criticism of Wong. That came during a press conference on Monday in which the shadow minister Bridget McKenzie – without evidence – alleged that Labor’s recognition of a Palestinian state, and Wong’s failure to visit certain sites of Hamas’s 7 October massacre in Israel, had “brought this upon us”.
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Wong on Monday had strongly condemned antisemitism and the Bondi attack, and called on politicians “to turn the temperature down” in Australia’s national debate. Ley, raising her voice and slamming her hand on a lectern, harshly criticised Wong for not attending funerals of the shooting victims or visiting the Bondi memorial site.
“I make no apology for my passion on that occasion and my ongoing passion for Australians, for Jewish Australians and for this hideous act of terrorism,” Ley told Channel Nine’s Today on Tuesday.
“I’ve been down there. The prime minister has hardly been there. Penny Wong has not been there at all. Her calls to take the temperature down were totally inappropriate.”
Albanese visited Bondi beach the day after the attack and attended the memorial there on the one-week anniversary. On Tuesday he said: “I certainly do regret the politicisation of this issue.”
“This is a time where the nation needs to come together in unity and with that sense of purpose, this is not a time for people to look for political product differentiation for the sake of it. And I’ll continue to argue for unity,” he told a press conference.
“That is what happens at a time of national crisis and mourning. That is what national leaders do. That is what has happened in the past.”
Ley has noted in numerous media appearances on Monday and Tuesday that Albanese received “jeers” at the Bondi beach vigil. On Channel Seven’s Sunrise, she again demanded a federal royal commission, suggesting twice that the government was “hiding” by not calling one.
“Were there warnings that they didn’t heed?” she said. “We have this growing list of judges, of top silks, of Sir Peter Cosgrove this morning, of people across this country who know that this is the next important step that this government needs to take. My question is, why not? Why not, prime minister?”
Albanese noted the Coalition governments in 1996 and 2014 did not call for royal commissions after the Port Arthur massacre and Lindt cafe terror siege, standing by his decision to not request such an inquiry so far.
Labor sources have been privately furious at the Coalition’s politicising of the Bondi attack, contrasting the opposition’s abandonment of any national united bipartisan approach to how oppositions of the past have supported governments of the day through previous terror attacks, the Covid pandemic and the Port Arthur massacre. The former Liberal treasurer Josh Frydenberg, who is Jewish, last week claimed Albanese was personally responsible for the 15 deaths.
In responding to attacks that Labor had been slow to act on antisemitism, government sources noted that the Coalition had voted against Labor’s anti-doxing legislation in November 2024, and had not taken stronger action on banning Nazi symbols during its time in government.
That frustration boiled over in public on Tuesday when Bowen claimed Ley’s Coalition had prioritised partisan politics, especially in the attack on Wong.
“Sussan Ley is not the arbiter of grief or mourning, and she does not get to decide how people express that mourning and that grief … it said more about Sussan Ley than it does about Penny Wong,” he said.
“Sussan Ley, I think, needs to reflect on her behaviour yesterday. It was pretty disgusting. And I think as it shows, that she is choosing to make political points out of an issue and a personal attack on someone like Penny Wong, I think, will jar pretty badly with Australians.”
Bowen, referring to the government’s planned crackdown on hate speech, noted that senior members of the Coalition had previously argued for weakening laws in a long-running debate about section 18c of the Race Discrimination Act.
“They spent their entire time trying to water down those laws,” he said. “Now they say they should be stronger. I mean, we didn’t seek this partisan argument, but if they want to have a partisan argument, then the facts will be laid out as well.”
Wong’s office declined to respond to Ley’s claims on Monday. Albanese said he was avoiding “partisan comments” after the Bondi shooting but rubbished the Coalition’s allegations that the terror attack was influenced by Labor’s recognition of Palestine or the itinerary of Wong’s Israel trip, as McKenzie had claimed.
“This was an Isis-inspired attack … These people weren’t shy about their motivation, and it is there for people to see,” he alleged. “And I think that people should look at those facts which are there.”
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