{"id":54640,"date":"2026-07-20T21:54:17","date_gmt":"2026-07-20T21:54:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/54640\/"},"modified":"2026-07-20T21:54:17","modified_gmt":"2026-07-20T21:54:17","slug":"myopic-former-afp-detective-questions-prime-minister-anthony-albaneses-response-to-islamophobia-report","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/54640\/","title":{"rendered":"‘Myopic’: Former AFP detective questions Prime Minister Anthony Albanese’s response to Islamophobia report"},"content":{"rendered":"

A former Australian Federal Police detective superintendent has questioned provisions in the government’s response to the Islamophobia Envoy’s landmark report.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

Anthony Albanese on the weekend said his government would accept 35 of Envoy Aftab Malik’s 54 recommendations while others remained under further review.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

Under broader categories the government will direct $41.9 million to improve Islamic faith locations, and further funding for\u00a0organisations\u00a0helping communities affected by hate.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

Further multicultural grants will look to support sports and cross-cultural events, alongside improved Islamophobia reporting systems with responses and community supports to be “improved”.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

But former AFP detective superintendent David Craig said the announcement left much to be desired.\u00a0<\/p>\n

He took aim at further “training” for AFP officers and parliamentarians, disputing the need.\u00a0<\/p>\n

“Having been in the AFP for a substantial period of time, there is already a lot of cross-cultural training done,” he told Sky News host Peta Credlin on Monday.<\/p>\n

“The last thing the AFP needs now, the last thing the Australian community needs now, is pulling more frontline officers off to tick some box for some additional\u00a0training which they’ve had in depth anyway.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

“Where are the AFP showing that they’re Islamophobic?”\u00a0<\/p>\n

He said he was disappointed with the report and ensuing\u00a0response\u00a0at large.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

“I thought that [Mr] Malik was going to put together a fairly astute report and not just a pro-Muslim report. I mean, I’m very disappointed. He could have done a lot better,” he said.<\/p>\n

“I\u00a0mean $15 million for a Muslim community\u00a0centre. Now\u00a0what’s\u00a0a\u00a0Muslim sports\u00a0centre, I mean? How is that going to help\u00a0Islamophobia? Every other religion or atheist that goes past the $15 million Muslim-only sports\u00a0centre, how is that helping social cohesion?”\u00a0<\/p>\n

He questioned lifting faith-based security funding from $25 million by $42 million, saying the majority of religious attacks were happening elsewhere.<\/p>\n

“They’re happening in synagogues. They’re in churches more often than they’re happening in mosques,” he said.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

“They’re also asking to rewrite the school curriculum and to educate people about Islamophobia, et cetera. But that’s only for the state-based schools … that doesn’t apply to Islamic schools. They’re not meant to be taught about social cohesion. It’s only all the other schools.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

“I think\u00a0it’s\u00a0very one-eyed,\u00a0it’s\u00a0myopic, and it\u00a0won’t\u00a0help.”\u00a0<\/p>\n

Mr\u00a0Albanese’s response came\u00a0ten months\u00a0after\u00a0the report\u00a0was\u00a0first\u00a0handed to\u00a0government.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

The government specified the accepted recommendations fell under four themes: Education and awareness, protection and support, building social cohesion, and accountability and responsibility.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

Notably absent, however, was support for a more controversial suggestion which targeted terrorism legislation.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

Mr\u00a0Malik submitted to the Royal Commission into Antisemitism and Social Cohesion last month a condensed list of 17 recommendations.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

One such recommendation was to water down “ideological labels” and definitions of “terrorist act” in Australia’s criminal code.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Mr\u00a0Malik wished to “reduce a reliance on ideological, political or religious motivation as a central criterion to the\u00a0offence”.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

Mr\u00a0Albanese explained his government decided to rebuff the suggestion as terror laws\u00a0operated\u00a0“on the basis of appropriate advice from national security agencies”.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

“But primarily, we sit in the National Security Committee of the government, and we take advice from our security agencies. I have confidence in them,” he said on the weekend.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Home Affairs Minister Tony Burke last week rejected the idea on the grounds Australia’s terror definitions “tended” to be internationally agreed upon by security partners.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

Mr\u00a0Craig labelled the suggestion “naive and blatantly stupid”.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

“I mean it is a naive and blatantly stupid idea. I’ve never seen something that would be so defeating of the good efforts that have been put in to fight crime in every respect, not just terrorism, but terrorism and extremism in all its forms, ideology is a basis for it,\u201d he told Sky News last week.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cTo discount that means you lose the ability to measure it. React to it, put social services around it, intervene when you need to.”<\/p>\n

Last week, Mr Malik’s\u00a0office clarified the submission<\/a>\u00a0was not advising police “ignore ideology”.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The office contended:\u00a0\u201cModern\u00a0radicalisation\u00a0is shaped by multiple,\u00a0overlapping factors, not one simple cause. Modern terrorism does not fit neatly into three boxes. Politics. Religion.\u00a0Ideology”.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The\u00a017 suggested outcomes<\/a>\u00a0called for debate about the role of religious motivations in the nation\u2019s terrorism definitions, and the need for a federal anti-racism framework.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

Mr\u00a0Malik\u2019s second recommendation of 17 was the government \u201camend the definition of \u2018terrorist act\u2019 in section 100.1 of the Criminal Code 1995 to reduce a reliance on the ideological,\u00a0political\u00a0or religious motivation as a central criterion to the offence\u201d.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

Another recommendation argued\u00a0cabinet\u00a0should embrace an \u201cideology-agnostic framework in relation to extremism in both legislation and policy”.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

It would classify extremism by \u201creference to its capacity to\u00a0mobilise\u00a0harm, incite violence and erode social cohesion\u201d,\u00a0not by its “ideological label”.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

“The recommendation made by the Independent National Security Legislation Monitor in its current Defining Terrorism review, to the extent the Monitor recommends\u00a0modernisation\u00a0along these lines, should be prescribed in legislation,” it continued.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

The submission additionally pushed for \u201ca cabinet protocol that seeks to reduce the\u00a0politicisation\u00a0of operational decisions and create consistency in responses to incidents\u201d.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A former Australian Federal Police detective superintendent has questioned provisions in the government’s response to the Islamophobia 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