14 August 2017 Panellists: Eric Abetz, Tasmanian Liberal Senator; Sam Dastyari, Labor Senator for New South Wales; Kim Rubenstein, Professor, ANU College of Law; Jamila Rizvi, Author, presenter and columnist; and Michael Jensen, Theologian and author.
Panellists Eric Abetz
Until September 2015 Eric Abetz was one of the Liberal Party’s most senior figures, a Cabinet Minister in the Employment portfolio and the Government’s Senate Leader. Then Malcolm Turnbull assumed the Prime Ministership from Tony Abbott, and Eric was one of the most high-profile casualties of the subsequent ministerial reshuffle. Now a back-bencher, he remains an Abbott loyalist and uses the freedom of his back-bench status to advocate for conservative policy stances.
Renowned as a highly committed warrior for the Liberal Right, a reputation he won many years ago as a student politician, he is a ceaseless critic of progressive causes.
Eric was born in Germany in 1958, the youngest of six children. The family migrated to Australia in 1961.
He has degrees in arts and law from the University of Tasmania and says his political ideology was sparked during his university days when he was told exam results would not be credited unless he joined the Australian Union of Students. He became politically active and in 1980 was the only Tasmanian to become national president of the Australian Liberal Students’ Federation.
Eric became a Senator in 1994, filling a casual vacancy, after a career as a barrister and solicitor. He served as Special Minister of State from 2001-06 during the Howard government and was then Minister for Forestry until the that government fell in 2007.
He is a strong advocate for curbs on union power, non-compulsory voting and a range of Christian conservative causes.
Sam Dastyari
NSW Labor Senator Sam Dastyari's rise through the ALP's ranks suffered a setback in 2016 when he had to resign from the Opposition front bench when it was discovered he had used foreign ALP donors to pay for a travel expense and a legal bill.
One of the Parliament's most colourful and energetic younger members, he recently published his first book, One Halal of a Story (italic).
Sam was born in a small town in Northern Iran, and with his family migrated to Australia as a young child during the Iran/Iraq war in 1988.
He joined the Labor Party following the republican referendum in 1999.
Before entering the Senate Sam developed a high public profile as NSW State Secretary of the Australian Labor Party from 2010 to 2013.
He is an outspoken advocate for multiculturalism and has a passion for social policy and economics.
Sam is married to Helen and together they are raising their two young daughters, Hannah and Eloise,
