In relation to headscarves, the writer recalls Mrs Bishop’s enthusiasm in being photographed with Muslim women at a farewell function for former NSW Premier and Finance Minister John Fahey in 2001. The writer was accompanied by three female Muslim students who chose to wear hijabs to the function. One of these three women was of Anglo-Australian background and is currently a councillor on Auburn Council.
While listening to Mrs Bishop discuss the issue with Terry Lane on Radio National Mrs Bishop appeared to be influenced more by what she may have seen, heard or read from a conservative think tank than any direct knowledge of Muslim Australians living in her electorate.
Some of Australia’s most productive and wealthy Muslim citizens live in the seat of Mackellar. Most are medical professionals with substantial medical practices in the electorate. Others are prominent business people who employ hundreds of Australians of all faiths.
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These Muslim Australians will be looking to Mrs Bishop to concentrate on ensuring the passage of Mr Howard’s IR reform package. By focusing on what the daughters of these Aussie Mossies wear to school, Mrs Bishop is diverting important air time away from a fight of greater relevance to people of all faiths in her electorate.
If Mrs Bishop were to use her substantial talents and experience (in both politics and the law) to take the industrial fight to the union movement, she would be doing the small business people in her electorate a huge service.
Instead, by focusing on overturning 30 years of legislative consensus by creating an exception to religious and sex discrimination laws, Mrs Bishop is merely reinforcing the union movement’s claims that the real agenda of the Howard Government is to turn back the industrial and social clock to a time when women could be denied opportunities for purely cultural reasons.
Aussie Mossies do not lecture Mrs Bishop on what she should be allowed to wear into parliament. The writer submits that she should not be marginalising Aussie Muslim women by telling them what not to wear in schools. She should leave comments on women’s dress to crackpot imams and other fringe elements on the fringe of our society.
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About the Author
Irfan Yusuf is a New South Wales-based lawyer with a practice focusing on workplace relations and commercial dispute resolution. Irfan is also a regular media commentator on a variety of social, political, human rights, media and cultural issues. Irfan Yusuf's book, Once Were Radicals: My Years As A Teenage Islamo-Fascist, was published in May 2009 by Allen & Unwin.