‘Vein of racism’: race discrimination commissioner accuses One Nation and Coalition of scapegoating immigrants

Key points

• One Nation and the federal opposition are “dehumanising” and “scapegoating” immigrants while drawing on a “deep vein of racism”, Australia’s federal race discrimination commissioner says.
• Giridharan Sivaraman made the comments as part of a panel discussion at a Brisbane seminar on human rights, hosted by the state’s human rights commission.
• Asked what his priority issues were, Sivaraman said the country was facing “a very pronounced political fault line”.
• “On one side of that fault line you have two parties, a populist party and now the federal opposition, who are dehumanising, scapegoating migrants,” he said on Wednesday.
• Together, they encouraged people to blame migrants for everything from the housing crisis and traffic to the cost of milk, he said.