Aha....ABC giving some background:
"Race riots erupt in Cronulla over the weekend
AM - Monday, 12 December , 2005 08:00:00
Reporter: Hamish Fitzsimmons
TONY EASTLEY: The racial violence that erupted at Cronulla in Sydney's south at the weekend continued overnight, with police cars attacked in one suburb and dozens of private vehicles smashed in another.
At Woolaware, near Cronulla, a man was stabbed by a gang of youths. He's in hospital in a serious condition.
What have been simmering, but relatively minor racial problems at one of Sydney's beaches blew out of control yesterday at Cronulla.
Large numbers of mainly young people had gathered to, in their words, reclaim Cronulla beach from gangs of youths, mainly of Lebanese descent.
There were dozens of arrests as police tried to maintain control of an increasingly drunken mob.
Anyone of Middle Eastern appearance became a potential target. Several people were set upon and bashed.
Hamish Fitzsimmons was there for AM.
And a warning: there is some strong language in his report.
VOX POP 1: We come here, we just get run over by Lebanese and wogs and ****. It's not cool. They come here, they disrespect the women, they disrespect the beach. They just, they just leave a lot of hate here. They come here and they use the beach, there'll be no problem.
HAMISH FITZSIMMONS: It was almost inevitable that there was going to be trouble at Cronulla.
After last weekend's bashing of two lifeguards, allegedly by men of Lebanese descent, word of mouth and text messages made the call for a day of bashing Lebs or 'wogs', as the messages said.
On a sunny Sunday, thousands flocked to the beach in Sydney's southern suburbs, drinking heavily and looking for a fight.
VOX POP 2: Anyone can come down here, and we let everyone come down here. But once they sound like idiots, we'll get together and say look, get away.
VOX POP 3: This is the best day I've ever seen in Cronulla in the five years I've lived here.
HAMISH FITZSIMMONS: Why is that?
VOX POP 3: Everybody here… these are people that have come from all different suburbs that have said, you know what? We've had enough.
Sure, the Lebanese community out in Bankstown to Lakemba to Stanmore to wherever, they've got more numbers than we do. It wasn't until two lifeguards got beaten up that everybody said, you know what? And I'm sorry for the language, but **** this.
HAMISH FITZSIMMONS: Dozens were arrested and a number of people were set on by mobs because they appeared to be of Middle Eastern descent.
New South Wales Deputy Police Commissioner Andrew Scipione says he's disgusted by what took place.
ANDREW SCIPIONE: Some appalling behaviour's been shown here, un-Australian, I'd probably go as far as to say.
HAMISH FITZSIMMONS: What about the alcohol that's been involved with that. There are a lot of people drinking and look to be drunk around the streets here.
ANDREW SCIPIONE: Yeah, it's a major issue, and particularly on my arrival we had a chance to look at what was happening, a decision's been made, we in fact approached the local liquor outlets, a number of bottle shops and hotels, they have voluntarily agreed to shut off the alcohol today. They've done that.
HAMISH FITZSIMMONS: There's definitely a racial element here today. The people I've spoken to have been saying this is all about people who come to the beach, particularly young Lebanese men, showing respect. What do you think of that definite racial element at play here?
ANDREW SCIPIONE: Well, look that's very sad. Australia's prided itself on being tolerant and being welcoming to anyone. Today's behaviour, as I said, if what you're indicating to me is that the people out there are seeing this as a racist issue, then that's appalling. I mean, it's just not Australian.
HAMISH FITZSIMMONS: What about the further issue, that there's been criticism of the police that there are inadequate resources down here, and now I guess you've had to throw hundreds of officers down here. What's going to be done about those claims?
ANDREW SCIPIONE: We've got more than enough officers here. We have officers in reserve. You've seen multiple helicopters, you've seen maritime fleet outside on the beach, you've seen dogs, you've seen horses. I mean, we are well resourced here today.
And the fact that this has gone as well as it has in terms of hardly any injuries, minimal damage to property, a number of arrests, would suggest to me that we've got… the mood of the crowd has been read, and the police have done an outstanding job in maintaining peace and order, as best they can without letting this flare up and go into a full scale riot.
HAMISH FITZSIMMONS: Locals going for an afternoon walk like Kerry Woolsher are also troubled by the day's events.
KERRY WOOLSHER: I must say, I probably don't really approve of it. I think there's a lot of people that are getting fairly worked up over a small issue, and it's a bit of a worry, the racial side of things. It's pretty sad.
HAMISH FITZSIMMONS: Others like Paula, a 40-year Cronulla resident, don't appreciate the troubles, but also point the finger at young men from the Western Suburbs.
PAULA: Half these people don't need to be here. They've only come to stir up trouble and to look and to see what's going on. Like, I wouldn't feel safe to go down the beach, with all those, whatever they are, what nationalities and all that, they've got no consideration for the people that live here.
HAMISH FITZSIMMONS: The violence isn't good for local businesses, which rely on the influx of tourists in summer.
Halouk runs a kebab shop within view of the beach and he says there are incidents every weekend involving local and Lebanese youths.
HALOUK: Every weekend there's all the Westerns come in here from Bankstown or Hurstville, and that group of young people.
The problem is I think they come in groups, just to… these locals feel uncomfortable, because they start teasing the girls and this, that.
But every weekend we have small incidents like this, but this time, I don't know why is… media pay too much attention, and both group start to increasing to tension, they start to exchange the words and the text messages.
I think it's not very right, because I've been here six years, never had a racial problem, they never called me racist or you're Turk, what you doing here, this that. I was happy with here.
HAMISH FITZSIMMONS: So as a person of Turkish descent, you've never had any trouble at all?
HALOUK: No, no, not at all.
HAMISH FITZSIMMONS: As a local businessman, how does stuff like today and over the last week affect you and your business?
HALOUK: Of course they affect it, because it's a bad reputation for Cronulla. It's nice paradise place, and everybody happy here, relax on the Sundays and the weekend, everybody comes here to… this beach for everyone, not only Aussies or Lebanese or other ethnic groups. Everybody has to share it.
TONY EASTLEY: Halouk, a Cronulla kebab shop owner, speaking there with our reporter Hamish Fitzsimmons."
http://www.abc.net.au/am/content/2005/s1528707.htm
Idiots!!!
Local member of parliament: ("Liberal" here meand conservative0
"MP says simmering tension in Cronulla has hit boiling point
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AM - Monday, 12 December , 2005 08:08:00
Reporter: Tanya Nolan
TONY EASTLEY: The State Liberal MP for Cronulla, Malcolm Kerr, says he supports the rights of locals to protest against what he describes as "years" of anti-social behaviour by Lebanese gangs coming into the area, but he says locals should be ashamed of yesterday's violence.
Mr Kerr, an MP for more than 20 years, has been telling our reporter, Tanya Nolan, there's been a lack of adequate policing for a long time.
MALCOLM KERR: Well, there's been a history of trouble of these gangs basically insulting, abusing people. That's turned to violence on a number of occasions, and then you had last Sunday, where a couple of lifesavers were injured.
So you've had this simmering anger and frustration and a lack of policing over the years. I've been calling attention to the need to have more police with this sort of situation brewing.
TANYA NOLAN: What I've been hearing is that a lot of the concerns to do with gangs coming to the beach, of gangs of Lebanese descent or Middle Eastern descent, have been largely anecdotal. What sort of statistics are there? Have there been many police arrests?
MALCOLM KERR: The police say they've only had one assault this year. But you must bear in mind that a lot of the antisocial behaviour hasn't resulted in reports to police.
People have been abused, spat on, insulted, but they haven't taken action against police, they've moved away from what they were. They've had their freedoms curtailed. While it's anecdotal, the people that have given the stories are quite credible and have no reason to lie.
So there has been that level of antisocial activity, that level of bad behaviour, and I think the population are now finding that intolerable.
TANYA NOLAN: Were you supportive of the community's decision to protest against the trouble that was going on at the beach with these gangs?
MALCOLM KERR: Well, I would support the community exercising its right. Nobody had a problem with people coming down to beaches and parks and observing the law. What we saw yesterday… nobody could condone attacks on bystanders, or attacks even on an ambulance, that occurred yesterday.
So the situation is that I would have been happy if people had taken to the beaches rather than the streets.
TANYA NOLAN: Do you think that the locals of Cronulla have anything to be ashamed about in relation to yesterday's violence?
MALCOLM KERR: Clearly, yes.
TONY EASTLEY: Cronulla Liberal MP Malcolm Kerr speaking there, with Tanya Nolan."
http://www.abc.net.au/am/content/2005/s1528709.htm
"Cronulla beach at the centre of violent turf war
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The World Today - Monday, 12 December , 2005 12:10:00
Reporter: Michael Vincent
KAREN PERCY: First today, to the Sydney beach turf war that turned a day of nationalism into a racist free-for-all never before seen in modern day Australia.
Thousands of young people converged on Cronulla Beach in the city's south to lay claim to a patch of sand that has become a lightning rod for ethnic divisions.
It was the culmination of a week of escalating tensions in the area, and is being seen as payback for the attack of two lifeguards on the beach, the weekend before.
Alcohol helped fuel much of yesterday's violence, but it's exposed an alarming underbelly of intolerance and hatred.
That's been reflected on talkback radio in Sydney this morning. As well, listeners have revealed a growing frustration and anger at this kind of behaviour.
RADIO CALLER 1: I didn't even leave my building yesterday afternoon. It sounded like something from Apocalypse Now.
RADIO CALLER 2: The young men who tore up multiculturalism and so forth by the rapes, in my view, the icing was put on the cake yesterday at Cronulla when people from the Australian community finally said no.
RADIO CALLER 3: The searing image for me, Virginia, was the image of two girls about 10 metres in front of me clearly of Middle Eastern descent walking along the main street of Cronulla out the front of Northies Bar, all of a sudden they were pointed out by some people nearby.
Two girls then came forward and pushed them over from behind. One of the more disturbing things was all the locals stood around, and all the girls came in, and kicked them and punched them and pulled their hair.
RADIO CALLER 4: There's thousands of people there, and two Middle Easterners and a Middle Eastern woman walking with her head gear on. What are they expecting to happen?
RADIO CALLER 5: I am a Cronulla resident as well, and I too am very devastated and just so embarrassed about what the mob was all about. There was so many people dressed, you know, draped in the Australian flag, and I just thought, I just didn't want to be associated with the Australian flag if that's what they believed, what Australia is all about.
RADIO CALLER 6: We've become this gang because they've been coming down to our beach all these years, and I've had baseball bats handed to me, as a 12-year-old, going for a surf, to deal with them. Now, that's my upbringing. When you've got these other gangs coming to our beach, that's when it stems and the violence erupts.
RADIO CALLER 7: Racism in the community is always the responsibility of governments, and I think that they've got to take some responsibility for these fools who thought that they were somehow upholding Australian traditions.
KAREN PERCY: That's a taste of what callers have been saying on Sydney radio stations today. And we'll explore what role politicians should play a little later in the program.
The violence lasted well into the night and spilled over into other beachside suburbs, and this morning feelings are still running strong at Cronulla and Brighton-Le-Sands.
The World Today's Michael Vincent has spoken to some of the locals today, and while no one was justifying the violence, no one was prepared to say that it was over either.
MICHAEL VINCENT: A day after the violence, the music at the Cronulla kiosk is still playing, but the mood is definitely not relaxed.
Friends and long term local residents Sue and Marilyn are enjoying a coffee and a chat, but neither wanted to give their last names when approached by The World Today.
Both tell stories of violence and intimidation from men they describe as of Lebanese background.
VOX POP 1: I am becoming racist. I will tell you, I am becoming racist.
VOX POP 2: I think we're the ones that are discriminated against, really.
MICHAEL VINCENT: Why?
VOX POP 1: The law doesn't protect the innocent. The law is giving all the rights to the guilty. It is.
VOX POP 2: Not only that…
MICHAEL VINCENT: You don't think that those people that bashed the lifeguards the other day, you don't think they're going to get jail time?
VOX POP 1: No, no. No, they'll say they're the ones discriminated against.
MICHAEL VINCENT: So what do you think when you see a young Lebanese man come down to the beach? What do you think immediately?
VOX POP 1: Well I… nothing. I don't judge him, because… I mean, my cousin used to be married to a Lebanese. You know, I mean, I don't judge them, it's… it's what they do, what their intention of why they come here. And it's obvious later on. I mean, I take everybody, you know, I give everyone the benefit of the doubt.
VOX POP 2: Yeah, once you're jumped on it's too late. Yeah. You're the one that's injured, and…
VOX POP 1: The thing that scares me is what is Australia going to be in 50 years time? I've got a 10-year old grandson, and what is it going to be like for him, unless they can change the law, and I don't think that'll ever happen now.
MICHAEL VINCENT: Change the law to what?
VOX POP 1: Back to… I mean, they've got no respect. They've got no respect for any of our laws.
MICHAEL VINCENT: This feeling of us and them is even stronger amongst the young members of Cronulla.
Chris and his friends are still drinking and their beachfront apartment is littered with bottles from the party they began before yesterday's rally.
VOX POP 3: No, I wouldn't say it was ugly. It was only ugly when people were throwing beer bottles at the bloody ambulance.
VOX POP 4: Yeah, that was disgraceful.
VOX POP 3: That just wasn't on. That was un-Australian. That's not how you play cricket. It's just not how you play cricket.
MICHAEL VINCENT: But you were there in support of the lifesavers from last weekend?
VOX POP 4: Yep.
VOX POP 3: Yeah. Not so much support, just here as brothers in arms for our brothers and sisters, you know? You gotta… we gotta stand up for our town, basically.
VOX POP 4: And we don't want a party, so…
VOX POP 3: It was a good excuse to drink on a Sunday, really (laughs).
VOX POP 4: And Monday.
MICHAEL VINCENT: I heard… the reports in some of the papers today that there were neo Nazi groups down here yesterday trying to cause trouble.
VOX POP 3: No, they weren't trying to cause trouble, they were just handing out flyers. They weren't neo Nazis. They were skinheads, but just because they've got shaved heads doesn't mean they don't like Asians.
MICHAEL VINCENT: But do you think that their presence kind of influenced the violence yesterday?
VOX POP 3: No, no, not at all. Not at all. You know, there wasn't any specific violence towards anyone, anyone that wasn't causing trouble.
MICHAEL VINCENT: It wasn't just Cronulla that was affected by the violence, with confrontations erupting in nearby suburbs throughout the evening.
Bay Street in Brighton-le-Sands is a popular nightspot. Local resident Jay, who didn't want to give his last name, explains what happened when a group of Lebanese youths grabbed the Australian flag from the local RSL.
VOX POP 5: It started off here. Right?
MICHAEL VINCENT: We're just outside the Brighton-le-Sands RSL club.
VOX POP 5: Yeah. There was about 30, 40 boys here. There was about 30, 40 boys just standing here. There was an Australian flag up there. One of the Lebo boys jumped up here, grabbed it down, ripped it down, burnt it.
MICHAEL VINCENT: Burnt it?
VOX POP 5: Burnt it. They burnt it in the middle of the road, in the middle of the road over here. And then they laid the flag out on the ground for all the cars coming past, and cars were just stopping and doing skids on the flag, and then someone rang the police, and the police come over here, and then everyone went across the road and then went down the road to Hashems.
And there was about 200 boys down there, ready to go to Cronulla, and then the police turned up, riot squad came running out, and just started spraying everybody, started arresting everyone.
Everyone started running, everyone ran back this way, and then everyone met here, and then the police, the police just started blocking it up and then everyone just started meeting up and… boys were ringing boys, telling them to come down, and then the next thing…
MICHAEL VINCENT: How many people all in all?
VOX POP 5: I'd say about 400 people.
MICHAEL VINCENT: Have you ever seen… I mean, have you seen the tensions building between …
VOX POP 5: Yeah, I've had it myself. I've had phone calls from a few of the boys – "where are you? Meet us at blah blah street, bring heaps of boys," you know?
MICHAEL VINCENT: Are these your so-called Aussie friends, or the Lebanese friends?
VOX POP 5: Just a few Lebanese boys, yeah.
MICHAEL VINCENT: Yeah?
VOX POP 5: Yeah.
MICHAEL VINCENT: How do they feel about it?
VOX POP 5: They were pissed off that… what they were pissed off about was how they bashed the lady out at Cronulla, that's all they were pissed off about. Like, one of the boys here was saying here last night there's going to be a few drive-bys out at Cronulla and stuff, you know?
MICHAEL VINCENT: Drive-by shootings?
VOX POP 5: Drive-by shootings, yeah.
KAREN PERCY: That's Jay, a young man in Brighton-le-Sands, the beachside suburb near Sydney, talking to Michael Vincent."
http://www.abc.net.au/worldtoday/content/2005/s1529136.htm
"Sydney Lebanese community fears backlash after Cronulla riot
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The World Today - Monday, 12 December , 2005 12:14:00
Reporter: Jennifer Macey
KAREN PERCY: Lebanese Australians have condemned the weekend's events, describing the violence on all sides as disgusting. Out in Sydney's south-western suburbs, home to a large Lebanese community, people fear a possible backlash against the entire community.
Jennifer Macey went to Lakemba and filed this report.
JENNIFER MACEY: On the streets of Lakemba, home to the majority of Sydney's Lebanese community, there was reluctance to talk about the violence in Cronulla over the weekend.
Some feared an attack on lifesavers earlier in the week, blamed on a gang of Lebanese youth, would result in a backlash for the entire community.
VOX POP 1: We're not here to cause any trouble at all, at all, at all. We've been in the country for 36 to 40 years, nothing happened at all. Why is it happening now? I don't know. I go swimming, I take my kids to Cronulla, I take them to Manly, we go and swim, you know?
VOX POP 2: I think it's disgraceful. I think the bashing of the lifeguards was disgraceful, but what happened yesterday was a truly scary precedent in Australian history, and I think that comes down to 10 years of Howard Government, where he's played the race card for so many years that it's now sort of seeped into the Australian psyche, or the ethos, that it's okay to be racist, or to make excuse based on people's ethnicities - to target people, basically.
VOX POP 3: You know what I mean, I couldn't sleep yesterday. Lifesaving, my kid is practising to be a lifesaver. What's this? I wouldn't accept that, you know what I mean?
VOX POP 4: I think this is wrong, this racism, because we don't want, we don't want to se what happened in French or anywhere in the world, because we live in peace in Australia. And we don't want to see what happened overseas.
JENNIFER MACEY: Ahmed Kamaledine the President of the Lebanese Muslim Association. He says this idea of us and them is unacceptable.
AHMED KAMALEDINE: This is really disgusting, I think a lot of people are shocked for words, they're just stunned, and I'm one of those people. It's hard to say what could motivate for such a person, such people to go out of the lead, you know, and go out and do such a thing.
But regardless, this is not the way to treat a problem existing in the community. We give full support to the police. We also ask the police to go out and have a look at the surveillance and all the footage on the day, and bring those people to justice.
JENNIFER MACEY: He's concerned that talkback radio is fuelling anger and resentment against the Lebanese community.
AHMED KAMALEDINE: But a lot of suggestions by some of the media outlets, talkback radios, that go out there - even headlines across the newspapers as well - really isolate some of the people.
So, if you're going to stereotype a kid of Lebanese descent who thinks that he's being labelled or targeted, he might say something stupid, you know, or he might do something stupid. But if he does, then the law must deal with it. Not to punish the rest of the community by someone's actions.
But, I mean, having said that, why don't we focus on the successful achievements that the Lebanese have been made in Australia. I mean, have a look at Marie Bashir, for example, she's Lebanese. Steven Bracks, Premier of Victoria, he's Lebanese.
I mean, have a look at the great achievements Lebanese have been done to this community, or to the Australian community. We've contributed to the Australian community, or contributed to the Australian way of life.
So we don't want to be punished and labelled and isolated by media outlets, and sometimes by politicians, by scavengers who would really use these type of events to get popularity.
JENNIFER MACEY: Eman Dandan is the office coordinator at the Lebanese Muslim Association that offers counselling services to Lebanese young people.
She questions the notion of ownership over public spaces like beaches.
EMAN DANDAN: Along the lines of, how can people like that come to our beaches? And this concept of ownership over beaches and over public property, which sort of purports this idea that we can decide who comes, if we don't like you, you're not allowed here.
I mean, this mentality that's been bred in Australia, I mean, from the issues of refugees and now to issues of beaches. I mean, just this mentality, you can see the same sort of mentality running through. It's quite ridiculous.
JENNIFER MACEY: Eman Dandan says her organisation has been cooperating with the police and says anyone who commits a crime should be dealt with as a criminal, regardless of their cultural background.
EMAN DANDAN: It's really, it's leading Australia down the one-way track of returning to a White Australia policy. And I mean, if that's where we want to go, then we've really got to… I mean, we can look at the results that reaped… and if we can't learn from our mistakes, and our history, then when are we going to learn?
KAREN PERCY: That's Eman Dandan, from the Lebanese Muslim Association in Lakemba, speaking to Jennifer Macey.""
http://www.abc.net.au/worldtoday/content/2005/s1529204.htm
"White Australia in the Shire: understanding the violence
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The World Today - Monday, 12 December , 2005 12:26:00
Reporter: Stephen Long
KAREN PERCY: Our Finance Correspondent Stephen Long grew up in the Shire, not far from where the riots took place. He and his family still live there, just a couple of suburbs away. This is his personal view of the area, and the prejudice underlying the current tensions.
STEPHEN LONG: There's a scene in the first Lord of the Rings movie where Frodo and his friends set off on their adventure.
One of the hobbits exclaims: "If I take one more step it will be the furthest I've ever been from the shire".
When I heard this I laughed out loud - because it seemed to sum up the insularity of my own shire.
The Shire, as locals call it, is bordered by water to its north, west and south, so you can only get there by bridge or boat.
Locals joke that you should need a passport to enter, because in multicultural Sydney, the Shire is an Anglo enclave. More than 90 per cent of its residents stem from English or Irish stock. And racism's always been the Shire's dark underbelly.
When I grew up there in the 1970s, it was the wogs, the slopes and the slant eyes who were the target. Since I moved back to the Cronulla district four years ago, it's been "the bloody Lebs".
It's not just young people, and it's not just surf culture tribalism. The racism is pervasive. And the assumption is that anyone from "our shire" will share the view.
I often hear phrases like: "If they don't want to adopt our ways, they can piss off." "Bloody Lebs, lock em all up," one of my touch footie mates is fond of saying.
When I replied one time that they used to say that about Catholics not so long ago, he said: "Yeah, lock them all up too"
I asked a buddy I cycle with why a certain Shire school was so popular.
He replied, "well, it's got high academic standards, and let's just say there's an absence of kids from Southern Mediterranean extraction."
When I sought clarification, he said: "all Aussie kids, no Lebanese".
The prejudice is underpinned by fear.
Last year, my friends and neighbours were mortified to find there would be kids from outside the Shire on a cruise to celebrate the end of the HSC.
80 per cent of the patrons were Shire kids, but about 20 per cent were from the multicultural suburbs of the St George and Canterbury districts, just a 15-minute drive or so away.
Fathers muttered darkly about the prospect of "bloody Lebs" raping their daughters.
The Shire is full of good people. Kind people. People who you would trust your kids. And Cronulla is just 30 kilometres from the centre of Sydney. But in some respects it's a world away.
KAREN PERCY: That personal perspective from our reporter Stephen Long, who was raised and lives in the Sutherland Shire.
http://www.abc.net.au/worldtoday/content/2005/s1529141.htm
This one would summarize my attitude to the deliberate divisivement of the Howard government, but we can't blame it all on that!!!!
"Divisive politics blamed for Cronulla violence
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The World Today - Monday, 12 December , 2005 12:22:00
Reporter: Tanya Nolan
KAREN PERCY: Some of the talkback callers to ABC radio around the country pointed to the racial violence that erupted at Cronulla yesterday as a product of divisive politics.
But the nation's federal and state politicians are today distancing themselves from the events, and are looking to community leaders to address the problems.
Tanya Nolan reports.
TANYA NOLAN: Racist violence at Sydney's Cronulla Beach wasn't just a hot topic for radio talkback callers in New South Wales.
Callers to 774 ABC Melbourne summed up what became a common theme for discussion this morning.
CALLER 1: I just wanted to express my absolute disgust at what I saw on the news last night in Cronulla, and I think we need to really lay the blame at the foot of the person who's responsible, and that's the Prime Minister John Howard.
This is a man whose entire leadership has been based on fear and hatred. This is a man who's made… who has said about refugees that we will decide who comes to this country - 'we'. Who is the 'we'?
CALLER 2: I am saddened by this whole thing, I'm ashamed, I'm disgusted, and I must agree with the last caller. I think the Prime Minister would be sitting back and secretly rubbing his hands together.
I think this is a product of the divisive politics that have been a part of our society since he's been in power.
CALLER 3: I think reclaiming our society is going to be very difficult in the context of the politics of fear that John Howard has been proclaiming for the last decade.
CALLER 4: I'm not blaming John Howard per se, but I think the politicians generally in the aftermath of the gang rapes and so forth haven't acted with real responsibility.
TANYA NOLAN: But the Prime Minister John Howard doesn't see it that way.
JOHN HOWARD: I do not accept that there is underlying racism in this country. I have always taken a more optimistic view of the character of the Australian people. This nation of ours has been able to absorb millions of people from different parts of the world over a period of now some 40 years, and we have done so with remarkable success, and in a way that has brought enormous credit to this country.
REPORTER: Do you think anything the Government's said…
JOHN HOWARD: I beg your pardon?
REPORTER: Do you think anything the Government's said over the last years has set the tone… (inaudible)?
JOHN HOWARD: Which government?
REPORTER: Your government.
JOHN HOWARD: My government?
REPORTER: Yes.
JOHN HOWARD: No, certainly not.
TANYA NOLAN: The Prime Minister does see it as first and foremost an issue of the police applying the law to those who break it.
However, many callers, particularly those who live in the area where the violence erupted, raised what they see as the steady decline in policing numbers as partly to blame for the tensions coming to a head yesterday.
But New South Wales Police Minister Carl Scully says it shouldn't just be a problem for frontline agencies to deal with.
CARL SCULLY: The police can respond to acts of violence and threats of violence. We actually need support from the community. These communities have leaders and they have people who are looked up to. And I'd be calling for some of those to exercise some responsibility.
TANYA NOLAN: The Federal Member for Cook, Bruce Baird, who lives in an apartment on Cronulla Beach agrees the community needs to take the lead from this point.
BRUCE BAIRD: I think community leaders have got to come out, I think government leaders need to say this is not the Australia we know.
TANYA NOLAN: The Federal Treasurer Peter Costello says it's certainly not the Australia we want.
PETER COSTELLO: This is not the Australia we know, it's not the Australia we want. We don't want gangs fighting each other in public places.
TANYA NOLAN: But if the public was hoping for politicians to take any more responsibility than that, it may be sorely disappointed.
New South Wales Premier Morris Iemma was pledging the efforts of a new taskforce to pursue investigations into those "thugs and hooligans", quote unquote, who he blames for the violence
MORRIS IEMMA: There have been some 16 arrests, and there will be further action taken. Strike force Seta, formed with detectives, will continue to pursue those responsible.
TANYA NOLAN: Mayor of the Sutherland Shire Council, which governs the Cronulla area, Kevin Schreiber, was doing his best this morning to make sure the name of Cronulla isn't irreparably damaged
And he wanted to make sure that all who use the beach understood that local government is doing all it can to make sure it is a safe place to return to.
KEVIN SCHREIBER: There was no call for this and there's no excuse for this level of violence or room for this behaviour in the Sutherland Shire.
Well, I've met with the Commissioner Ken Moroney and we've agreed to work together to implement strategies to help and bring calm to the situation and try and make the place safe so everybody can enjoy it.
KAREN PERCY: That's the Mayor of the Sutherland Shire, Kevin Schreiber, ending Tanya Nolan's report."
http://www.abc.net.au/worldtoday/content/2005/s1529244.htm