Morrison denounces Holocaust-quarantine links

PRIME Minister Scott Morrison has slammed Queensland Nationals MP George Christensen for laughing at a comment comparing Australia’s COVID-19 quarantine facilities with the Holocaust.

Appearing on an American conspiracy theorist’s online show, Christensen laughed when the host equated Auschwitz with Australian quarantine facilities because they both had “big fences”.

Federal Labor MP Josh Burns tweeted on Tuesday morning that Christensen was “involved in false comparison to the Holocaust, again. Yet Scott Morrison will do nothing”. Labor frontbencher Tanya Plibersek added, “I think it is up to the Prime Minister to pull him into line.”

Late on Tuesday night, Morrison said he denounced the comments “in the strongest possible terms”.

“The Holocaust was an evil abomination,” he said.

“Respect for the victims requires that it never be referenced in such a trivial and insensitive manner.”

Deputy Prime Minister and Nationals leader Barnaby Joyce concurred: “Any parallel of domestic policy with the abomination which was the Holocaust requires an immediate rebuke,” he said.

Christensen, who is retiring at the next election, has previously compared COVID restrictions to Hitler’s regime.