Violent threats to Federal MPs surge to record levels, prompting demands for boost to police resources

The number of threats against Federal politicians and their electorate offices has exploded more than 250 per cent in just four years, according to new figures that have prompted renewed calls to boost police resources to protect increasingly at-risk MPs.

Death threats to several MPs were among 1009 reports of nuisance, harassment, offensive and threatening communication referred to the Australian Federal Police in the past financial year - up from 279 in 2020-21.

Alarmingly, more than 280 reports appear to have been made in June alone.

The AFP Association is warning the true number of threats was higher than the reported figures, as the union demands a better pay deal for the officers tasked with protecting federal MPs.

The new AFP figures, obtained by The Nightly, come after a woman participating in the months-long pro-Palestine protest outside Prime Minister Anthony Albanese’s Sydney electorate office was arrested for trespass this week.

Mr Albanese criticised the protests which have blocked constituents from accessing basic government services from his office.

“I’m not quite sure what the aims are (of the protests). (Israel) Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is not looking at what’s happening on Marrickville Road before decisions are made,” Mr Albanese said.

The Nightly this week revealed a review into protective security arrangements for senior politicians and the Governor-General was ordered amid heightened concern for the safety of public figures after Hamas’ October 7 attack on Israel and the bitter Voice to Parliament referendum.

A series of attacks on electorate offices, including the firebombing of Jewish Labor MP Josh Burns’ office last month, and a pro-Palestine protest at Parliament House, has escalated fears about the potential for act of political violence in Australia.

Mr Albanese has also used the aftermath of the attempted assassination of US presidential candidate Donald Trump to plead for a more civil public debate at home.

The Nightly has obtained shocking examples of emails and letters sent to Federal MPs that illustrate the type of abuse flooding their inboxes.

In one threatening email, an MP was told “You will be dead very soon. I will murder you in a very brutal way”.

The death threats were referred to the AFP.

As a mental health precaution, some offices are rotating the staff member responsible for monitoring the main inbox to limit their exposure to the torrent of abusive correspondence.

NSW Liberal senator Hollie Hughes said she has received “beyond vile” emails, including ones suggesting she should have aborted her disabled son.

“These are clearly from someone who knows about my family and has targeted me personally and deliberately,” Senator Hughes told The Nightly.

“There is also a level of sexual violence in the messages that many female MPs and Senators receive. I do believe conservative women bear the brunt of this type of behaviour.”

The number of threats of violence reported to the AFP was already tracking at record levels, with Commissioner Reece Kershaw telling Senate estimates on May 31 that 725 reports had been received in the previous 11 months.

The final tally for 2023-24 means there were 284 reports in the final month of the financial year.

AFPA president Alex Caruana has highlighted the surge in threats to strengthen the union’s argument for better pay and conditions, including for the Close Personal Protection team who act as MPs’ “human shields”.

The union is locked in an ongoing wage dispute with the AFP.

Mr Caruana said the AFP was the lowest-paid police force in Australia and continued to be treated as “public servants”.

He said while the AFP did indeed provide a public service, lumping the force in with bureaucrats when it came to negotiating pay increases “is not respectful, and doesn’t take into consideration things like the CPP” where officers “put their lives on the line”.

“At the end of the day, Mr Albanese is expecting these people, the lowest paid police officers in Australia, to take a bullet for him,” Mr Caruana said.

“Now that these threats are growing, we’re not getting an increased budget, we’re not getting any increased pay or conditions or anything like that.”

He also underscored the importance of all parliamentarians who receive threats of any level to ensure they are reporting it to law enforcement.

“Police can’t do their job, and we can’t protect you, if we don’t know that these things are happening,” he said.

“And there might be a pattern. It might happen to you, it might have happened to a colleague, and then it might happen to somebody else. And the information that you have might be the missing piece of a puzzle that might prevent that from happening.”

He said because there were so many “credible threats” currently coming through, if parliamentarians opted not to report incidents it could have damaging ramifications including a potential under-resourcing that could leave AFP so thinly spread they would be prevented from attending a “Trump style of incident”.

Shadow home affairs minister James Paterson said the surge in threats was “alarming and heading in the wrong direction”.

Senator Paterson called for an urgent boost to AFP resources for MP security and laws to deter the behaviour.

He said it was also incumbent on politicians to stop inflaming community tensions, in particular the Greens over Israel and Gaza.