Geneva, Switzerland, 20 October 2026
On behalf of the Inter-Parliamentary Union (IPU) and the international parliamentary community, we express our profound shock at the news of a deliberate attack on Australian parliamentarian, Dr. Helen Haines, outside her electorate office in Wangaratta, Australia.
Our thoughts are with Dr. Haines, her family, her parliamentary colleagues and the community she serves. We wish her a swift recovery.
We condemn, in the strongest possible terms, all forms of violence. Any attack on a parliamentarian is an attack on democracy itself.
Democracy depends on a free space for political debate, where all, elected representatives and citizens alike, can speak their minds without fear of attack or reprisal.
Although the motivation for this attack was unclear at the time of writing, it is not an isolated incident. The IPU has been actively documenting the growing threat of public intimidation against lawmakers worldwide which is fuelled by polarization and declining trust in institutions and is amplified on social media.
Left unchecked, such violence drives self-censorship and deters people – especially women and members of minority groups – from entering public life. This corrodes democratic representation.
Countering this threat requires a coordinated response. Political and parliamentary leadership must set clear boundaries for acceptable public discourse, rebuild trust in democratic institutions and ensure intimidation never succeeds in silencing the voices that enrich our democracies.
Mr. Milton Dick, IPU President Ms. Anda Filip, IPU Secretary General
For more information about the IPU, contact press
ipu [dot] org (press[at]ipu[dot]org)
