KAP Leader Robbie Katter (C) holds a media conference in Townsville, North Queensland, alongside veterans Mark Molachino (L) and Daniel Grace, urging state MPs to support his bill to criminalise the burning of the Australian flag. Courtesy of KAP
Katter’s Australian Party (KAP) Leader Robbie Katter is urging Queensland MPs to support a bill to criminalise the burning of the Australian flag in the state, even if it means breaking ranks with party politics.
Katter held a media conference in the North Queensland city of Townsville, alongside veterans Mark Molachino and Daniel Grace, where he called on state members to support his bill.
The Katter’s Australian Party (KAP) introduced the Summary Offences (Protection of the Australian Flag) Amendment Bill 2026 in the Queensland Parliament in April.
If passed, the Bill would impose a maximum penalty of six months’ imprisonment for burning the Australian flag in circumstances likely to provoke public disorder.
Ahead of Remembrance Day on Nov. 11, Katter said it was more important than ever to protect the sanctity of the flag and urged the state’s politicians to act independently.
“We don’t want to hear what people’s party position is, we want to hear what individual MPs’ position is that they’re going to vote on,” he said.
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Katter described the law as necessary, and said many Australians already believed that burning the flag was illegal.
However, it has so far not been criminalised at any state or federal level.
“I think it’s really important that … for someone to burn and desecrate [the Australian flag] should be an offence that carries a consequence, because we want that as a deterrent to people who might do that,” he said.
“I think that’s a sentiment most people in Queensland agree [with], and particularly when you come into regional Queensland, people feel very strongly about that.”
RAAF Veteran and former Hinchinbrook KAP candidate Mark Molachino said the flag should be uniting Australians from the veterans’ perspective.
“This is a flag that flies in front of every single defence base in Australia, [and] flies down at parliament,” he said.
“Defence members and veterans look up to this flag.”
The federal Liberal MP for Townsville, Phillip Thompson, has expressed support for a federal ban on burning the Australian flag.
A spokesperson for the Queensland government told The Epoch Times it wanted a federal push.
“We’ve been outspoken that this type of behaviour has no place in our state or our country, which is why a national approach should be led by the federal government,” they said.
The KAP bill remains before the Queensland parliament.
