Canberra should be renamed "Pornberra" and marked on the map with an X, Queensland Senator Lady Bjelke-Petersen (Nat), The Canberra Times reported on the front page on this day 31 years ago.
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Senator Bjelke-Petersen was speaking during an urgency motion introduced to the Senate by the Opposition spokesman on the ACT, Senator Robert Hill.
The motion said that the Government should be follow the wishes of the state and Commonwealth Attorneys-General and ban X-rated (explicit sex) videos, thereby ending the Government's "hypocrisy" in "claiming a commitment" to improving the status of women, shown by criticising the advertising industry for their portrayal, while not banning the videos.
Senator Bjelke-Petersen said that, as a mother and a grandmother, "any issues which affect women and families rate the highest priority with me".
"I don't think I've ever been more worried about the future of families in Australia than I am at this moment," she said.
She said her role was that anything that could not be seen on television should not be hired or sold, although even this was a wide scope. Although parents were responsible for what their children watched, they could not always be there to supervise viewing, and the Government should legislate.
