A Liberal senator who refused to apologise for controversial comments about Indian migration has been booted from the shadow ministry.
Jacinta Nampijinpa Price spoke to Liberal leader Sussan Ley on Wednesday evening and was asked to step down from the coalition frontbench.
“I have accepted the leader’s decision,” Senator Nampijinpa Price said in a statement.
Despite a growing chorus of calls for her to say sorry for remarks claiming the Labor government was bringing in more Indian migrants to bolster its vote, the outspoken senator said she would continue to speak out on migration.
Ms Ley said serving in the shadow ministry was a privilege and shadow ministers were expected to uphold certain standards.
“Senator Jacinta Nampijinpa Price has failed to do so and will no longer serve in my shadow ministry,” Ms Ley said.
“Despite being given sufficient time and space to do so, Senator Nampijinpa Price failed to apologise for remarks which have caused Australians of Indian heritage significant hurt.”
Senator Nampijinpa Price’s refusal to provide confidence in her leadership made the position untenable, Ms Ley said.
The Northern Territory senator expressed her disappointment to Ms Ley about colleagues disregarding the key point she had made about mass migration and instead chose to “indulge agenda-driven media commentary”.
“Although I will be returning to the backbench, I will continue to speak up on issues which are in the national interest and that are important to millions of Australians,” she vowed.
Senator Nampijinpa Price earlier claimed she had received “overwhelming” community support.
“My comments were certainly clumsy. Unfortunately, the issue that’s of great concern, which I won’t be silenced on, is the issue of mass migration in our country,” she told reporters in Perth.
Senior members of the coalition urged Senator Nampijinpa Price to apologise for the comments, with the NSW Liberals saying sorry on her behalf.
But the senator called for the coalition to continue to hold the government to account on migration numbers.
“My husband is a migrant, this is the Australian story,” she said.
“I am a woman of mixed heritage myself, but this is ultimately the Australian story, and one that needs to be celebrated.”
Ms Ley previously declined to apologise on behalf of the coalition for Senator Nampijinpa Price’s comments, instead saying the remarks should not have been made.
Nationals leader David Littleproud said Senator Nampijinpa Price should admit her mistakes and get on with holding the government to account.
“In politics, we often get things wrong, what you’ve got to do is acknowledge it, say sorry, move on and focus on what we’re there to do,” he said.
Liberal senator Jane Hume said it was disappointing the coalition had to spend time being divided over the comments.
“It’s been poorly handled, and it should be now on all of us, beholden on all of us to bring it back to an internal issue, rather than something that gets played out in the media,” she said.
Foreign Minister Penny Wong confirmed Indian officials raised concerns with the federal government following rhetoric at anti-immigration protests where members of the Indian community were singled out.
“We’ve communicated with them, not at my level, but at official level, and they’ve seen the very important responses from the government,” she said.
Senator Wong emphasised the views shared at the anti-immigration protests did not reflect the broader community.
“Those protests didn’t represent Australia. I don’t think Australian values are values of division,” she said.
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