Family of Lindt Cafe victim call for royal commission, ‘appalled’ by PM invoking siege

The family of a Lindt Cafe siege victim has called on Prime Minister Anthony Albanese to launch a federal royal commission into the Bondi massacre, saying they were appalled he had invoked the cafe attack to avoid holding a national inquiry.

The family of Katrina Dawson, who was killed in the siege in 2014, said “painful personal experience” showed them that a state-based royal commission would not have the power to uncover what went wrong leading up to the Bondi attack, in which 15 innocent people were killed.

“We are appalled that the prime minister, seeking to avoid a much-needed royal commission into antisemitism and Islamic extremism, would say that we don’t need a royal commission because there wasn’t one into the Lindt siege,” Dawson’s parents, Sandy and Jane and her brother Angus, said in a statement.

Calls for a Commonwealth royal commission have persisted despite the prime minister insisting a state-based royal commission, the antisemitism envoy’s report, and a federal inquiry into law enforcement processes would deliver the fastest results.

Forced to defend his position, Albanese said on Tuesday that a federal royal commission had not been called for after other shootings.

“There was no royal commission called by the Howard government after Port Arthur. There was no royal commission called by the Abbott government after the Lindt siege,” Albanese said.

“We provided on both those occasions, as the opposition – and I was a part of that opposition – we provided support for national unity at that time.”

The prime minister has said the federal government and intelligence agencies will fully co-operate with the NSW royal commission, but Dawson’s family cast doubt over Albanese’s claim.