Scott Morrison has described a Labor attack ad on Liberal MP Gladys Liu as a "sewer tactic" but repeatedly declined to answer when asked whether it is inaccurate.
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A pre-election ad titled "What do we know about Gladys Liu?" accuses the Hong Kong-born MP of spreading "fake news" on Chinese messaging app WeChat, and claims she is linked to people deemed national security risks.
Prime Minister Scott Morrison on Sunday claimed race was motivating Labor's attacks, but refused to answer when pressed repeatedly on whether any claim made in the advertisement was inaccurate.
"They actually go after Gladys Liu because she's Chinese. She's from Hong Kong, and they're engaged in what I think is a sewer tactic here," he said.
The ABC reported Ms Liu supporters had spread misinformation on WeChat in the lead-up to the 2019 election.
The advert also references a 2019 Herald Sun article, which revealed the Victorian Liberal Party was forced to refund $300,000 raised by Ms Liu's guests at fundraiser events over security concerns.
But with Mr Morrison insisted the commercial was a "desperate" smear.
"[Labor] has been caught out actually running their own policies and speeches past the Chinese government before they'll even talk to the Australian people," he said.
The comment was a reference to Richard Marles, who News Corp revealed this week provided the Chinese Embassy with an advanced copy of a speech he delivered to Beijing university in 2019.
Mr Marles insisted the speech remained unchanged.
Labor foreign affairs spokeswoman Penny Wong, deputising for COVID-afflicted leader Anthony Albanese, dismissed the Coalition's defence, saying "a number of these issues" had been raised in Parliament.
"I can remember my then counterpart, Senator [Mathias] Cormann, accusing me and others of attacking her because of her ethnic heritage, which is not the case," she said on Sunday.
"I think there were questions that she should have answered, and it is legitimate for those to be answered."
Senator Wong accused the Coalition, which has run a muscular line over its response to Beijing, of "increasingly shrill and desperate" attacks on Labor over national security.
It came after Treasurer Josh Frydenberg, whose electorate borders that of Ms Liu, on Sunday blasted the ad as racist.
"The Labor Party here is being dishonest, deceitful and engaging in scare tactics and in a racist attack ad on the first Chinese born person to sit in the House of Representatives," he said.
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