"Indeed, Ruddick, who left the Liberal Party in 2021 after public disagreements over the Party's handling of the pandemic response, said out loud in parliament what many Australians have been saying for some time now – at first privately, around dinner tables, but increasingly more publicly, over workplace water coolers or at the pub, as saying the obvious becomes more socially acceptable. 

Nevertheless, what is socially acceptable offline is not necessarily acceptable on social media. YouTube swiftly removed Ruddick's speech from its platform, just seven hours after it was uploaded. The NSW Liberal Democrats say this is the first time in Australian history that a politician's maiden speech has been censored by the platform.