Attack on Australian politician follows years of threats to public figures

By Byron Kaye SYDNEY, Oct 20 (Reuters) Australian lawmakers and enforcers have to sought to lower the temperature of political debate and warned about growing threats to public figures since 2021, when anti-lockdown protesters put an effigy of a state leader on a makeshift gallows in Melbourne. Those fears came to a head on ​Monday when a man rammed a car into Helen Haines, an independent member of the lower-house, inflicting ‌major injuries including the loss of a leg, media and officials said, while doctors work to save the other. Police have yet to state a motive for the attack outside Haines regional electorate office in Wangaratta, some 240 km (150 miles) away from Melbourne. We ve all seen a level of hate and disrespect and intolerance in our political debate that we never really used to see, Health Minister Mark Butler told Channel Nine s Today ‌Show. His ​remarks come amid growing debate about increasingly toxic political dialogue in a country ⁠that has traditionally pri