Political hate speech can have real-world fallout. After the alleged attack on Helen Haines, our leaders must act

‘In times of crisis our federal and some state parliaments do national introspection well,’ Paul Daley writes. ‘But too often nothing comes of it.’ Photograph: Mike Bowers/The Guardian

If the increasingly vituperative tenor of our public discourse, online and verbal, has fully trailed America’s into the murky dungeon of political violence with the appalling alleged attack on Helen Haines, Australia’s political class has only itself to blame.

Amid outpourings of concern from across the political spectrum (including from people who have fostered considerable vicious personal animus online and in the parliament) for the gravely injured and much-respected member for Indi, it is blindingly evident that the political square has long been utterly incapable of self-regulation.