The freedom movement's Convoy to Canberra protest was a fizzer (Image: Supplied)

Just a year after a crowd of anti-vaccine, anti-lockdown campaigners filled the front lawns of New Parliament House in Canberra, the dregs of the freedom movement have held a poorly attended anniversary protest in the nation’s capital.

The protest’s dismal turnout, which was hyped on social media and foreshadowed on Ben Fordham’s 2GB radio program, shows how the energy from the convoying, protesting and camping wing of Australia’s anti-vaccine movement is at its nadir.

Over the weekend, a small crowd of loosely packed, red ensign flag-waving and placard-holding protesters assembled and marched across a campsite, the governor-general’s residence and outside of Parliament House. 

Speakers shouted into a megaphone with the usual false claims and conspiracies — everything from the sovereign citizen-inspired belief that Australia’s federal Parliament is illegitimate, to the dangers of COVID-19 vaccination. While people led chants about mRNA vaccines, children ran around and some participants sat under marquees to shield themselves from the harsh Canberra summer sun.

Some of the freedom movement’s most fringe figures made an appearance, including David “Guru” Graham and Riccardo Bosi. But the low energy and small number of attendees — even among those figures who have now dedicated their lives to the anti-vaccine movement — was a far cry from the triumphant return to the nation’s capital that was promised.

Those involved blamed the poor turnout on lack of promotion: “I’ve just been notified that no one even knows about the reunion,” one participant who drove from Coffs Harbour for the event said in a video posted online.

The excitement expressed by last year’s Convoy to Canberra participants soon gave way to disappointment as the promised resignations of politicians never happened. The campaigners were sick, fractured and disenchanted with allegations flying around that donations for the movement had been pocketed by some of its leaders. 

While the protesting part of the anti-vaccine movement has fizzled, some of its ideology has inserted itself into the political mainstream. Coalition Senators Alex Antic and Gerard Rennick spout anti-vaccine rhetoric. The United Australia Party is filling venues with people seeing anti-vaccine touring doctor Dr Peter McCullough. 

The anti-vaccine movement doesn’t need to protest outside Parliament anymore. It’s already inside.