ballard has been a vocal critic of australian government policy towards asylum seekers. in 2016 he told sbs: "i've found myself getting really angry about the way we treat refugees as a country. i figured if i could take that passion and interest and funnel it into my comedy i might come up with something that would be a different way for people to engage with the whole topic." in 2017 ballard told the abc "i'm a painful atheist and bang on about it quite regularly in my comedy", but added that his "strident atheism" had been tempered in recent years through his involvement in refugee advocacy and meeting faith leaders in that space "living the best values of the christian teaching."