Just.Equal Australia says the Government’s abandonment of vilification protections in its proposed anti-hate bill is a missed opportunity to protect all Australians from hate speech.
Spokesperson, Rodney Croome, said the Albanese government had turned down the opportunity to make Australia a safer place for all Western Australians.
“The abandonment of vilification reform is a missed opportunity to making Australia safer for everyone.”
“We urge cross-parliament cooperation to pass vilification protections for LGBTIQA+ Australians and others vulnerable to hate as soon as possible.”
“We also urge remaining anti-hate provisions in the Government bill, including harsher penalties for hate-motivated crime, to be widened to protect LGBTIQA+ people and others.”
“We will continue to make the case that if the Bondi tragedy has taught us anything, it is that the Government should not wait until such attacks occur before taking tough action.” Croome said on Sunday.
The Government’s proposed vilification reform would only have protected against racial vilification, but groups like Just.Equal repeatedly called for this to be expanded to include other attributes such as sexual orientation, gender identity, sex, religion and disability.
Widening of the protected attributes is supported by the Greens and cross-benchers, and was being seriously discussed with the Prime Minister and other Government leaders.
In its submission to the current inquiry on the Federal Government’s anti-hate bill, Just.Equal warned of the “dark path” Australia could go down without urgent action against anti-LGBTIQA+ hate.
After citing a long and escalating list of attacks against LGBTIQA+ Australians, the submission says:
“We can see the same escalation in other countries including the United Kingdom and the United States.”
“We have seen extremists bomb a gay pub in London and kill 49 people at a LGBTIQA+ nightclub in Orlando.”
“Our deep concern is that Australia will follow those countries down a dark path.”
“We fear how easy it would be for an extremist to start shooting at an LGBTIQA+ venue, Mardi Gras parade or any of the local Pride marches held around the nation.”
“That is the kind of horrific scenario escalating attacks may lead to if we don’t act now and take anti-LGBTIQA+ hate speech far more seriously.”
In its submission Just.Equal also called for a range of measures not in the draft bill including an expansion of protections against humiliating and intimidating conduct, currently limited to race in federal law.
The group also called for training of police to identity hate-motivated crime and better data-collection systems to record it, and the establishment of a third-party reporting system for those who experience hate crimes.
It was also suggested that community education campaigns about reporting hate crime and the damage it inflicts, alongside community education campaigns promoting respect and inclusion for LGBTIQA+ people and others vulnerable to hate.
