Liberal MP Craig Kelly responded to a letter from Anglican Schools that called for legislation that allows for religious based schools to fire teachers to remain in place, saying the problem was largely a hypothetical one.

“We have to be very careful legislation in this space.” Kelly said saying there was a balancing act between protecting religious freedom and stopping discrimination from occurring.

“It’s not something that it’s a problem at the moment.” Kelly told Sky News on Wednesday. “Normally we’re putting legislation in parliament when we see some type of problem that needs to be fixed. I’m yet to see that there is an actual problem that does need to be fixed.”

“Yes, there is the potential of discrimination, but we need to balance it up very carefully with the rights of those schools to employ who they think are more fit, a better fit, for those religious schools.”

Kelly said he was against students be discriminated against. “We don’t want to see students kicked out of school because they are gay, but it comes down to employment rights. I think its different between a teacher and a student, but we don’t want to see it happen to a student.”

“Under the current laws that is possible at the moment, but its not something that has ever happened, or that anyone is aware, or can give an example of happening and we need to change the law. We need to be very careful legislating in places where there is actually no problem occurring.”

OIP Staff