SMH: ‘We need to draw a bright line’: Government readies new hate speech laws
Michael Barnett OAM
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‘We need to draw a bright line’: Government readies new hate speech laws
Matthew Knott
The Albanese government is being lobbied to include protections for disabled and LGBTQI Australians in beefed up hate speech laws as it prepares to circulate draft legislation within days.
Anti-vilification laws are set to be at the top of the government’s agenda when parliament returns ahead of schedule later this month following the antisemitic massacre at Bondi Beach in December.
Member for Wentworth, Allegra Spender, during a visit to Bondi Beach following December’s mass shooting. Oscar Colman
Independent MP Allegra Spender, whose electorate of Wentworth includes Bondi, has joined key Jewish groups in urging the government to outlaw the promotion and incitement of hatred, rather than simply speech that threatens force or violence against minority groups.
The government is expected to introduce legislation with similar wording to amendments unsuccessfully proposed by Spender last year when the parliament passed new hate crime laws, but politicians and lobby groups are eagerly awaiting the detail of the bill.
Key lobby groups should be briefed on draft legislation by the end of the week, with parliament expected to resume before Australia Day.
Prime Minister Anthony Albanese told reporters on Tuesday: “We’re working on the legislation, and we also want to consult on the legislation as well. So some of those consultations will take place over coming days to make sure that we get this legislation right.”
Albanese said he was determined not to rush the process given the issues involved were complex and had constitutional implications.
“I want to see an Australia where someone, because of their faith, is not targeted, that they are able to practise their faith and with pride,” he said.
Spender told this masthead: “We need to draw a very bright line and make clear that spreading hate and division in the community is not allowed. It is absolutely critical that we do this properly and get it right this time”.
Spender said that incitement to violence was “very hard to prove and a very high bar”. There was also a risk that such speech would not be prosecuted until it was too late, she said.
The law must be changed so that statements calling for “the final solution” of Jews and “jihad against the Jews” is banned, she said.
Spender, whose electorate includes one of the country’s biggest Jewish communities, said that while increasing protections against antisemitic hate speech was crucial, she was concerned the government may limit any new hate speech protections to race.
Neo-Nazi groups had also promoted hatred based on sexuality and religion, she noted.
Attorney General Michelle Rowland said: “The government is continuing to work expeditiously on a package of reforms designed to crack down on those who spread hate, division and radicalisation in our community. As part of this process, we are consulting with the Jewish community and others.”
Albanese said before Christmas that the government was considering drafting laws to expand protections against racial vilification and create a new offence against promoting racial supremacy.
Home Affairs Minister Tony Burke said the government would introduce “a new serious vilification offence that criminalises inciting hatred and we will be consulting closely with the Jewish community and others on the structuring of this offence”.
The government will also include an aggravated hate speech offence for preachers and leaders who promote or threaten violence against protected groups or members of groups.
The Executive Council of Australian Jewry (ECAJ), the nation’s peak Jewish group, supports expanded hate speech protections for all minority groups, not simply based on race.
ECAJ previously said it was “deeply disappointed” the government did not create a new provision to outlaw serious vilification of individuals or groups on the basis of race, religion or other protected attributes as well as speech threatening violence.
Protesters chanting “F--- the Jews” and “Where’s the Jews?” outside the Sydney Opera House after the October 7 attacks of 2023 would not have been able to be prosecuted under the new hate speech laws, the council warned in an October 2024 parliamentary submission. Neither would inflammatory antisemitic statements by Sydney hate preachers.
Free Palestine protest outside the Sydney Opera House on October 9. AAP
The Coalition and Labor united last February to vote down amendments proposed by Spender that would have created a new serious vilification offence, opting instead for narrower protections against speech advocating or threatening violence.
Equality Australia, the nation’s peak LGBTQI advocacy group, has been urging the government to outlaw serious vilification against gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender and intersex Australians.
Equality Australia legal director Heather Corkhill said: “We expect that new protections from hate speech will protect all communities that experience the devastating impacts of hate.”
Peak lobby group People With Disability Australia has also urged the government to go further by outlawing serious vilification against disabled Australians, not just language threatening violence.
“Vilification, like threats of violence, can cause significant psychological harm and stop people from enjoying their fundamental human rights,” the group said.
