6 hours Ago By David Crowe
A new bid to stamp out hate speech will impose criminal penalties on people who promote hatred over race, religion, gender and other factors, in a crossbench move to challenge Labor and the Coalition to toughen the law. Independent MP Allegra Spender will put the proposal to parliament on Tuesday in a call on both major parties to strengthen draft laws that criminalise incitement to violence but do not ban serious vilification, amid growing fears about antisemitism. Allegra Spender visiting the scene of an antisemitic attack in Dover Heights in her electorate of Wentworth last month.
Credit: Kate Geraghty Spender said the government bill to tackle hate speech was too weak because it did not prevent clear cases of public speech that sought to provoke hatred, such as calls that echoed attacks on Jews during the Holocaust. Her amendment has gained support from the Executive Council of Australian Jewry and Equality Australia, an advocacy group for LGBTQ Australians, while also meeting some of the concerns set out by disability groups in their reaction to the government’s draft law. If adopted, Spender’s amendment would make it a criminal offence for a person to commit a public act with the intent to promote hatred towards another person or group.
Loading Labor had initially promised to outlaw serious vilification, but dropped it from the draft government bill because Christian and Islamic groups, in particular, could not agree on a balance between free speech and protections for religious beliefs. With the hate speech laws tipped to be debated in parliament on Tuesday, Spender has put her amendment to both major parties in the hope they will join crossbench MPs in widening the scope of the draft laws. The sanction on promoting hatred would apply to speech that targets a person’s race, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, disability, nationality, ethnic origin or political opinion.
.
