Bill Shorten (Maribyrnong, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for the National Disability Insurance Scheme) Share this | Hansard source

It's now 10 minutes to 11.00 pm and there have been many speakers on the question of the Religious Discrimination Bill 2021. Sometimes in the life of a parliament, there are matters which are conducted which, regardless of who is in government or who is in opposition, would be conducted, and they're worthy matters. But, periodically and occasionally, there come matters which force all parliamentarians, on behalf of their constituents, to examine why it is they take the actions they do and why it is they will vote the way they do—perhaps to reach a little deeper into their own values and their own views to ask, 'What is in the national interest, what is in the interest of families and what is in the interest of Australians?

I believe, fundamentally, and I have believed this for my whole adult life, that this nation needs to find points of unity, points of commonality and points of agreement more than we do points of disagreement, points of division and points of fierce argument. This is an occasion where I believe that the parliament, whilst seeking the former, is achieving the latter: not more agreement, more unity and more commonality of purpose. I think this parliament is in danger, with this legislation, of making the wrong call and actually dividing the nation, not uniting the nation.

I don't think we need to give each other, no matter what one's political perspective, a big sermon on who is more morally pure or who is more virtuous. I believe that members of parliament, no matter what their background, their calling or their ideology, believe, by and large, in a free and respectful Australia, one where the rights of individuals and groups are respected. These are not universal rights to the point that someone can infringe upon someone else's rights but a point where someone should be able to practise their faith in a church, regardless of their religion, or, indeed, if they're a member of the LGBTQIA community, practise their life according to their values. I think parliamentarians would normally say that the nation should protect the rights of all Australians.

But what I am concerned about with this government legislation we are debating today and tonight, is that it seeks to legislate between competing rights of different groups. I think that is a mission or a task which is fraught with risk. My concern with the bill that the government presents, if it is not amended, is that it fails to contemplate—o, indeed, wilfully ignores—how this bill will affect the rights of Australians with disability. I worry that if this bill is not amended it will open the floodgates in relation to allowing people with disability to be insulted and vilified in the name of religion, which is not at all the function of faith.

Thankfully, that is less common today than it was in the past but, unfortunately, the following is not extinct: there are some people quoting some religious views which see disability as a result of divine intention, perhaps even the result of divine displeasure or a lack of faith on the part of the person with disability. There will be Australians driving on the roads tonight and listening to parliament, or there will be others who might read these words, who will say: 'Surely, that is an exaggeration? No-one in the name of a faith will vilify or denigrate, belittle or patronise a person with disability.' But, unfortunately, it does happen. This is certainly the informed view, a view I share, of the Australian Federation of Disability Organisations, the national voice representing people with a lived experience of disability in Australia. AFDO, unarguably representing people with disability, has stated:

People with disability are often subjected to unwelcome & uninvited statements of religious belief that demean disability as the result of sin, possession, or karma. While these may seem extreme religious views and statements, they are views commonly expressed to people with disability and the Bill will legitimise these views as long as they are personally held beliefs of religious doctrine and are made in good faith.

Mr. Michael Small from Disability Voices Tasmania advised; 'Some documented examples of current abuse are direct statements to people with disability that their disability is a "punishment from God for their, or their parents', sins"; their disability can be "healed by prayer" or by "living virtuously" or that they "deserve to suffer from their disability for what they have done in a previous life". Our concerns are that these existing discriminatory practices will be furthered and protected by this current Bill'.

Along with AFDO and Michael Small from Disability Voices Tasmania, I've been contacted by many people with disability and those who love and care for them, who are concerned that this Morrison government have neglected to consider the potential effect of this bill upon them. People with disability have not raised theoretical debating points; they have told me of some of their experiences of discrimination and vilification, behaviour that will be allowed if this bill is passed.

I want to share these examples with the parliament and other Australians tonight. I have been told of a Tasmanian teacher with a disability who was told by a relief teacher in a staffroom that the reason she was in a wheelchair was that she had something to learn in this life. I have been informed of a young girl at school being told by a playmate that the reason she uses a wheelchair is that her mother and father don't believe in God. A third example involves a women with a visible disability on a tram. This is a disturbing story. She felt she was being stared at. She turned to see a woman on the tram openly staring at her. She got off the tram to do her shopping and she went into a bookshop. This other woman followed her off the tram and into the bookshop and approached her and told her that she could be healed. The woman wanted to pray with her. People with a visible disability have also been told they deserve to suffer their disability for what they did in a previous life. All of these comments and statements of belief would be authorised by this government's legislation.

Then there is Mary Henley-Collopy: she's a fantastic person and she lives in my electorate. These are her words:

I am one of the millions of Australians who live with a significant physical disability. I have three fingers emanating from both shoulders and foreshortened legs. We, as Australians with disability, are amongst the most vulnerable in the community. I wish I was exaggerating when I tell you that for every one of my 60 years of life I have been regularly approached by people – mostly when they first meet me – who have made comments such as, 'if you came to our church, you could be healed'.

These offensive, hurtful, and degrading statements imply I am not 'whole' and that I need to be 'repaired' to fit the norm. I work very hard to not absorb these comments and to remain content with who I am. But it is tiring to have to do so and some days I feel quite hurt by such comments.

I am completely gobsmacked that the proposed Religious Discrimination Bill is even being considered! I find it incomprehensible that this proposed bill will override all anti-discrimination legislation already in place at both Commonwealth and State levels!

I need to ask – are we not learning from the tragic stories that have thus far been told to the Disability Royal Commission into Abuse, Neglect and Exploitation of People with Disability? This proposed bill has already triggered my own emotional experiences of the historic, extensive and continuing abuse of my community of people with disability.

People with disability have raised with me their concerns that, while some of these examples could currently be the basis of a discrimination complaint, the proposed bill would protect such deeply hurtful comments as protected 'statements of belief'.

Now, I do not want my comments to be construed as a criticism more broadly of our nation's varied religious and faith communities. Indeed, many people with disability and those who love and care for them are people of faith, and many churches and faith groups were amongst the first to get involved in and continue to deliver disability services. I do not believe the hurtful views of disability reflect the mainstream or modern doctrine of most major faith groups, but, unfortunately, they still exist. Even those people of faith who express these hurtful views, whilst in my view are thoroughly misguided, are not necessarily acting maliciously but certainly ignorantly. They often speak out a genuine belief, with no deliberate bad intent. Some indeed may think that they are saving the person with a disability to whom they address. But these statements can be shattering for people with disability. They set back the progress of disability as part of the mainstream Australian experience. Such attitudes are patronising. They set people apart. They involve seeing people with disabilities as objects of pity or charity, receptacles of God's will, instead of fully rounded people in their own right. Such attitudes infect the day-to-day lives of people with disability.

People with disability are also concerned whether they can retain their current rights not to be discriminated against in employment service provision or access to accommodation. The government is explicitly authorising permitting statements of belief that will harm, hurt, vilify and discriminate against people with disabilities. By introducing clause 12 in this bill, it specifically authorises that statements of religious belief are no longer subject to the Disability Discrimination Act and comparable state instruments. There can be no other interpretation. I mean, what is really going on here? Can it really be the government's intent to remove protections against people with disability just so that other people can enjoy more protections?

We have a hyperpolitical Prime Minister who is not the Prime Minister for uniting Australia but the Prime Minister for dividing Australia. He cunningly pits different groups of Australians against each other for his own political advancement. It is my belief that even faith groups in this debate are being treated unfairly as a political football by our divider in chief. How on earth has the Prime Minister got the parliament and the nation to the point where the proposition is that one group can improve their rights but only at the expense of another group? According to the Prime Minister, people of faith, with their religious beliefs, can only have that if kids and people with disabilities lose some of their rights.

I want to be very clear: I have no doubt that discrimination against people of faith is real. The weeping sore on the history of the 20th century anti-Semitism is unfortunately not a thing of the history books, nor is Islamophobia, and neither is the sectarianism of casual jeering references to Christians and their faith. Discrimination against people faith is real, it is deplorable, and it has no place in Australian society. It is wrong.

But I fear, in the name of religious freedoms, gay kids at school and people with disabilities could feel the increasing sting of discrimination. This is wrong. How do government MPs explain to constituents that your faith can be protected, but your gay kids may not, and family members with disabilities can be subject to ignorant comments?

Trying to legislate against these competing rights is a fool's errand. I suspect that if the Prime Minister has his way with this legislation, it will be a lawyers picnic where the only real winners will be the people in the horse-hair wigs. I suspect it will be open lawfare, and there'll be unforeseen consequences, and not just for the values of those on our side of the aisle. How does it help people of faith and religious freedom, with values of love, compassion and dignity and moral justice, when other vulnerable groups lose protections or have their protections diminished?

The story of our Labor Party and the Labor movement, but also the story of the Australian parliament, the story of the Australian people, is about including more people, embracing more people, in the definition of fairness, broadening the circles of Australian democracy, extending our embrace to all people of all identities. It is ever-changing, ever-expanding. The moral values I grew up with 13 years of Catholic education were about extending compassion, not cutting children from it, not cutting vulnerable Australians from it. People of faith need their rights protected. But so do people with disabilities, so do people in the LBGTIQ+ community.

I fear that parliament is settling for a rushed, inferior piece of legislation. It's not what Mr Ruddock wanted. It's not what I think Mr Turnbull had in mind. It's not what people of faith seek. It's not what people with disabilities deserve. This parliament can do better than this legislation, and we will rue the day, if this legislation passes the Senate.

See this speech in context