Mark Dreyfus (Isaacs, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Attorney General) Share this | Hansard source

Labor have our own amendments in relation to the statement of belief, which is clause 12 of the Religious Discrimination Bill. While we have some sympathy for the amendment that has been moved by the leader of the Greens party, which is to delete clause 12 in its entirety, after consideration, our view is reflected in the amendment that I will later move as an amendment to the government amendments. We've concluded that a better approach is simply to remove the override of state and territory discrimination statutes and to remove the specific override of section 17 of the Tasmanian Anti-Discrimination Act, but to leave part of clause 12 intact with an amendment which would provide clarity that a statement of belief or religious activity in and of itself won't constitute discrimination under the Religious Discrimination Bill. We think that that is a better way to reassure people of faith that, in our view, the mere expression of a non-malicious statement of belief should not contravene any Australian law—and I will have more to say about this—but it's certainly the case that there has been a great deal of disagreement about what clause 12 would allow, what it would not allow. It's simply that we think that the better approach is as set out in the amendments moved by the Greens party.

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