Monique Ryan (Kooyong, Independent) Share this | Hansard source

All democratic governments have to balance the freedom to express cultural and religious opinions with the competing need to ensure their citizens' freedom from discrimination. I'm concerned that, given the time pressures on this parliament, the Albanese government is rushing consideration of a really difficult and complex piece of legislation and, in doing so, has doomed this legislation to outlaw hate crimes in this country to failure. Between 2017 and 2021, under the previous government, we saw a series of inquiries and proposals to introduce protections against religious discrimination. That process ended with the unsuccessful Religious Discrimination Bill 2022.

At the last election, this government promised to introduce legal protections for religious beliefs but also to legislate to protect teachers and students from discrimination. Despite that promise, the Prime Minister indicated during this term that the government would not proceed with that religious discrimination reform without bipartisan support, and it has not done so. I felt that that was appropriate. I think that bipartisan support is really important for these important pieces of public policy, which brings us to this legislation, the Criminal Code Amendment (Hate Crimes) Bill 2024, aimed as it is at combating the increasing antisemitism and Islamophobia which have been evident in Australian society since 7 October 2023.

The last 16 months have been a time of untold tragedy in the Middle East. The actions of Hamas on 7 October 2023, and the subsequent response by the Israeli government, have resulted in enormous human loss and suffering in Israel, in Gaza and in the other occupied territories. Australia's Jewish community felt the loss, the shock and the horror of October 7 immediately and profoundly. For so many, these events have affected their family members, their friends and their loved ones in Australia but also in Israel. In recent months, the increasing wave of antisemitism in this country has compounded their trauma and their grief. Australian Jews have had to deal with racially based hatred of a degree and an extent previously unknown to them, although many have told me that antisemitism is, sadly, not new to them. The trauma of these last 16 months has exacerbated their received memory—the buried but ever-present intergenerational impact of the Holocaust on diasporic Jewish communities—while it has also created a new trauma in which they have seen an upending of the very reasonable assumption that the past is the past.

That new knowledge, that understanding that antisemitism is a real, present, confronting and constant issue in Australia today, has traumatised the Australian Jewish community. It has shocked those of us that are not Jewish but stand with those that are and reject and abhor this most ancient of hatreds. In many respects, it feels as though our society's capacity for respectful dialogue and empathy has been lost. Our understanding and tolerance, our support for other families in our communities and our gratitude for the many cultures and histories which contribute to our rich social fabric seem strained and difficult. It seems that we no longer have common ground where we have had it before. Our accepting communities seemed to have hardened. They've become less generous and less inclusive.

Sadly, rather than acting in a bipartisan and respectful way around these difficult times, many have chosen to politicise and weaponise the horrific events of October 7, the ongoing plight of the hostages and their families, the tragic impact of the Israeli government's response upon innocent Palestinian civilians and the ongoing grief and trauma of those who watch from afar. Politicisation of this tragedy has made no-one safer; rather, it has exacerbated the anxiety and the fear felt by so many. I therefore supported yesterday's motion in parliament to deplore the appalling and unacceptable rise in antisemitism in Australia, including attacks on synagogues, schools, homes and childcare centres. I unequivocally condemn and reject antisemitism and racism in all of their forms, as I condemn similar hate directed to any group in our community. Jewish Australians should not, and no Australians should, have to live with discrimination and vilification based on their religion. I call on all of my colleagues in this place to support this rejection of hatred and ignorance and to express solidarity with our Jewish Australian brothers and sisters.

Australia's Muslim community has also been affected by an increase in religious and culturally motivated hate speech. I think of the constituent who came to my office and told me that she cannot and will not speak of such things publicly because, on the only occasion that she did, she was labelled a terrorist by her friends. I think of the mum who brought her two small children to my electorate office not long after October 7. They told me that they were really worried for their cousins in Gaza. These small children were sad because they felt that this country didn't care about them or about their loss.

Australia's anti-islamophobia envoy, Aftab Malik, has already reported that Islam is associated in the media and in the majority of the public mind with radicalism, extremism and terrorism. He has reported that Islamophobia is normalised in Australia but that it is underreported, and that violence, hatred and discrimination against Muslims are widespread daily realities in this country. So I call on my colleagues in this place to also reject that hatred and that ignorance and to express solidarity with our Muslim Australian brothers and sisters.

The events of the last 16 months firstly led to the Counter-Terrorism Legislation Amendment (Prohibited Hate Symbols and Other Measures) Bill 2023, which I supported when we legislated it in 2023. The new and additional measures included in the bill now before the House are a further response to the increasing prevalence of hate speech and hateful conduct in our society. The bill extends protections to groups defined by race, religion, nationality, national or ethnic origin, or political opinion to add sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, intersex status—which is an outmoded terminology, and I agree with the member for Wentworth that it should be altered to 'sexual characteristics'—and disability.

The bill as presented to this parliament has actually stepped back from the government's initial plan, which was to criminalise religious hate speech; instead, conduct will be criminalised only where it involves threats of force or violence. We do have to maintain a balance between the freedom of expression and protecting the Australian community from discrimination and hate. We have to have carefully framed laws which proscribe speech and inciting radicalisation and violence. While protection of freedom of expression is crucial in certain circumstances, that right has to be subject to limitation, and that includes advocacy of hatred, which constitutes incitement to discrimination.

Many Kooyong constituents have described to me in recent months how they feel that the federal laws we have passed in this place are not being enforced in Melbourne and that they no longer feel safe in our city on weekends. I have responded by asking the federal and state attorneys-general to clarify their attitudes to these and to other concerns, including the ongoing protests in the city of Melbourne every weekend. It's frustrating that just this week in Victorian parliament the Liberal opposition has voted against legislation which is similar to that now before this house. The fact that we have a hodgepodge melange of ineffective state and federal legislations around these matters is frustrating for people who are most concerned by them. The public deserves to understand and feel protected by our laws. They need to know they will be enforced; otherwise, our actions here and those of our state governments are pointless. But our responsibility to the public is also to ensure that any limitations that we put on their ability to gather peacefully, and to express their ideas and opinions, are necessary, precise, and proportionate.

It's unclear to what extent this legislation currently in front of the House will be impactful. I note there have been no prosecutions or convictions in the 35 years since New South Wales criminalised vilification involving threats of physical harm or property damage. These new Commonwealth offences have complex definitions. It will be challenging to prove them beyond a reasonable doubt.

We also have a responsibility to identify and understand the drivers that are attracting people to the far right and to act in the ways we are attempting to address with the legislation currently before the House. The horrific firebombing of the Adass Israel synagogue in Ripponlea in Melbourne was a terrorist attack. So too were the two attacks on synagogues in Sydney and the horrifying recent attack on a childcare centre in Sydney. The finding of a caravan packed with explosives shocked the whole country.

Passing legislation of the sort currently before the House will not stop those sorts of activities. We have to do more to understand who is committing these crimes, what motivates them and how we can cut antisemitism and other forms of racism off at the roots. Passage of these laws in the House today will not stop those forms of mindless violence. We have to do better as a nation. We have to work to find what binds us and not what divides us. We have to say publicly and repeatedly, in the face of hate speech, 'No, never again.'

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