David Smith (Bean, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

Just yesterday, before the commencement of the parliamentary year here in 2025, many members from right across parliament came together at St Christopher's Cathedral for what I see as almost a traditional display of unity and togetherness—a reminder that, often, there are many things that bring us together and less that keeps us apart. That ecumenical prayer service, which has been going for more than 50 years now, is something which is a reminder for each and every one of us that the words that we say in this parliament matter. It is critical that we should be working for the common good. And, really, that's the frame for this legislation. It comes also a week after I was at the National Jewish Memorial Centre in Forrest—which is only really a stone's throw from St Christopher's Cathedral—to announce the investment by the Albanese government of $4 million for a Holocaust education resource to ensure that, for generations to come, they continue to know the story about the absolute horror of the Holocaust. We can't neglect the importance of education in this space.

But, getting to this legislation, this bill, of course, creates new criminal offences and strengthens existing offences against hate speech. That's the key and heart of this. The amendments in this proposed legislation protect groups distinguished by their race, religion, nationality, national or ethnic origin, political opinion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity and disability and members of those groups. This bill would strengthen existing offences relating to urging violence against a group or a member of a group. They apply where a person urges others to use violence against a group or a member of a group and is reckless as to whether the violence urged will occur. This bill will also create a new criminal offence for threatening force or violence against a group or members of a group to cover conduct involving a direct threat from one person to another. And it amends the existing offences of publicly displaying prohibited hate symbols, specifically to cover targeted groups distinguished by those factors that I outlined but, in particular, by existing attributes of race, colour, sex, language, religion, political or other opinion or national or social origin.

This bill sends a clear and unambiguous message that urging or threatening violence and advocating acts of hatred are not acceptable in our country. It is criminal behaviour and will be treated as such. This should be a unity ticket for this parliament. This is something that should bring together people from across the aisle and across all different political groupings in the parliament. It's important. The Australian people are looking to us to show that sense of unity and to show that sense of togetherness that, as I outlined, was pretty clearly present at that prayer service before we commenced parliament this year. Often, the challenge with such services is to ensure the messages that we hear there actually get past question time on the first day.

As I said, this bill sends a clear and unambiguous message that urging or threatening violence and advocating acts of hatred are not acceptable in our country. It is criminal behaviour and it will be treated as such. There is clear concern from key parts of our community, quite understandably, about such actions occurring right across our community. The criminal offences that are outlined in this bill will support law enforcement's ability to disrupt, investigate and protect against the activities of those who foster hatred and incite violence, discrimination and other serious damage. The offences in this bill complement existing Commonwealth, state and territory civil and criminal protections against hate speech. The offences in this bill have been carefully crafted to target the most serious forms of harmful hate speech—namely the urging and threatening of force or violence.

The robust expression of diverse opinions is an important feature of our democracy, and the measures in this bill respect the need for vibrant public debate. The offences are not intended to criminalise mere expressions of belief or opinion. But what we're seeing in Sydney, in particular, is not expressions of robust, diverse opinions. They have been expressions of hatred and they have been designed to incite racial hatred. It's important that, where we can, we send the message that we are working together and that this is a shared mission of this parliament. Wherever there's a sense that there is division or dissent on these matters, it's fodder for those who are trying to foment this hatred across our communities. It certainly doesn't reflect the concerns that have been raised by local communities in my electorate of Bean and across the Canberra community.

It's important that this parliament passes legislation like this before we depart this fortnight. It's critical that this federal parliament is seen to act and actually get through key changes because this is the sort of leadership that our communities are looking for. They see it as our responsibility. Whether you're coming from the regions or from the cities, whatever state or territory you might come from, these are issues that should be bringing us together. We have a responsibility to act together, and I support the resolution.

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