Independent MP Allegra Spender, whose electorate is home to the nation’s largest Jewish community and also takes in large sections of Sydney’s LGBTQ nightlife areas, has supported broad-based hate speech laws that go beyond solely a protection of race.
Allegra Spender at Bondi following the December 14 mass shooting.
Credit: Kate Geraghty
“Our priority must be the Jewish community because of the specific threat they face. But protecting others against hatred as well doesn’t lessen our protections of the Jewish community,” Spender told this masthead.
“Inciting hatred against any group in our country is not OK … I don’t understand why our parliament would say neo-Nazis can’t incite hatred on one group, but then let them use the same phrases to incite hatred against another group.”
Spender proposed amendments to hate speech laws in the last term of parliament that would have seen a serious vilification offence included, but the measure was blocked by Labor and the Coalition.
The most recent attempt to tackle the decades-long debate over hate speech foundered during the last term of parliament, when then attorney-general Mark Dreyfus abandoned proposed criminal penalties for serious vilification on the basis of race, sexuality, gender, disability or religion, following months of debate.
Loading
On Wednesday, Ley repeated her demand that Albanese immediately recall parliament to pass the hate speech reforms. Ley said parliament should have returned before Christmas, dismissing arguments from the prime minister on Tuesday that the legislation was complex and faced potential High Court challenges.
“This is just a series of excuses from this prime minister, and we’ve just had excuse after excuse to give real recognition and real understanding, not just to victims’ families, but to the national crisis of antisemitism that we face,” Ley said.
Sources close to the government told this masthead on Tuesday that Albanese had opened the door to calling a Commonwealth royal commission into antisemitism despite weeks of opposition from the government.
Loading
The parliament is expected to be recalled before Australia Day, ahead of schedule, to debate hate speech laws.
Two neo-Nazis have been raided by border officials and now face deportation. In late December, a 20-year-old Ukrainian national in the group was raided by Border Force and is now being held in immigration detention in Melbourne. National Socialist Network leader Thomas Sewell told followers on a video stream that the man expected to be deported soon.
Ryan Turner, a British national and NSN member who had been helping lead the group’s boxing training in Western Australia, was also detained by officials on Tuesday and taken to immigration detention, where he now awaits deportation. Turner’s visa was cancelled on character grounds. Both men will have a chance to appeal against the decision to cancel their visas.
On Tuesday, One Nation leader Pauline Hanson wrote to Albanese asking him to lift a seven-day suspension from the Senate she received in the final sitting week of last year after she wore a burqa into the chamber. Hanson said the ban would prevent her from debating the new hate speech laws once parliament is recalled.
