Labor’s Promised Hate Speech Bill Will Not Deal with ‘Hate Speech’

Labor has scrubbed criminal penalties for seriously vilifying minority groups from its upcoming hate crimes bill, just months after Prime Minister Anthony Albanese promised to introduce stronger measures to protect people from hate speech.

Sources familiar with Labor’s promised “hate speech” bill said it had been significantly weakened in the final stages of drafting and was now starkly different from Albanese’s original pledge, which was made earlier this year following months of dispute over the war in Gaza and community concerns about inflamed antisemitism.

Attorney-General Mark Dreyfus will introduce the bill to parliament on Thursday but sources, who spoke anonymously as they were bound to confidentiality in order to be briefed, said it will not use the words “hate speech” nor introduce a serious anti-vilification law, which was a key aim of the bill. Instead, it will focus on acts and threats of violence.

This masthead exclusively reported in May that Dreyfus was drafting a hate speech bill that would impose criminal penalties for serious instances of vilification based on a person’s race, sexuality, gender, disability or religion.

The softer version of the laws will disappoint those who had demanded strong action on hate speech, such as LGBTQ advocates and Jewish representatives, but should satisfy stakeholders who were more concerned about freedom of religion and speech, such as Christian groups.

It also creates another fraught political dispute for Albanese, who will be forced to clarify how he intends to fulfil his promise to get tougher on hate speech if the bill does not allay community concerns, particularly around antisemitism. The government spent the last fortnight tied in knots over its commitment to LGBTQ questions in the census as it tried to avoid a divisive debate.

Jewish groups, for example, had sought assurance from the government that the laws would address concerns about the antisemitic phrases chanted by protesters near the Sydney Opera House following Hamas’ October 7 terrorist attack on Israel.

Executive Council of Australian Jewry president Daniel Aghion in February welcomed the Albanese government’s commitment to strengthen hate speech laws and introduce separate anti-doxxing laws, which will also happen this week. “We have called for an end to the impunity and we are grateful that the government has listened,” he said at the time.

LGBTQ groups have also been pushing for stronger protections, particularly since the government walked away from its election promise to remove a controversial part of the sex discrimination act that allows religious schools to discriminate against staff and students.

Equality Australia chief executive Anna Brown in May said: “With attacks on the rise, especially against trans people, there is an urgent need for national laws to protect LGBTIQ+ communities from hate speech and vilification.”

Victoria’s anti-vilification laws, for example, prohibit behaviour that “incites hatred, serious contempt, revulsion or severe ridicule” of people based on race or religion. The threshhold for the federal law would have been much higher, but people consulted on it were at odds over the balance between free speech and making the protections strong enough to win prosecutions.

The Australian Christian Lobby has previously pushed back on any laws that would criminalise the legitimate exercise of freedom of speech or religion, saying that would violate human rights.

The bill acts on Albanese’s commitment from February, when he said: “I’ve asked … the Attorney-General to develop proposals to strengthen laws against hate speech, which we will be doing. This is not the Australia that we want to see.”

But Albanese, when asked in question time on Tuesday if the government would enact comprehensive vilification protections for LGBTQ Australians, said: “The government will be introducing legislation this week to create new criminal offences and strengthen protections against hate crimes”.

He did not directly mention anti-vilification measures or hate speech. Stakeholders were also recently informed the government had changed course on its plans after originally being told the bill would deal with serious examples of vilification.

The new laws will focus on incitement, and strengthen existing sections in the criminal code that already prohibit urging violence against minority groups. The existing laws have not led to prosecutions, and minority faiths, including Muslim, Sikh and Jewish groups, have for years sought stronger anti-vilification measures.

Christian groups have historically been lukewarm on anti-vilification laws in case they weaken religious freedom.

While the Coalition has typically opposed legislative curbs on free speech, Opposition Leader Peter Dutton has this year joined the political push for stronger hate speech laws, citing rising antisemitism.

The Labor caucus approved the new legislation on Tuesday, clearing the way for it to be introduced on Thursday. Dreyfus’ office declined to comment.