Page 4257 - Week 10 - Wednesday, 21 September 2011
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support from the Labor Party or the Greens. But we genuinely hoped to get support for this bill.
This bill contains one substantive clause. It inserts into the Discrimination Act an exception or, should I say, another exception, as there are many in the act already. Even a cursory consideration of the practical application of the Discrimination Act demonstrates that exceptions can and indeed must be included. It would be absurd if the Discrimination Act was used to tell an innkeeper that refusing service to minors was a breach of their human rights. That would be absurd. It would be absurd if the Discrimination Act was used to tell a gambling provider that refusing service to minors was a breach of their human rights. And it is absurd to threaten a school principal with the Discrimination Act for trying to encourage local communities to help keep kids in school.
The clear proof of the requirement for exemptions is in the act itself. There are 15 grounds for discrimination listed in the act, ranging from sex to spent convictions. Yet there are 23 pages of exceptions. These exceptions are to protect communities and groups from unintended consequences, just as this amendment would have done. The entirety of part 4 of the act is completely devoted to exemptions. Without them, the act is absurd.
There are exemptions for domestic duties, for residential care for children, for adoption, for domestic accommodation, for the pre-selection by employment agencies, for insurance and for superannuation. Acts done under a statutory authority are exempt, as are voluntary bodies, religious bodies or educational institutions. There are exemptions about sex, relationship status, pregnancy and breastfeeding. Exemptions exist for the employment of a couple, accommodation for employees and clubs for members of one sex.
Sport has exemptions. Clubs have exemptions. Jobs have exemptions. There are exemptions for racial and religious workers and for political workers. There are exemptions for dramatic performances and entertainment, for access to premises, for the provision of goods and services, for public health and for private clubs. There are exemptions for the aged and for the young. There are exemptions for minimums and maximums, for health and safety, for services and facilities, for recreational tools and accommodation and in relation to profession, trade, occupation or calling.
Yet we are told by the Labor Party and the Greens today that we would not really be able to make these kinds of exemptions, that we could not have an exemption of this kind. How absurd! How ridiculous! What a fig leaf when you see the number of exemptions that we have in the act. What an absolute fig leaf from the Labor Party and the Greens, because they want to protect their ideological position. Their ideological position is to back the human rights commissioner at any cost, to knock back a principal trying to do his job. That is what they will be found out for in this case. They had the choice to fix the law.
In fact it was Mr Corbell, when we had a debate in this place, who said to us, “If you do not like it, the proper way is to come back and change the act.” That is what we sought to do. We took him up on his offer and sought to change the act but when he
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