Page 830 - Week 03 - Wednesday, 9 April 2014
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Speeches . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . . Video
the right to vilify their peers on the grounds of race and cultural background. This is not conducive to our wonderfully multicultural Australia in which I was born and am proud to live.
I would like to note the hypocrisy shown by the federal government in their move to repeal 18C. The Liberal Party often talk about efficiency in the workplace or the lack thereof. They use this argument to attempt to undermine the rights of workers of Australia on a regular basis. Racial harassment and vilification are shown to clearly reduce the capacity at work, reduce one’s state of mental health and in turn reduce one’s efficiency in the workplace. If the Liberal Party were truly in favour of having a fair, yet efficient workplace they would not be proposing such a repeal.
This repeal will have the effect of allowing circumstances in the workplace to affect employees so severely that they become inefficient, due to the terrible state of mental health caused by racial vilification supposedly acceptable amongst members of the Liberal Party. And I say this is wrong. The repeal is bad for Australian people and the wrong thing for the Liberal Party to do, and that is why I commend Dr Bourke’s motion today.
The absurdity and possible consequences of the repeal of section 18C of the Racial Discrimination Act can be seen through the consequences of relaxed racial vilification laws across Europe in the past few years. The rise of the extreme right—Jobbik in Hungary, Front National in France and, most pertinently, Golden Dawn in Greece—demonstrate what can happen when racist and xenophobic minority movements are allowed to build a soapbox, particularly during times of economic hardship.
This leads to the spread of racist rhetoric into the minds of the general public, following which we see immigrants and refugees being assaulted in the street and denied access to care in public hospitals, as is a very common occurrence in the streets of Athens these days. This sort of environment is not what I want for my electorate of Brindabella, the ACT or Australia. The aims set out in this motion help to attempt to prevent that happening within the ACT at least.
I would like to also outline my support for a submission to the review of the commonwealth Racial Discrimination Act. It is important that, as members of the community and government which have its citizens’ welfare most at heart, we send a message to the federal government that it is not acceptable to spread hate, fear and exclusion. It is important that we know that this place values all people equally and we do not agree with allowing people to abuse, harass and vilify members of different ethnic, racial or cultural groups.
If the federal government will not do its job in protecting vulnerable citizens from racist and derogatory abuse and hate speech, a review of the ACT’s Discrimination Act 1991 may eventually provide this protection at least for ACT citizens. A strengthening of the Discrimination Act 1991, the ACT’s act, would provide protection from racial abuse where federal legislation fails to do so, depending on what the review finds and the eventual outcome of the federal government’s repeal attempts. This has the potential to be an excellent amendment to legislation.
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Speeches . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . . Video