EQUAL OPPORTUNITY (MISCELLANEOUS) AMENDMENT BILL

Second Reading

Adjourned debate on second reading.

(Continued from 3 February 2009. Page 1156.)

The Hon. I.K. HUNTER (21:36): I rise this evening to voice my support for this bill and to congratulate the Minister for the Status of Women on the privilege of introducing it to this chamber. It is self-evident that, as time passes, society's values and attitudes change and, as these values and attitudes progress, we must ensure that legislation reflects this progress. At this point in time, the equal opportunity legislation that we have in South Australia does not.

The Equal Opportunity Act, as it currently exists, is more than 20 years old. By any estimation, that is a long time not to have had any change in a piece of legislation such as this. In fact, we all know that, more than 14 years ago, the then Liberal government believed that enough time had elapsed to call for a review of the act. Almost a decade and a half later, those recommendations are yet to be acted on.

Whilst I am pleased that this legislation has now been introduced, I am sad that it has taken so long. Since this revised version of the legislation was first mooted, there have been a series of negotiations with the opposition about a format that both the government and opposition would find acceptable.

I felt that we were making real and significant headway in approaching this from a bipartisan standpoint, so I am a little disappointed that after these long and protracted negotiations to create a piece of legislation that could be supported by both of the major parties we are now coming to this debate knowing that the opposition has not yet got a party room view on this legislation and that it is mooting giving its members a conscience vote, at least on some clauses.

I am not sure of the logic behind this decision. I appreciate that conscience votes are given when legislation goes to areas of personal ethics and morality, but surely providing equality of treatment and freedom from discrimination should be a basic human right. To my mind, there is no moral quandary for such a proposition. Perhaps it is a matter of some people being more equal than others for some MPs.

I remind members that last year we saw a significant milestone—the 60th anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights—which I think we can all agree is an important document. When the United Nations Commission on Human Rights came together to formulate the declaration in the wake of the Second World War, those members came with wildly varied ideological backgrounds. One could argue that they were much more widely disparate than what we find in this place, with representatives from Australia, the US, France, China, Iran and the USSR amongst those involved in the drafting.

One of the basic principles that they could agree on was that all humans are entitled to non-discrimination. I urge members to keep that in mind as they come to making their decision about whether they will support this legislation.

This legislation is not aimed at putting hardships on people. It is not about making life more difficult for employers, business owners or educational facilities, but it is about making sure that all South Australians can fully participate in society without fear of prejudice.

Although the Minister for the Status of Women has already eloquently explained this bill, I will take this opportunity to look at the main points of this legislation again, because I understand that there is still some confusion in the minds of some members of this council.

The proposed changes in relation to discrimination on the ground of caring responsibilities has been refined in the Equal Opportunity (Miscellaneous) Amendment Bill to reflect the relationships covered in the commonwealth Sex Discrimination Act. This bill, however, extends further than the federal legislation in that it takes into consideration indirect discrimination and it protects carer relationships that fall under Aboriginal kinship rules.

The new bill proposes that the domestic partner status, as it is defined in other pieces of South Australian legislation, be included in the state's equal opportunity legislation. It is important that we make sure that there is conformity across acts in this state.

I am aware that there were concerns about religious appearance or dress in the previously proposed legislation and whether religious schools should be able to prohibit students from wearing dress or adornments from their religion if they wish to do so. For example, some Christian schools were concerned about Jewish students wearing the Star of David or female Muslim students wearing a hijab. This concern should be allayed with the provisions in the proposed new legislation, which will mean that schools can continue to prevent students from wearing religious adornments of religions other than the school's religion. Whilst I find such provisions objectionable, I understand that, as compromise often means, we have had to remove that provision from the bill.

So, there we have it: another example of some religious wanting to continue with a policy of discrimination. I understand that the member for Fisher in the other place has also, sensibly, proposed an amendment that a person be required to show his or her face for the purposes of reasonable identification, and that condition has been included in this bill.

Proposed new section 87(3) outlines that sexual harassment complaints can be brought against students who are 16 years or older. I believe that this is a reasonable compromise. In the 2006 bill a complaint could be raised against a student of 12 years or older. Opponents argued that a child of 12 did not have the capacity or maturity to be subjected to this legislation, and so the age was raised through negotiations with the Liberals. Surely, if we believe that young adults can be in control of a motor vehicle at the age of 16, they must then have the discernment to refrain from sexual harassment and, if they do not refrain, they should be expected to face the consequences. I believe that this is yet another very sensible component of the changes from the 2006 bill to the bill now before us.

In line with the 2006 bill, this bill proposes to reduce the scope of institutions that discriminate on the ground of sexuality to religious schools only. I feel that this provision is out of step with the values of the wider community, however. As the Minister for the Status of Women outlined, an argument can be made that those who accept public funding should comply with the standards set by the public by legislation, and religious schools do receive substantial funding from the public purse.

There is no reason why this exemption should be allowed, in my view—except for those grating voices of a vocal minority whose bigotry is well displayed by their discriminatory practices. They should be held up to public standards, or perhaps they should stop seeking public funding if they do not see fit to uphold these standards. However, as before, that has been excluded from the provisions of this bill. That is regrettable but, again, this is the result of the compromise at which we arrived.

However, I am pleased that the requirement for such exclusionary policies to be publicised is included. Not everyone who belongs to a religion accepts all precepts of that religion completely, and those who belong to a religion that, by and large, does not accept homosexuality do not always accept or support such discrimination. People in that situation should be aware of exactly what sort of religious education their children will receive should they decide to send them to such a religious institution so that they can choose to avoid bigotry in education.

When the 2006 equal opportunity bill was brought before the parliament I know there were some who were concerned about the proposed expansion of section 86 of the act. Such an extension would have made it unlawful to engage in a public act inciting hatred of a person or a group of persons on a ground of discrimination to which the act applied. Those who have such fears can now rest easy. That provision also has been removed from the bill presently before us and, if it fits with their belief system to do so, they can continue to incite hatred against people based on gender, race or any other ground of discrimination covered by the act without fear of breaking the law.

I am aware that many concerns have been raised with many MPs and voiced often by some so-called Christian groups. I have received about 100 emails from people belonging to these organisations. Personally, I am not a religious man but, as far as I understand the central tenets of the Christian faith, inciting hatred towards anyone is never an answer to the eternal question: what would Jesus do?

But apparently there are some who felt that their religious freedoms would be curbed by the existence of such a clause. So Family First can rest easy; their candidates can continue to urge the pulling down of mosques and their supporters can continue to urge the burning of lesbians at the stake. Let us just remind ourselves, perhaps, of some of the so-called freedom of speech that Family First want to defend in opposing this bill. First of all, let us reference the ABC's excellent religious affairs program Compass and its program of 2005 on Family First. In that program, the narrator tells us:

The national spotlight fell on Family First finally when a Brisbane party volunteer made a comment at a pre-polling booth that lesbians like Ingrid Tall—

a Liberal Party candidate—

should be burnt at the stake along with all the other witches.

Further into the program, the narrator tells us:

Adding fuel to the media flames—

and what a prescient choice of words that was—

were revelations that a religious tract issued by Family First candidate Danny Nalliah had implored Christians to pray to bring down 'Satan's strongholds' including bottle shops, brothels and Buddhist temples.

That was the ABC, but others have provided the direct quote from that leaflet:

Ask the Lord to give you insight. Spot Satan's strongholds in the area you are living in (brothels, gambling places, bottle shops, mosques, temples—Freemasons/Buddhist/Hindu etc...witchcraft.

Yes, this Family First Senate candidate, Pastor Danny Nalliah, is the very same person that Family First raised in relation to opposing this bill because of a charge in Victoria against him and another pastor for vilification. The original judgment against Pastor Nalliah and Pastor Scott was overturned on appeal, to be sure, but even then this is what the appeal court found his colleague and co-accused Danny Scott had said (and I reference the Crikey website for this quote):

Muslim people, when they come [to] some teaching, which they don't like people should know, they will tell the truth—

I think there was a slight error there; they go on to correct this, and I continue:

They will not tell the truth. They will hide the truth. They will tell lies. And concerning money, I mean we think of money but Muslims pour money in evangelism and building mosques and so on. So they have a lot of money, which mostly comes from oil, and all of you know that it was mentioned during September 11 that 70% of drugs, which go to England, they are from...Afghanistan and other Islamic countries. So they make a lot of money from there also so that they can spread Islam and fulfil their desire.

The appeal court judge said:

Pastor Scott did assert, incorrectly, that the population of Muslims in Australia is growing such as to double every seven years and said that 'so that is how they are growing, so because they have control over our Immigration Department and they bring all types of people'.

That is the sort of incoherent and inaccurate speech that Family First are desperate to protect in opposing this bill. Let us hear some more from Pastor Nalliah himself. On multiculturalism, he has said:

Like a pressure cooker or bottle of soda water waiting to explode, the simmering racial war will reach its inevitable climax later, if not sooner...The multicultural melting pot has turned into a pressure cooker and it's now a case of assimilate or implode Australia.

Not one to hide his light under a bushel, Pastor Nalliah has written about himself:

Pastor Danny has travelled to many countries in Europe, Eastern Europe, Asia, Middle East, Africa, USA, Australia and has ministered to crowds of more than ten thousand people. He has seen thousands come into the Kingdom of God during these meetings and many blind, deaf, dump—

but I am sure he meant 'dumb'—

crippled people healed by the power of God. He also writes in his book of the dead girl who came back to life when he prayed for her in Jesus' name.

At the very least, one has to query his medical qualifications and just what exactly is his definition of 'dead'. Finally, I would like to quote from a media release from Catch the Fire Ministries (CTFM) headed 'Abortion laws to blame for bushfires'. It states:

CTFM leader Pastor Danny Nalliah said he would spearhead an effort to provide every assistance to devastated communities—

so far so good—

although he was not surprised by the bushfires due to a dream he had last October relating to consequences of the abortion laws passed in Victoria. He said these bushfires have come as a result of the incendiary abortion laws which decimate life in the womb. Besides providing material assistance, Catch the Fire ministries will commence a seven-day prayer and fasting campaign for the nation of Australia tomorrow, Wednesday 11^th.

What sort of credulous boobies are they who follow this nutter? I am sorry that Family First members are not here. Pace, Mr Hood and Mr Brokenshire, that was an entirely rhetorical question. Most of us here do know only too well the answer to that question.

Family First has been vigorous in its defence of the 'two Dannys', as they affectionately called them, linking our EO bill in South Australia not quite accurately with the Victorian bill and its vilification provisions. I am sure that the Hon. Mr Hood and the Hon. Mr Brokenshire are now quite clear that this bill before us no longer contains such a provision, but it seems that many of their supporters do not and continue to send emails to MPs opposing this bill on some specious fear that it restricts freedom of speech. It will not.

These are the main points of the legislation as I see them. I think it is very important, long overdue legislation, and I urge all members to support it. Before I conclude, though, I would like to address an article that appeared in The Advertiser of 19 August 2008, authored by the Hon. Dennis Hood. The opinion piece was entitled 'Freedoms being eroded by political correctness', and referred to this bill as 'political correctness gone mad'. This seems to be a catchall phrase for anyone these days who wants to say absolutely anything with absolutely no responsibility and absolutely no regard whatsoever for the consequences.

The Hon. Mr Hood wrote that he was concerned that this bill would impinge on the right to freedom of speech. I am not sure how the honourable member now feels, having actually seen and been able to read the contents of this bill, rather than prophesising about what was going to be contained. I would say this to him, though: if he still holds such concerns, I, too, cherish the right to freedom of speech.

Perhaps one day it will be enshrined in a state or national bill of rights, and I would welcome the honourable member's assistance in lobbying for that issue, if he would like to. But I recognise that with rights come responsibilities. And the point of this legislation—the point of all legislation—is that even mature, sensible adults do not always act responsibly. If they did, we would not need to have this legislation, nor would we need to worry about people speeding, taking illicit drugs, or harming others. But we do.

For fear of being dismissed as merely a godless lefty, and thus having my opinions discounted by the fact, I turn to the words of South African Anglican Bishop Desmond Tutu, a Christian who is grossly offended by the idea of discrimination of any kind. He states:

Apartheid, crassly racist, sought to penalise people for something about which they could do nothing—their ethnicity, their skin colour. Most of the world agreed that that was unacceptable, that it was unjust. I joined the many who campaigned against injustice that the church tolerated in its ranks when women were not allowed to be ordained. They were being penalised for something about which they could do nothing, their gender. Mercifully, that is no longer the case in our province of the Anglican Communion, and how enriched we have been by this move.

I could not stand by while people were being penalised again for something about which they could do nothing—their sexual orientation. I am humbled and honoured to stand shoulder to shoulder with those who seek to end this egregious wrong inflicted on God's children.

As this irreproachable man of God is saying so eloquently, all people are created equal. There is no such thing as some people being more equal than others. And we cannot stand by and do nothing while discrimination is perpetrated in our community.

Ultimately, there are aspects of this bill that I personally think could have gone further, and there might be aspects that others believe go too far. That is what happens when negotiations occur and compromise is arrived at. In that spirit of negotiation I believe that the Equal Opportunity (Miscellaneous) Amendment Bill strikes the right balance between addressing the concerns that have been held about previous proposed changes to the Equal Opportunity Act and protecting South Australians from discrimination.

To my respected colleagues, let me say this: let us not rally our citizens with inflammatory calls to tear down the strongholds of Satan; let us move them with appeals to their better natures to bring down the walls of hatred and of bigotry and of discrimination that still surrounds too many hearts in our nation.

Debate adjourned on motion of Hon. J.M. Gazzola.