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Legislative Council - Fifty-Fifth Parliament, First Session (55-1)
2023-11-02 Daily Xml
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Prohibition of Nazi Symbols

The Hon. T.A. FRANKS (15:10): I seek leave to make a brief explanation before addressing a question to the Attorney-General on the topic of the prohibition of Nazi symbols.

Leave granted.

The Hon. T.A. FRANKS: All other states in Australia and the ACT have now enacted bans outlawing the display of Nazi symbols, with the salute covered in some jurisdictions. These bans make exceptions, including for Hindus, Buddhists and other groups for whom the swastika is an important symbol predating its appropriation by Nazis.

In Victoria—they were the first state—they enacted a ban on 29 December 2022. There it is a criminal offence to display the Nazi symbols in public and it carries a maximum penalty of almost $22,000, 12 months' imprisonment, or both. There the government is also moving on the Nazi salute as well. New South Wales carries penalties of up to a year in prison and a fine of up to $11,000. Queensland, Tasmania and WA all similarly have significant penalties and jail time applied. Laws, of course, have also been introduced into the ACT, and there you can look at 12 months in jail for these crimes.

In June this year, the federal ALP Attorney-General progressed work in the federal parliament, noting that any federal laws need to be complemented by state and territory actions. As you are well aware, the Labor Party supported the Hon. Sarah Game to chair an inquiry in September 2022 to look at the prohibition of Nazi symbols in South Australia. That inquiry has now been going for over a year. It had submissions that closed in January 2023. It has not had a public hearing for over four months.

My question to the Attorney-General is: will the Malinauskas government wait for the One Nation-Labor alliance Select Committee on Prohibition of Neo-Nazi Symbols to report, or will it act to ban Nazi symbols in South Australia as every other state has now done?

The Hon. K.J. MAHER (Minister for Aboriginal Affairs, Attorney-General, Minister for Industrial Relations and Public Sector) (15:12): I thank the honourable member for her question. Certainly, this was an issue that—and I can't remember the exact date, but a few months ago when all the attorneys-general got together to meet—was discussed. At that stage, a few months ago—and I just can't remember the numbers—there were three states which had bans come into force. There were a couple of other jurisdictions, or at least one other, which had bans that had passed parliament, and other ones which had them in various stages of development, whether it be papers out or in parliament.

I think most jurisdictions would have had similar advice, that when there is a law that could be seen as curtailing the implied freedom of speech that is read into the constitution, it needs to be adapted to that jurisdiction—the response that occurs to that. I know that jurisdictions have had their own processes in terms of it, and a lot have had committees that have looked at this issue. I will certainly look at where it is up to in other jurisdictions and talk to the Chair of the committee in South Australia to look at what the next steps forward are in South Australia.

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