The day that was – Friday 4 February
And that is it for Friday’s blog.
Before we go into the weekend, let’s recap the big stories from today:
- The assistant attorney general discussed the Coalition’s religious discrimination bill ahead of the release of reports from two parliamentary inquiries into the government’s Religious Discrimination Bill.
- Amanda Stoker said religious schools have the right to exercise beliefs “even if it might offend some others”.
- Novak Djokovic said his detention in Australia was “unexpected to say the least”.
- Anti-vaccination protesters gathered in Canberra.
- NSW recorded 31 Covid deaths and 10,698 new cases, Victoria recorded 36 deaths and 11,240 cases, Tasmania had 570 cases, Queensland had 13 deaths and 6,857 cases, the ACT recorded one death and 449 cases, the NT reported 1,004 new Covid cases, WA recorded 18 new cases and SA reported three Covid deaths and 1,363 cases.
- Police attempted to clear the ACT anti-vaccine protest camp.
- The government sought Labor support to pass the religious bill unamended.
- Victoria announced a $1.4bn funding package for the state’s health system.
- The prime minister backed a slow reopening of Western Australia.
With that, it is time to put this blog to bed. We will be back tomorrow to go through Saturday’s news with you.
Updated
LGBTQ+ advocacy group Just.Equal Australia has also released a statement in relation to the release of the religious discrimination report, saying both major parties are ignoring the views of the Australian people.
Spokesperson Rodney Croome said:
A recent national poll by YouGov Galaxy found that 77% of Australians oppose special exemptions to allow harmful speech in the name of religion while 62% oppose religious schools being allowed to sack LGBT teachers.
Yet in the two parliamentary reports both major parties have either endorsed, or left the door open to, a federal Religious Discrimination Bill that would do exactly that.
Both reports gloss over the key problems with the Federal Bill, problems that have been raised by a wide array of legal experts, community organisations, professional bodies and state governments.
In their effort to chase the votes of the tiny number of Australians who want special legal privileges for religion, Scott Morrison and Anthony Albanese have abandoned the vast majority of Australians who want equal treatment for all.
Updated
The Public Interest Advocacy Centre has expressed its “extreme disappointment” that two parliamentary committees have failed to “adequately address any of the fundamental problems in the government’s proposed Religious Discrimination Bill 2021”.
PIAC policy manager Alastair Lawrie said:
The majority reports have not grappled with the serious problems created by the Bill’s extraordinary and excessive religious exceptions.
This includes exceptions that apply to a far broader range of organisations than any other Australian anti-discrimination law, and which adopt a far more lenient test to determine when discrimination will be permitted.
Amongst the biggest losers will be Muslim, Jewish, Hindu, Buddhist, agnostic and atheist workers in religious hospitals, housing, aged care and disability services, who will be able to be discriminated against on the basis of their faith.
Entrenching discrimination against workers from minority faiths is a perverse outcome from any Religious Discrimination Bill.
Updated
