Advocates will lobby Senate to block Scott Morrison’s push for religious freedoms

Advocates will lobby Senate to block Scott Morrison’s push for religious freedoms
Image: Image: Australian Christian Lobby / YouTube.

Equality advocates have said they will lobby the Senate to block new laws that further protect religious freedom, after Prime Minister Scott Morrison suggested it was a priority on his agenda.

Speaking to the Sydney Morning Herald recently, Morrison said legislative change to strengthen religious freedom was part of his agenda as the country’s new PM.

“Just because things haven’t been a problem in the past, doesn’t mean they won’t be a problem in the future,” he said.

“So I’ll be taking a proactive approach when it comes to ensuring that peoples’ religious freedoms are protected.

“At the end of the day, if you’re not free to believe in your own faith, well, you’re not free.”

In response, equality advocates have said they will urge the Senate to block any new laws that water down existing discrimination protections under the guise of ‘religious freedom’.

“There is no threat to religious freedom so we fear the real purpose of any new law will be to take existing discrimination protections away from LGBTI Australians,” said just.equal spokesperson, Rodney Croome.

“We will lobby the Senate to oppose any new law that waters down existing discrimination protections.

“Last year Australians voted overwhelmingly for equality and any move to weaken LGBTI discrimination protections would run against that.”

A YouGov poll conducted in February last year found that 65 per cent of Australians were against laws allowing LGBTI people to be refused services based on the service-provider’s religious beliefs.

Morrison has come under fire by the LGBTI community several times since becoming Prime Minister last month.

He refused to acknowledge concerns over gay conversion therapy, said he sent his daughters to private school so they could avoid the Safe Schools program, and denigrated teachers trained in trans inclusion as “gender whisperers”.

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2 responses to “Advocates will lobby Senate to block Scott Morrison’s push for religious freedoms”

  1. As with everything ScoMo, this just prompts more questions than it answers.

    If ScoMo believes in discrimination on religious grounds, I don’t particularly have a problem with that as long as it’s applied consistently and across the board. Of course it’s hard to keep a straight face when you say that because you just know it’s going to be applied unevenly and focussed against LGBTIQ folks. And therein lies the problem – if religious freedom is used to abuse, then it’s going to find itself on the receiving end of a shit-ton of court cases and lawsuits.

    Freedom isn’t free, ScoMo. It’s all well and good to say people must be allowed to live according to their faith, but if they only actually use that freedom to discriminate against certain sections and not all folks who don’t completely agree with them then that’s an abuse which won’t be tolerated. It’s hypocrisy and we all know what your bible has to say about that.

    It’s dangerous territory to blunder into these things without thinking about the consequences, and ScoMo could wind up doing a lot more damage than good to his precious Christian constituency.

    Don’t just take my word for it either. In around 2002 the then new state Labor government in SA had a Christian attorney general who tried to bring in anti-discrimination laws to protect people of religion (as they have in some other states). It didn’t go ahead. Who opposed the laws? Christians, overwhelmingly. They could see that the laws would be used against them as much as to protect them, and they lobbied hard to stop them, successfully. The Hansard is available on-line.

  2. Religions, particularly the Catholic Church, have more than enough freedoms. They need no extension.
    The Catholic Church has already said it will simply ignore the outcome of the Royal Commission into Child Sex Abuse – in which it, the church, was the biggest offender of all. The Bishop of Port Pirie in SA who is acting as interim head of the Catholic Church in Adelaide has stated that he and the church will simply not obey the Law in SA and report any Child Sex Abuse or Domestic Violence.
    This irrelevant bishop and his increasingly irrelevant religious business thein they are above Australian Law.
    At the same time the head of the catholic Church, pope Francis, who has loudly condemned paedophile behaviour by members of his business has proven himself to be a total and complete Hypocrite. So it is no wonder his underlings in Australia refuse to obey Australian Law.
    Francis hides and protects dozens of fugitive priests within the Vatican. Mostly men who have either been questioned and charged with offences or ones who are wanted in their homelands (Australia, UK, Ireland, USA etc,) for questioning over their criminal behaviour.
    Until Francis orders these people to leave the Vatican & return home then no-one in any country can trust the Roman Catholic Church.