Coalition delays action on LGBTI school discrimination until 2019
Image: Prime Minister Scott Morrison. Image: ABC News.
UPDATE – Tuesday December 4: The Centre Alliance today supported a Labor motion to bring the bill to a debate. Labor’s bill will be debated in the Senate starting 11am on Wednesday December 5, after which it will be voted on.
Labor’s bill to remove discrimination exemptions for religious schools will not be voted on after Coalition senators delayed debate on the legislation.
Senator Penny Wong’s proposed bill was due for discussion this afternoon but the government’s Senate leader Mathias Cormann suspended debate.
The Coalition had the support of two Centre Alliance – formerly Nick Xenophon Team – senators, who were put on blast by Wong for voting with the government.
The government’s loss of a majority in the House of Representatives meant that if the bill made it through the Senate, they may not have had the numbers to block it in the House.
The Coalition has used repeated delay tactics to prevent action on removing discrimination exemptions, saying they wish to preserve schools’ religious freedom to operate on the basis of their faith.
“We support it with reasonable amendments to ensure that for example religious schools can provide appropriate rules for the proper conduct of their schools,” said Cormann.
“Labor’s bill completely removes the ability of religious educational institutions to maintain their ethos through what they teach and the rules of conduct they impose on students,” said Liberal senator Michaelia Cash.
Wong, who introduced the bill, was furious at the Coalition’s tactics and slammed the Centre Alliance senators for contributing to the delay.
“Call an election instead of lying the way you have about this issue,” Wong said.
Opposition Leader Bill Shorten also introduced a bill on the issue on Monday, which replicated the aims of the Senate bill.
Labor’s current efforts only seek to remove discrimination exemptions against LGBTI students but not teachers or staff, prompting criticism from the Greens.
The Greens last week tabled an amendment to Wong’s bill which would update the proposed changes to include staff members, with Labor now saying they will introduce legislation to address discrimination against LGBTI teachers in the first sitting fortnight of 2019.
“We saw an outrageous display from the Morrison government teaming up with Centre Alliance to push the discrimination-free schools bill off the agenda today,” said Greens LGBTIQ+ spokesperson Janet Rice.
“This means the parliament won’t deal with discrimination in schools until next year.
“Before the Wentworth by-election the Prime Minister promised he would remove discrimination from schools as a matter of urgency. This is yet another lie from the Prime Minister.
“The dirty tricks displayed today demonstrate a desperate Scott Morrison’s willingness to play games with the lives of LGBTQ+ people.
“Schools should be discrimination-free for all LGBTQ+ people – that means students, teachers and staff,” she said.
“The Greens were ready to act today to remove discrimination against teachers as well as students, as is supported by three quarters of the Australian population.
“It is so disappointing that political games and dirty tricks have delayed this long overdue reform.”
Co-Chair of the Equality Campaign and Director of Legal Advocacy at the Human Rights Law Centre Anna Brown described the delay as a blow to students and their parents seeking certainty ahead of the new year.
“It’s outrageous that our Government is stalling on this important vote. Parents and children deserve certainty for the new year,” Brown said.
“No kid should be feeling scared to walk through the school gates just because of who they are. Today’s delay is a slap in the face to LGBTQ kids and their families.”
Of course Morrison is deferring any decision. What did anyone really expect? Morrison is a member of one of those ultra-conservative, homophobic Pentecostal-style church. Though unlikely , even if, privately, he does not believe schools should have the right to discriminate against our GLBTIQ Community he hasn’t the guts nor the honesty to come out and say so. There are far too many votes at stake and as Morrison knows only too well he is in desperate need of as many votes as possible to stay in office. This is just typical Tony Abbott-style prevarication. Abbott never wanted Same Gender Marriage to become a reality so what did he do? He proposed that his Dishonest Plebiscite knowing full well that even if it had received a 100% Vote in Favour he could, and would, have just ignored it as Plebiscites are not binding on any Government. At least Turnbull kept his word about giving us Equality if his Postal Vote got enough “Yes” votes.
Morrison is just Abbott and all the other homophobic MPs and Senators in the Federal Parliament and that include a huge number of ALP ones as well as Coalition..
It’s time for a comprehensive Human Rights Act in Australia to enshrine the equal rights of all rather than using individual pieces of legislation to address each issue of inequality and discrimination.
The Fair Work Act provides faith based organisations the same discriminatory employment exemptions as the Anti-Discrimination Act. Will a Supreme Court Challenge be necessary when changes to Anti-Discrimination legislation are made or will these Fair Work Act exemptions no longer apply?
Nobody is covering themselves in glory here, I must admit the Greens are doing the best job by far.
On the one hand Labor’s bill is a stunt to divide the Liberal Party. Now that’s not always terrible but in this case it throws gay teachers at religious schools under a bus, and in so doing it maintains the legislative reality that gay people can still be regarded as second class citizens. So I’d have preferred Labor to do nothing rather than this stunt on this occasion, it would be much more principled.
But the Libs are just making it all worse. Senator Cash’s claim that “Labor’s bill completely removes the ability of religious educational institutions to maintain their ethos through what they teach and the rules of conduct they impose on students” is a disaster. The bill only refers to gay students. Ergo, Cash is convinced that the ONLY religious freedom anyone wants is to pick on the gays. “Ethos” usually means a broad range of requirements, but not to Cash and the Libs, it only means “kicking out gays”. Because it sure as fuck doesn’t let them kick anybody else out, no one is disputing that.
Even conservative Christians who hate gay people would mostly be offended by this. They also hate Muslims and atheists and communists and Greens voters and pregnant teens and sometimes hate adulterers and blasphemers and feminists and a host of other sinners. For all their trouble to keep their schools and societies clean from troublemakers, the only “ethos” the Libs will permit them is gay bashing, they have no respect for anybody’s actual ethos.
@Dave – you claim the Greens are somehow “doing the best job by far” – but 2018 ends without any protections for LGBTI students or teachers.
I’d rather win with Labor’s Penny Wong than yell with the Green’s from the sideline. Winning nothing is never better than winning something.
Labor’s proposal would see LGBTI students protected now – and then, in the first fortnight of 2019’s parliament, another Labor bill to protect teachers.
Had two independent Senators sided with Penny Wong, LGBTI students would be protected now and in two months, teachers.
Hi Ben, I’m a Labor supporter, I personally attended Penny’s 30th birthday years before she was a Senator so I’m certainly pro-Penny. But the ALP’s stunt on this issue is about embarrassing the Libs and in so doing it does nothing for gay teachers in religious schools, it cements them as second-class citizens, not cool. I’m not a Greens voter, I really dislike the Greens’ approach but credit where it’s due, they’re the only folks standing up for genuine equal rights on this issue right now.