Labor Government’s One-Year Report Card On LGBT Rights
Image: Prime Minister Anthony Albanese (extreme right) and foreign minister Penny Wong (third from right) at the Sydney WorldPride march on March 5, 2023. Image: Twitter
The Anthony Albanese Labor government is yet to implement major LGBTQI rights law reforms in its first year.
LGBTQI advocacy group Just.Equal published a report card that reveals the federal Labor government has a long way to go before it fulfils its promises to LGBTQI communities.
According to Just.Equal Australia’s, Sally Goldner and Brian Greig, “the Government must do better if it is to win back the substantial number of LGBTIQA+ voters who defected to the Greens at the last election.“
Election Promises
In 2022, before the elections, Labor committed to a Religious Discrimination law that does not encroach on LGBTQI rights, said it opposed conversion practices, backed counting LGBTQI Australians in the census, and committed funds towards LGBTQI health and ending HIV.
Just.Equal said the only major law reform that was implemented in the past year was to protect trans and intersex people from workplace discrimination under the Fair Work Act.
The government announced $26 million in funding for LGBTQI health research and allocated $3.5 million towards a fund to advocate for LGBTQI rights and reduce discrimination against the community in the Asia-Pacific region. Government, earlier this month, earmarked an additional $19.7 million in the 2023-24 Budget to deliver on its commitment to eliminate HIV in Australia and “address the health disparities experienced by LGBTIQA+ people”.
Soon after the elections, the Albanese government tasked the Australian Law Reforms Commission to recommend legal reforms to protect LGBTQI students, teachers and staff in religious schools. The report is due on December 31, 2023. Consultation is underway with regard to counting LGBTQI persons in the 2026 Census and Medicare rebates for gay surrogacy.
Bare Minimum
“We welcome workplace protections for trans, gender diverse and intersex Australians, but the continued discrimination against LGBTIQA+ teachers and students in faith-based schools is something the Government should have passed laws against already”, Goldner said in a statement.
“As for the continued culture war against trans and gender-diverse people, the Government has consistently failed to stand up for us. The one glimmer of hope for trans and gender diverse people is that the Government is considering Medicare rebates for gender-affirming health care,” said
Just.Equal’s Greig said the Labor was doing “the bare minimum” that is “nowhere near enough to adequately address anti-LGBTIQA+ discrimination.”
Greig pointed to a Just.Equal survey after the 2022 Federal elections, that revealed that Labor lost one in five LGBTQI voters to the Greens.
“If Labor wants to win back disaffected LGBTIQA+ voters it must do more,” added Greig.
