THE Greens candidate for Mallee Sam McColl has hit back at the Coalition Government’s plan to reintroduce the Religious Discrimination Act without introducing protections for LGBTQIA+ students, saying the Bill will be “a Trojan horse for hate”.
The Coalition Government made the Religious Discrimination Act (RDA) – which it claims is aimed at prohibiting discrimination in some areas of public life based on religious belief or activity – a part of its 2019 election campaign.
The RDA passed the House of Representatives earlier this year, but only after opposition from several MPs, including members of the Coalition, who pushed for amendments to the Sexual Discrimination Act to ensure gay and transgender students were protected.
However, the government decided not to put the Bill up for debate in the Senate in March.
While speaking to media in Perth recently, Prime Minister Scott Morrison said if the Coalition were re-elected it would introduce the RDA “in its own right” and did not confirm if and when amendments to the Sexual Discrimination Act (SDA) would be made.
Mr McColl said the Coalition was employing a “damaging” election tactic by reigniting the debate surrounding the RDA.
“Time and time again, the rights of LGBTQIA+ people seem to be something we can just have a bit of a discussion about,” Mr McColl said. “And it always seems to be before an election.
“It’s a complete Trojan horse for hate. It just means bigots would be free to discriminate against people, whether that’s at school and university, whether that’s in the workplace – anywhere in public life.
“Saying that this is a bill for religious people to protect against religious discrimination – it’s completely wrong. Especially now that it’s separate from the Sex Discrimination Bill.”
The 26-year-old Greens candidate, who studied at Catholic primary and high schools, said he came out at age 15, and was not sure what effect the RDA would have had on his choices were he still in school.
“The school I went to was quite accepting of my sexuality, but I could have been asked to leave. I could have been outed … to people I wouldn’t have told yet.
“The fact that they’re separating it and wanting to put this through first – it would have created an even more horrible experience for me growing up. I wouldn’t have come out until after I left school.”
Mr Morrison said he would leave the subject of the RDA to the Australian public to decide upon, but Mr McColl said he was concerned the prime minister’s comments signalled a start of a rise in messages of hate.
“We’re getting into a point in the election campaign where I feel like the messages of hate are probably going to start being louder than the messages of care.”
“The party that Dr Webster belongs to voted in favour of the Bill. She has not spoken out against the Bill.”
Dr Webster was absent earlier this year at the second reading of the Religious Discrimination Act, when 10 out of 15 National Party members voted yes. Dr Webster told Sunraysia Daily at the time the RDA was “not designed to give a sword” to religious groups, or allow them to harass, harm or vilify.
Mr McColl said the Labor Party has also supported the Bill and urged voters to think about the Greens as the only party which voted for bills that didn’t “discriminate”.
“Even if the incumbent gets back in – to have a swing away from Webster means that we can send a message that people don’t want to vote for hate.”
He said he hoped young people seeing these messages coming from government understood the LGBTQIA+ community had support in the conservative Mallee electorate.
“They don’t need to feel like they’re less than other people because they’re not. Don’t listen to the hate, and just continue to do your thing.”
