The Northern Territory government has released a discussion paper called Modernisation of the Anti-Discrimination Act (Sept 2017). It invites comments by 3 December 2017. You can almost get the tone of the paper from the title! After all, who in this fast-changing age could oppose anything called “modernisation”? But there are a number of concerning recommendations and comments made from the law and religion perspective, and there are some real doubts whether the proposals properly reflect religious freedom principles. My colleague Dr Alex Deagon from QUT has graciously provided a guest blog post in which he outlines his comments on two major concerns with the proposals to amend the Act. Those who are interested in the interaction of discrimination law and religious freedom should find them very helpful, and may wish to make their own comments in response to the discussion paper. There are other controversial proposals in the paper which may be the subject of future posts. Comment on Proposed Amendments to the Northern Territory Anti-Discrimination Act – Discussion Paper My comment will address two issues: the removal of current exemptions for religious bodies, and the enactment of legislation making it unlawful to ‘offend, insult, humiliate or intimidate’ a person or group on the basis of identified attributes. In relation to the first issue, I will argue that the removal of exemptions for religious bodies is contrary to the stated purpose of making the system fairer and more inclusive, and is contrary to the principles undergirding the free […]
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