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Let's start by acknowledging that women are not things. Before we talk, like we have to, about what the attacks on abortion access mean for this anxious, awful political era, let's establish as a ground rule that women are not vessels, or incubators, or an undifferentiated natural resource. Women are human beings whose human rights matter.

This week, 25 white men in Alabama decided otherwise. In a sadistic nationwide legislative binge against women's basic reproductive rights. Draconian new anti-abortion measures have also won wide margins of approval in Georgia, Ohio, and Missouri. This has been coming for a long time. It's all part of a strategic frontal assault on women's right to choose, a deliberate ploy to overturn the landmark 1973 Roe v. Wade ruling upholding abortion access as a constitutional right in the United States. These laws are not about whether a fetus is a person. They are about enshrining maximalist control over the sexual autonomy of women as a foundational principle of conservative rule. They are about owning women. They are about women as things.

Here's what it comes down to. Right now in Ohio, there is an a 11-year-old child who was abducted, raped, and made pregnant. It's easy to see, by any sane moral measure, how a regime that forces a child to carry this pregnancy to full term and give birth is monstrous, heartless, and immoral. And it's just as clear that a state that threatens to kill that child unless she bears that pregnancy to full term and gives birth is morally equivalent to the rapist-taking away that little girl's agency, declaring that her pain is unimportant, that she has no right to decide who has access to her body.

But the crucial connective point, the point that gets shunted to the side in the culture-war rhetoric of abortion outrage, is this: It is equally monstrous to inflict the same punishment on a woman in her thirties who doesn't want to be a mother just because the condom broke on a Tinder hookup. She, too, deserves bodily autonomy. She should not have to beg for it just because some religious extremists and Viagra-addled Republican lawmakers are frightened of women who fuck freely and without remorse. Seen in this light, forced-birth extremism is the logical extension of rape culture.

"Abortion kills babies" is an article of faith on the American right. The millions of voters who have grown up hearing nothing else are not lying when they say they believe life begins at conception. They are entitled to that belief, as long as they don't weaponize it to punish strangers. The question of whether a fetus is a person is conveniently unanswerable. The question of whether a woman is a person, however, is not up for debate-and it is female personhood, not fetal personhood, that should decide the issue of basic bodily autonomy.

The mere fact that an abortion is taking a life-if that is truly what you believe-is not enough to justify jailing little girls for getting one. There are plenty of situations where American law permits one individual to take a life: home invasion, self-defense, membership in the armed forces. Now, I happen to believe, along with 58 percent of Americans and most medical professionals, that terminating a pregnancy in its early stages is no more murderous than a biopsy. I happen to believe that a six-week-old fetus with a heartbeat but no limbic brain activity is less sentient than what most Republicans eat for breakfast in any of the constitutionally carnivorous states of the American South. But my personal feelings about the meaning of life don't matter here. As the philosopher Judith Jarvis Thomson put it, what matters more-far more-is women's freedom to control their own lives.

Even if abortion ends a human life, forcing a woman to give birth against her will is worse. No state should be empowered to do so at the point of a gun, just as no state should be empowered to kidnap a person and drain off pints of their blood so that someone else can get a transfusion. That's the course of action that's morally equivalent to this clenched fistful of misogynistic laws-in-the-making.

The Trump regime was given the keys to the nation's capital by white evangelicals mostly on the basis of a promise to criminalize abortion. Now Republicans across the country are gleefully delivering on that promise, because they like power and want to keep it, and because it makes them feel big and tough to confiscate basic human rights from pregnant people. I say "pregnant people" here because, of course, trans men and non-binary people can also become pregnant-but to parsimonious conservative pearl-clutchers, everyone who has a uterus is a woman, and therefore someone whose sexuality is by definition subject to state control.

Part of what it means to acknowledge the humanity of women is to treat them as political agents, and not walking wombs with the inconvenient habit of moaning about their personal preferences and material needs. The anti-choice Republican feeding frenzy comes from a deep conservative greed for social control. That's why Tony Tinderholt, the Republican Texas state representative who is sponsoring a bill to make abortion an actual capital crime-again, so much for the "pro-life" position-says that the great social virtue of his proposal is to "force" women to be "more personally responsible" in their sexual lives.

The eventual aim here is to put women's bodies under strict and brutal state surveillance across the whole of America. The same thing is happening across Europe-in Poland, in Austria, in Northern Ireland, in every polity where strongmen are elected by a population easily swayed by promises to put women and people of color in their proper place. They don't put it like that, of course. They cosset their cowardly bloodlust in affected piety, soothe their base's sentiments with concern-trolling about how all life is sacred-far too sacred to entrust to stupid, poor, and/or nonwhite women. Forced-birth extremists-I refuse to dignify a movement that makes a mound of women's bodies and calls it the moral high ground with the moniker "pro-life" - are not yet brave enough to make their position clear. So it's up to the rest of us to have the guts to say what we mean.

I believe there should be no legal restrictions on abortion whatsoever.

Right now, that's an extremely unpopular position, but I don't see why it should be. I don't see what's unreasonable about regulating abortion like any other medical procedure-if we work on the basis, again, the women are not things . Criminalizing abortion makes female sexual agency a crime. That is what it is designed to do; it is very much the point. Give the Tony Tinderholts of the world some small credit for candor: They've come forward to confirm that what they actually care about is that they're here to punish slutty slutbags who think they can just have sex without being afraid of the consequences. And they're also here to ensure that the consequences will be nine pounds of raw screaming need, delivered at gunpoint in the shadow of the electric chair. If such measures weren't about punishing women for having sex, the rank hypocrisy of the few remaining "exceptions for rape and incest" would ring out even to Republicans pickled in their own precious self regard.

We live in a society that is comfortable letting men get away with sexual violence, but determined not to let women get away with consensual sex. This is why there are vast swathes of society who are comfortable giving vast executive and judicial power to men credibly accused of sexual assault-as long as those same men promise to confiscate women's power to sexually self-determine.

Female sexual freedom is the basic moral outrage that unites the religious right and libertarians convinced that the state should shrink until it's small enough to slip into a woman's underwear in inarticulate rage. The appeal to "choice" does not work on people to whom women's freedom of choice is a fearful thing. We are told that women who choose to have abortions for "social reasons"-i.e., because they simply don't want to be pregnant-are selfish. Sure, some of them are, if "selfish" means actively choosing to prioritize your own needs and desires above those of a potential child. Selflessness should not be a legal duty imposed on women on pain of death or jail. Choosing to have a baby you don't want to raise, to give it up for adoption, might make you a very nice person indeed. But women should not be threatened with imprisonment and death for not being nice enough.

The biggest lies about women's rights are told by people who are trying to take them away. In anxious, violent times, when oppression is enacted under a deafening barrage of propaganda, it's important to listen out for the silences. It's vital to listen, in other words, to what's not being said by those who are making the most noise.

The cacophony of outrage shapes itself around a painful silence, one that prevents us from pronouncing the actual stakes at play. We still can't quite say that there are no circumstances under which it is acceptable to force pregnancy on a woman against her will. None. Because that's a monstrous thing to do to a person, and women are people, not things.

Instead of affirming that essential truth, we are still arguing over when a fetus becomes a person and therefore worthy of dignity and protection. Six weeks? Twelve weeks? Twenty? We urgently need to be asking the far more pressing question of when women will be allowed to be people and therefore worthy of protection.

Two distinct legal persons with absolute rights to self-sovereignty cannot occupy the same body. Thanks to this deranged counter-moral calculus of moral deliberation, regimes of male supremacists and religious extremists around the world are now in agreement that a six-week-old clot of cells is more of a person than any adult woman. After all, that clot of cells might be the next Mozart, the next Mandela. The idea that a pregnant woman might be the next Mozart or the next Mandela, of course, does not compute.

This mind-bending determination to bring women's bodies under maximum control, at all conceivable cultural costs, helps explain why this week's actions have been so coordinated, swift, and brutal. After Alabama's all-male senate majority voted to force women to give birth against their will, their counterparts in Georgia went further still, arranging to institute effective life sentences for abortion providers, while placing women's bodies under strict and callous state surveillance. Indeed, the eventual aim here, beyond the repeal of Roe, is to put women's bodies under rigid and brutal state surveillance across the whole of America.

It's a race thing, too, of course, and it always has been. It was anti-choice evangelicals who-together with some carefully timed voter suppression-gave Brian Kemp his razor-thin, contested victory over Stacey Abrams, his black, female Democratic opponent. Across America and Europe, conservatives have been happy to trade away women's freedom for a chance at power. Kemp is now delivering on the promise he made to white evangelicals-and Donald Trump, who is making increasingly manic mouth-sounds about babies being executed at birth, looks likely to do the same.

Sexual oppression and racial paranoia have always run together under the skin of the story America tells about itself. Any student of racial oppression can readily recognize the ruthless denial of agency, the deep and structural downgrading of persons into objects from the heyday of slavery and white supremacy. Indeed, the forced-birth movement in the United States has always gone hand in hand with white supremacy. Before abolition, white women were tacitly permitted to terminate pregnancies as they chose. In fact, the earliest case law regarding abortion was not designed to protect fetuses, but to protect women from shady doctors operating without licenses or a working knowledge of germ theory. There had long been folk remedies for ending an unwanted pregnancy, and the women who were punished for doing this were to a significant degree African American.

White male slaveowners, meanwhile, had absolute right to the bodies of black women, who were routinely raped and forbidden to prevent pregnancy. Any child born to a slave, after all, was a valued capital asset, the uncontested property of the mother's "master."

All of that changed after abolition, when white Americans suddenly began to panic about being outbred by nonwhite people. Theodore Roosevelt himself was one of the first public figures to use the term "outbreeding."

Laws regulating abortion and contraception-especially for white women-were instituted along with programs of mass, enforced sterilization of black and immigrant women. Ideas of race, nation and territory have always been embedded in the anti-choice movement. "The U.S. subtracts from its population a million of our babies in the form of abortion," Representative Steve King told a far-right Austrian magazine. "We add to our population approximately 1.8 million of 'somebody else's babies' who are raised in another culture before they get to us. We are replacing our American culture two to one every year."

There's a very clear message here about whose lives matter. Texas legislators care so much about the sanctity of life that they have suggested the death penalty for women who get abortions. The state of Alabama cares so much about life that it executes more prisoners per capita than any other state; it had an execution scheduled for the day after Governor Kay Ivey signed the state's abortion ban into law.

That's not the only thing about the forced-birth movement that seems to stink of hypocrisy. People who believe that motherhood is precious do not rip toddlers away from their parents and keep them in sweltering cages at the borders. People who are concerned with the sanctity of life do not advocate for lethal firearms to be sold at every strip mall. People who care about the unborn do not torpedo legislation designed to ensure that the planet those kids inherit is not actively on fire.

For all these crushing moral contradictions, though, forced-birth extremists are not hypocrites. Underlying all of the pious and disingenuous cant of their crusade is a terrifying logical consistency. There is a common thread that cinches together border paranoia, military fetishism, and obsessive state control of women's bodies. It is chauvinism on nightmare mode: a dark story told by frightened child-men about the right of strong fathers and stern paternal leaders to protect resources. And in that story, women's bodies are a resource, one that men should be able to access freely. Women should not have the right to refuse men sex, or to abort the baby a man put inside her-sorry, I mean the baby God put inside her.

Is that too much? Am I getting too angry? We're not supposed to get angry when we talk about abortion. An angry woman, more or less by definition, is a crazy woman and a crazy woman can't be trusted with bodily autonomy, although apparently she can be trusted with a baby.

What we're supposed to do is quietly and politely explain, even to the extremists grabbing major world governments by the privates, that banning abortion takes away autonomy, as if they didn't know. Of course banning abortion takes away women's autonomy. That is the point of banning abortion. That's the whole point.

Making abortion illegal, after all, doesn't stop it from happening. In nations where abortion access is restricted, they don't have fewer dead babies-but they have a lot more dead women. Around the world, 5-13 percent of maternal mortality results from unsafe abortion. The point is to send a clear message that uppity hussies have been having their own way for far too long, and that there should be consequences. The point has never been that babies matter. The point is that women don't.

We're supposed to smile and be polite while our basic humanity is stripped away by old men who think little girls should be forced to bear children in rage. To survive in a time of patriarchy, you're not allowed to speak plainly about how much it hurts to survive patriarchy. If you must speak of it, you speak softly. You don't talk about anger. And you definitely aren't supposed to talk about pain. Women's pain is assumed to be invisible by design.

The strategy of patriarchal restorationists on the evangelical right has long been to strip women of human dignity, and to force them to bear unwanted children in rage and pain. We're not supposed to talk about any of these ugly, grimy details: the pain, the blood, the tearing, the exhaustion, the insecurity, the poverty. We're not supposed to talk about all the bitter, degrading things that go along with pregnancy, childbirth, and motherhood in an economy designed and run by men. No, we're supposed to meekly wipe up the blood and the shit and spend exhausted weeks climbing stairs to nowhere in the gym to "get back" our "pre-pregnancy bodies." If we commit the cardinal sin of having a pregnancy terminated, we are supposed to be ashamed, to whisper it, to make a show of shame-just as we are supposed to be ashamed of consensual sex, just as we are supposed to be ashamed of surviving rape.

It's time to be completely clear. Forcing a woman to give birth against her will is morally equivalent to rape. It's exactly the same logic of entitlement and abuse: Men get to control women's bodies. Female sexual agency must be punished. Women's consent does not matter.

This is not a moment to mince words. This is a moment for moral clarity. Women's personhood is not conditional. Women's sexuality is not shameful. The only shameful thing, the only thing that no citizen who believes even fractionally in freedom should tolerate, is a world in which women are treated like things.

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The Criminalization of Women's Bodies Is All About Conservative Male Power

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Let's start by acknowledging that women are not things. Before we talk, like we have to, about what the attacks on abortion access mean for this anxious, awful political era, let's establish as a ground rule that women are not vessels, or incubators, or an undifferentiated natural resource.

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Commission guidance

This page provides general information on COVID-19 vaccinations and federal discrimination law and is intended as a guide only. It gives guidance on the most frequently asked questions that we are getting on this subject.

The information reflects current discrimination legislation, applicable judicial decisions, and guidance issued by government agencies.

As outlined below, each state and territory in Australia also has discrimination legislation, which may apply in different ways. People must comply with both federal and state/territory law.

Summary

If there is no specific law requiring a person to be vaccinated, individuals, businesses and service providers are encouraged to obtain legal advice about their own specific circumstances, and to carefully consider the position of vulnerable groups in the community before imposing any blanket COVID-19 vaccination policies or conditions. These may have unintended consequences, particularly for some people with disability, and may also breach federal discrimination law.

Are COVID-19 vaccinations voluntary?

The Australian Government's policy is that COVID-19 vaccinations are voluntary for most Australians, although its aim is to have as many people as possible choose to be vaccinated.

On 28 June 2021, the Australian Government announced that COVID-19 vaccinations would be made mandatory for residential aged care workers.

Some states and territories have also issued public health orders mandating vaccination for certain industries or workers. For example, on 1 October 2021, the Victorian Government announced that all workers on the relevant 'Authorised Worker' list will be required to have their first COVID-19 vaccine dose by 15 October 2021 to continue working onsite. These workers will need to be fully vaccinated by 26 November 2021. Further information about the situation in Victoria can be found on the Victorian Government's website and [when available] the Victorian Equal Opportunity and Human Rights Commission.

Information about relevant public health orders can be found on the Safe Work Australia website.

Can it be unlawful discrimination for an employer to require that its employees be vaccinated?

If there is no specific law requiring that a person be vaccinated, employers should be cautious about imposing mandatory COVID-19 vaccination policies or conditions on staff. The need for vaccination should be assessed on a case-by-case basis, taking into account the nature of the workplace and the individual circumstances of each employee.

There are medical reasons why some people may not be able to receive a COVID-19 vaccination, or may choose not to in their circumstances, including because of protected attributes such pregnancy or disability. Additionally, at present, many younger Australians have not been eligible for certain COVID-19 vaccinations at all, or for shorter periods of time than older Australians.

The Sex Discrimination Act 1984 (Cth) (SDA), the Disability Discrimination Act 1992 (Cth) (DDA) and the Age Discrimination Act 2004 (Cth) (ADA) make it unlawful to discriminate on the grounds of pregnancy, disability and age in many areas of public life, including in employment. 'Disability' is broadly defined in the DDA and includes past, present and future disabilities, as well as imputed disabilities.

A strict rule or condition that mandates COVID-19 vaccinations for all staff, including people with certain disabilities, medical conditions or who are pregnant, may engage the 'indirect discrimination' provisions in the SDA, the DDA and the ADA.

Indirect discrimination and reasonableness

In broad terms, indirect discrimination occurs when a person is required to comply with a general requirement or condition (such as mandatory COVID-19 vaccinations), and they are unable to do so because of a protected attribute, for example because of their disability, and it has the effect of disadvantaging them.

Under the SDA, the DDA, and the ADA indirect discrimination may occur if an employer requires, or proposes to require, that a person comply with a general requirement or condition.

This means that an employer does not need to seek to enforce a mandatory COVID-19 vaccination policy (for example, by way of termination, suspension, or performance management) to engage in unlawful discrimination. It is a defence to a claim of indirect discrimination if the condition or requirement is shown to be 'reasonable' in the circumstances of the case.

Whether a court considers it 'reasonable' for an employer to mandate COVID-19 vaccinations is likely to be highly fact dependent, considering the workplace and the employee's individual circumstances. It may consider information such as:

The existence and scope of any relevant public health orders.

Health and safety issues and the reasons advanced in favour of the mandatory COVID-19 vaccine requirement.

Issues relating to an employee's disability or medical condition.

The nature and extent of the disadvantage resulting from the imposition or proposed imposition of the mandatory COVID-19 vaccine requirement.

The feasibility of overcoming or mitigating any disadvantage to the employee by the mandatory COVID-19 vaccine requirement.

Whether the disadvantage to the employee is proportionate to the result sought by the employer.

The nature of the work performed by the employee.

Whether the employee has close contact with people who are most vulnerable to severe COVID-19 health impacts. For example, people working in aged care, disability care, health care, people over 60 or people with respiratory conditions.

Whether the employee interacts with people with an elevated risk of being infected with COVID-19. For example, medical professionals, flight crew, border control or hotel quarantine workers.

The incidence, severity and distribution of COVID-19 in the areas where the work is undertaken.

The availability of the vaccine.

Advice from medical and work health and safety bodies such as the Australian Health Protection Principal Committee and Safe Work Australia about COVID-19 and COVID-19 vaccinations at the relevant times, including duties owed by employers to staff and customers under work health and safety laws.

Whether there are any alternative methods that might reasonably achieve the employer's objective without recourse to the mandatory COVID-19 vaccine requirement, such as:

testing regimes

remote work

physical distancing

personal protective equipment.

The SDA, the DDA, the ADA explicitly place the burden of proving 'reasonableness' on the person who requires compliance with the requirement or condition - in this case, the employer.

The duty to provide reasonable adjustments

The DDA also creates an explicit duty to make 'reasonable adjustments' for people with disability, including at work. Depending on the circumstances of the case, a 'reasonable adjustment' may include exempting workers with disabilities, who have a medical reason for not being vaccinated, from a general rule requiring COVID-19 vaccination. Employers are not required to make adjustments for people with disability if the adjustments would impose an unjustifiable hardship on them. Unjustifiable hardship is a high test, and it recognises that some hardship on businesses and employers may be needed and justifiable to reduce discrimination against people with disability.

What about 'the inherent requirements' of a role and other exemptions?

In responding to a complaint of disability discrimination, an employer may seek to rely upon the defence of 'the inherent requirements' of the role. Under the DDA, it is lawful for an employer to discriminate against a person on the ground of the person's disability if the person is unable to carry out the 'inherent requirements' of a particular job or would, in order to do so, require services or facilities that would impose an 'unjustifiable hardship' on the employer.

Depending on the circumstances of the case, it might be an 'inherent requirement' of a particular role that a person be vaccinated against COVID-19.

An employer may also seek to rely upon the 'infectious diseases' exemption in s 48 of the DDA. This provides that it is not unlawful to discriminate against a person if their disability is an infectious disease - or arguably the potential to acquire an infectious disease - and such discrimination is 'reasonably necessary' to protect public health.

In considering the term 'reasonably necessary', it is not likely to be sufficient that a discriminatory condition or policy is merely helpful, desirable or convenient in protecting public health.

Can it be unlawful discrimination for an employer to require that its employees attend a particular workplace?

There are reasons why some people might be particularly vulnerable to severe COVID-19 health impacts, including because of protected attributes such as pregnancy, disability or age. Depending on the nature of the work being performed, a blanket rule requiring all employees to attend a particular workplace may constitute indirect discrimination.

As outlined in the question above, whether a general requirement to attend a particular workplace is considered 'reasonable' by a court is likely to be highly fact dependent, taking into account the nature of the work and the employee's individual circumstances. It may consider information such as:

The reasons advanced in favour of the requirement to attend the workplace, including operational requirements and reasonable business grounds.

Issues relating to the employee's age, pregnancy, disability or medical condition.

The nature of the work performed by the employee, whether it is outside or in a confined space, and associated risk of transmission.

Whether the work involves interacting closely with other employees or with large numbers of people.

Whether the employee is able to perform their work remotely, and if they have demonstrated the capacity to do so effectively.

The incidence, severity and distribution of COVID-19 in the areas where work is undertaken.

Advice from medical and work health and safety bodies such as the Australian Health Protection Principal Committee and Safe Work Australia about COVID-19 at the relevant times.

Whether other control measures are available and in place in the workplace to minimise the risk of infection, so far as is reasonably practicable.

The duty to provide reasonable adjustments

The DDA also creates an explicit duty to make 'reasonable adjustments' for people with disability, including at work. Depending on the circumstances of the case, 'reasonable adjustments' may include allowing a person to work remotely, at different times or on different shifts, or to have stricter control measures in place.

Employers are not required to make adjustments for people with disability if the adjustments would impose an unjustifiable hardship on them. Unjustifiable hardship is a high test, and it recognises that some hardship on businesses and employers may be needed and justifiable to reduce discrimination against people with disability.

What about 'the inherent requirements' of the role defence?

In responding to a complaint of disability discrimination, an employer may seek to rely upon the defence of 'the inherent requirements' of the role. Under the DDA, it is lawful for an employer to discriminate against a person on the ground of the person's disability if the person is unable to carry out the 'inherent requirements' of a particular job or would, in order to do so, require services or facilities that would impose an 'unjustifiable hardship' on the employer.

Depending on the circumstances of the case, it might be an 'inherent requirement' of a particular role that a person be able to work at a specific workplace.

Can it be unlawful discrimination for a business or service provider to refuse to provide goods, services or facilities to people who are not vaccinated?

If there is no specific law requiring COVID-19 vaccination, businesses and service providers should be cautious about imposing a blanket rule requiring vaccination as a condition of entry, or as a condition for the delivery or provision of goods, services or facilities.

There are medical reasons why a person may not be able to receive a COVID-19 vaccination, or may choose not to in their circumstances, including because of protected attributes such pregnancy or disability. Additionally, at present, many younger Australians have not been eligible for particular COVID-19 vaccinations at all, or for shorter periods of time than older Australians.

The Sex Discrimination Act 1984 (Cth) (SDA), the D isability Discrimination Act 1992 (Cth) (DDA) and the Age Discrimination Act 2004 (Cth) (ADA) make it unlawful to discriminate on the grounds of pregnancy, disability and age in many areas of public life, including in the provision of goods, services and facilities.

'Disability' is broadly defined in the DDA and includes past, present and future disabilities, as well as imputed disabilities.

A strict rule or condition that requires COVID-19 vaccination as a condition of entry, or as a condition for the delivery or provision of goods, services or facilities, may engage the 'indirect discrimination' provisions in the SDA, the DDA and the ADA.

Indirect discrimination and reasonableness

In broad terms, indirect discrimination occurs when a person is required to comply with a general requirement or condition (such as mandatory COVID-19 vaccinations), and they are unable to do so because of a protected attribute, for example because of their disability, and it has the effect of disadvantaging them.

Whether a court considers it 'reasonable' for a business or service provider to make COVID-19 vaccination a condition of entry, or a condition for the delivery or provision of goods, services or facilities is likely to be highly fact dependent, taking into account all the circumstances. It may consider information such as:

The existence and scope of any relevant public health orders.

The reasons advanced in favour of the COVID-19 vaccination condition, including operational requirements and reasonable business grounds.

The nature of the goods/services/facilities being delivered. It can be expected that a court would strictly scrutinise the reasonableness of any measure that had the effect of seriously limiting or depriving people with disability of essential services.

The physical space of the location (e.g. the shop) and associated risk of transmission.

Issues relating to an employee's disability, age, pregnancy or medical condition.

The nature and extent of the disadvantage resulting from the imposition or proposed imposition of the COVID-19 vaccination condition.

The feasibility of overcoming or mitigating any disadvantage to the person attempting to access goods/services/facilities by the COVID-19 vaccine condition.

Whether the disadvantage to the person attempting to access goods/services/facilities is proportionate to the result sought by the business or service provider.

Whether the business or service provider has close contact with people who are most vulnerable to severe COVID-19 health impacts. For example, people working in aged care, disability care, health care, people over 60 or people with respiratory conditions.

Whether the business or service provider interacts with people who have an elevated risk of being infected with COVID-19. For example, medical professionals, flight crew, border control or hotel quarantine workers.

Whether the business or service provider provides any opportunity for people who cannot be vaccinated to access its goods/services/facilities.

The incidence, severity and distribution of COVID-19 in the areas where the business or service provider operates.

The availability of the vaccine.

Advice from medical and work health and safety bodies such as the Australian Health Protection Principal Committee and Safe Work Australia about COVID-19 and COVID-19 vaccinations at the relevant times, including duties owed by employers to staff and customers under work health and safety laws.

Whether there are any alternative control methods that might reasonably achieve the business/ service provider's objective without recourse to the condition, such as:

testing regimes

physical distancing

personal protective equipment.

The SDA, DDA and ADA explicitly place the burden of proving 'reasonableness' on the person who requires compliance with the requirement or condition - in this case, the business or service provider.

The duty to provide reasonable adjustments

The DDA requires businesses involved in the provision of goods and services to make 'reasonable adjustments' for people with disability. 'Reasonable adjustments' are all adjustments that do not impose an unjustifiable hardship on the business making the adjustments. Unjustifiable hardship is a high test, and it recognises that some hardship on businesses and employers may be needed and justifiable to reduce discrimination against people with disability.

Depending on the circumstances of the case, a 'reasonable adjustment' may include allowing unvaccinated customers into a shop or to receive services if they cannot receive a COVID-19 vaccination for medical reasons.

Can it be unlawful discrimination for an employer to require that its employees be vaccinated if it goes against their religious beliefs?

There are very limited avenues for people to make complaints about discrimination on the ground of religion or religious belief under federal discrimination law.

The Australian Human Rights Commission can accept complaints about discrimination in employment based on a person's religion under the International Labour Organisation Convention (No 111) concerning Discrimination in respect of Employment and Occupation.

However, unlike discrimination complaints based on protected attributes such as race, sex, pregnancy, disability or age, these complaints cannot proceed to the Federal Circuit Court or the Federal Court for legal remedies.

Discrimination related to religion, religious conviction or religious activity may be unlawful under state and territory discrimination law. For further information on this topic, please seek legal advice or contact your local state or territory human rights, equal opportunity or anti-discrimination agency.

State and territory agencies

Can it be unlawful discrimination for an employer/ business owner/ service provider to require medical evidence as to why an employee or customer cannot be vaccinated?

It is not unlawful under the Disability Discrimination Act 1992 (Cth) (DDA) or the Sex Discrimination Act 1984 (Cth) (SDA) for a person, such as an employer or a service provider, to request or require another person to provide information about a medical condition or pregnancy if the person making the request can demonstrate that it is not in connection with, or for the purpose of, unlawfully discriminating against the other person on the ground of disability.

However, the collection of personal information is also regulated by privacy laws. Any requirement for individuals to provide evidence of a medical reason for refusing a vaccination must be made in compliance with those laws.

You can find more information on Australia's federal privacy laws on the website of the Office of the Australian Information Commissioner (OAIC).

The OAIC also provides links to relevant state and territory privacy laws and bodies.

How might the 'infectious diseases' exemption in section 48 of the Disability Discrimination Act apply?

Section 48 of the Disability Discrimination Act 1992 (Cth) (DDA) provides that it is not unlawful for a person to discriminate against another person on the basis of disability - either directly or indirectly - if the person's disability is an infectious disease and the discrimination is reasonably necessary to protect public health.
The exemption in section 48 of the DDA clearly applies to people who have a disability that is an infectious disease. 'Infectious disease' is not defined in the DDA but it appears likely that it would apply to COVID-19, as it has been accepted as applying to other transmissible viruses such as HIV.

In considering the application of the section 48 exemption in relation to COVID-19, a court would need to consider whether the relevant conduct was 'reasonably necessary' to protect public health. The existence of the COVID-19 pandemic, and information and advice from public health bodies such as the Australian Health Protection Principal Committee, would likely be relevant to any consideration of what was 'reasonably necessary' conduct.

The exemption in section 48 of the DDA may also extend to people who are not vaccinated against COVID-19 ( see Beattie (on behalf of Kiro and Lewis Beattie) v Maroochy Shire Council [1996] HREOCA 40 (20 December 1996)).

However, as judicial consideration has not been given to the application of section 48 of the DDA to unvaccinated people, it is strongly encouraged that anyone seeking to rely upon the exemption in relation to mandatory COVID-19 vaccinations seek legal advice.

State and territory discrimination legislation

In addition to federal discrimination legislation, each state and territory in Australia has equal opportunity and discrimination legislation and agencies with statutory responsibilities.

Federal laws and the state/territory laws generally overlap. However, the laws apply in different ways and people must comply with all legislation.

For more information on state/territory laws, please seek legal advice or contact your local state or territory human rights, equal opportunity or anti-discrimination agency.

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COVID-19 vaccinations and federal discrimination law

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This page provides general information on COVID-19 vaccinations and federal discrimination law and is intended as a guide only. It gives guidance on the most frequently asked questions that we are getting on this subject. The information reflects current discrimination legislation, applicable judicial decisions, and guidance issued by government agencies.

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https://bmcpublichealth.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s12889-021-12114-8

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Of the 2517 respondents, 2417 were included in the analysis based on the inclusion/exclusion criteria. The age of participants showed 446 (18.5%) people aged 18-24, 715 (29.6%) people aged 25-34, 591 (24.5%) people aged 35-44, 394 (16.3%) people aged 45-54, 189 (7.8%) people aged 55-64 and 82 (3.4%) people over the age of 65. Females accounted for 80.1% of the respondents ( = 1937 people) and males accounted for 18.8% ( = 454 people). Respondents were predominantly North American with 70.3% ( = 1700) from the USA and 12.9% ( = 312) from other North American Countries. The remaining were divided into 7.4% ( = 180) Australia/Oceanic, 7.3% ( = 176) European, 0.9% ( = 22) Asian, 0.6% ( = 15) African, 0.5% ( = 11) South American, and 1 respondent from Antarctica. The education levels showed that 0.1% ( = 2) had no formal schooling, 0.4% ( = 10) completed elementary school (grade level 1-8), 21.2% ( = 509) completed high school (grade level 9-12/13), 22.3% ( = 540) completed an Associates (2 year) degree, 34.5% ( = 833) completed a Bachelor (4 year) degree, 13.9% ( = 336) completed a Master's degree, and 7.7% ( = 187) completed a Professional degree (PhD, MD, DC, DO, etc.). Individuals identified themselves as Lower class socioeconomic status (SES) comprised 9.8% ( = 238) of the population, 82.2% ( = 1987) as Middle class SES, and 7.9% ( n = 192) as Upper class SES.

Facebook is the most commonly used social media type in the population with 69.8% ( n = 1688), followed by Twitter 15.6% ( n = 378), Instagram 12.9% ( n = 311), then other forms of social media 1.7% ( n = 40). Other forms of social media were identified as Snapchat, Tumblr, Reddit, Pinterest, or using all platforms equally. Most people 47.9% ( n = 1158) claimed to only spend 0-2 h on social media daily, followed by 40.9% ( n = 989) using 3-4 h, 8.4% ( n = 204) using 5-6 h, 1.5% ( n = 36) using 7-8 h, and 1.2% ( n = 30) using social media for over 9 h. Most respondents 92.7% ( n = 2240) have seen posts on social media about vaccines and only 7.3% ( n = 177) have not. These posts influence 5.4% ( n = 130) of users to think vaccines are worse than previously thought, 13.6% ( n = 328) to think vaccines are better than previous thought, 76.4% ( n = 1846) claim to not have been influenced by the posts, and 4.7% ( n = 113) had not seen any posts. Lastly, people claimed to trust doctors 89.4% ( n = 2160) the most with their immunization related information/decisions. The remaining people trust the internet 4.1% ( n = 100), family 2.0% ( n = 48), peers and friends 2.3% ( n = 55), social media 0.2% ( n = 5) and the government 2.0% ( n = 49) with their information and decisions.

Knowledge

Table 1, found in the supplementary document 2 labeled "Tables", depicts the frequency of knowledge scores in the sample population. As described in the methods, knowledge scores are based on a scale from 0 to 12 derived from 6 questions with answers ranked from 0 to 2 points. Scores toward 0 represent negatively skewed knowledge, or lack of correct information. Scores toward 12 represent positively skewed knowledge, or adequate vaccine knowledge. Scores of 6 represent uncertainness.

Analysis of all demographic questions against the respondent's knowledge score was completed by Welch and then further analyzed by Games Howell. Explanations of why these tests were chosen can be found in Methods. When age was compared with knowledge scores a Welch statistical value of 0.763 and the significance of 0.576 ( p > 0.05). Post hoc was not necessary.

Gender analysis showed a Welch statistic of 1.627 with a significance value of 0.204 ( p > 0.05). Post hoc analysis was not examined because there was no significance.

Geographical Welch testing showed a statistic value of 11.552 with a significance of < 0.001( p < 0.05). Since this value is statically significant post hoc analysis was examined. North Americans (USA) has significantly lower knowledge scores compared to Europe (mean difference − 0.78309, significance < 0.001), and Australia/Oceania (means difference − 0.84316, significance < 0.001). North Americans (Other) also showed significantly lower knowledge scores compared to Europe (means difference − 0.76122, significance 0.001) and Australia/Oceania (means difference − 0.84316, significance 0.001). Values from Asia, Africa, and South American should be looked at with caution because of low responses. Antarctica was excluded from these calculations because there was only one respondent.

Analysis of respondents highest level of education completed showed a Welch statistic of 13.030 and significance of 0.001 ( p < 0.05). Post hoc showed that those who completed a Professional degree had significantly higher scores than Bachelor's degree (means difference 0.55353, significance of 0.007), Associates degree (means difference 1.21578, significance of < 0.001), and high school (means difference 1.11273, significance < 0.001). Those with Masters Degrees were significantly higher scoring than Associate degrees (means difference of 0.80000, significance < 0.001), and high school (means difference of 0.69695, significance of 0.001). Bachelor's degree holders had significantly higher scores compared to Associates degree (means difference of 0.66224, significance of < 0.001) and High school (means difference of 0.55920, significance of 0.003). Those values from who have no formal school or only completion of elementary school should be looked at with caution due to low frequencies.

Socioeconomic class compared to knowledge scores yielded a Welch statistic of 0.266 and a significance of 0.767 ( p > 0.05). No further analysis was needed.

The type of social media used compared to knowledge score showed a Welch statistic of 7.175 and significance of < 0.001( p < 0.05). Games Howell determined that Twitter users had significantly higher scores than Facebook (means difference 0.43812, significance of 0.001) and Instagram (means difference 0.69491, significance of 0.001).

Hours spent on social media showed a Welch statistic of 2.531 and significance of 0.044 ( p < 0.05). Post hoc testing showed significantly lower values in those who use social media for 3-4 h compared to 0-2 h (means difference 0.33869, significance of 0.018). No other means from this analysis were significant.

Whether or not a respondent had seen anything on social media about vaccines was not analyzed because there are only 2 categories and therefore the question is noncompliant with the Welch analysis. The influence of vaccine posts on social media had a Welch statistic of 145.202 with a significance of < 0.001 ( p < 0.05). Post hoc testing revealed that those who now perceived their opinion of vaccine of being worse than previously thought had significantly lower scores compared to those who now think vaccines are better (means difference − 6.36712, significance of < 0.001), no influence/change in opinion (means difference − 5.83564, significance of < 0.001) and those who had not seen anything (means difference − 4.70483, significance of < 0.001). Those who think vaccines are better after seeing social media posts had significantly higher scores compared to worsened opinions (as mentioned before), those who were not influenced (means difference 0.53148, significance < 0.001) and those who have not seen anything (means difference 1.66229, significance < 0.001). In addition, those who have not been influenced by posts had significantly higher scores than those who have not seen any posts (means difference 1.13081, significance < 0.001).

Lastly, those trusted for immunization related information and decisions was analyzed and found a Welch statistic of 83.032 with significance of < 0.001 ( p < 0.05). Post hoc analysis showed those who trusted Doctors the most have significantly higher scores than those who trusted the internet (means difference of 5.32139, significance of < 0.001), family (means difference 5.94306, significance < 0.001), and peers (means difference 6.31957, significance of < 0.001). Those who trusted the government the most also had significantly higher scores than internet (means difference 5.13429, significance < 0.001), family (means difference 5.75595, significance of < 0.001) and peers (means difference 6.13247, significance of < 0.001). Trusting of social media should be looked at with caution due to low frequencies.

Beliefs

Depiction of the frequency of belief scores in the sample population can be found in Table 2, found in the supplementary document 2 labeled "Tables". As noted in the methods, the remaining 6 questions were scored on a two point scale resulting in a belief score from 0 to 12. Scores toward 0 represent negatively skewed beliefs or belief in common myths. Scores toward 12 represent positively skewed beliefs or disbelief in common myths. Scores of 6 represent uncertainness.

The analysis of the demographic questions against the individual's belief score was completed by Welch and then further analyzed by Games Howell. Explanations of why these tests were chosen can be found in methods. When age was compared with belief score a Welch statistical value of 2.923 and significance of 0.013 ( p < 0.05). Post Hoc revealed 65-year-olds and older had significantly lower scores than 10-24-year-olds (mean difference − 1.37750, significance 0.014) and 24-34 year olds (mean difference − 1.19606, significance 0.047).

Gender analysis showed a Welch statistic of 0.320 with a significance value of 0.728 ( p > 0.05). Post hoc analysis was not examined because there was no significance.

Geographical Welch testing showed a statistic value of 29.212 with a significance of < 0.001( p < 0.05). Due to this value being statically significant, post hoc analysis was examined. North Americans (USA) had significantly lower belief scores compared to Europe (mean difference − 1.47989, significance < 0.001), and Australia/Oceania (means difference − 1.81575, significance < 0.001). North Americans (Other) also showed significantly lower belief scores compared to Europe (means difference − 1.29021, significance < 0.001) and Australia/Oceania (means difference − 1.62607, significance < 0.001). Values from Asia, Africa, and South American should be looked at cautiously because of the low response rate. Antarctica not included in these calculations because there was only one individual who responded.

The analysis of individuals with the highest level of education completed showed a Welch statistic of 17.789 and significance of < 0.001 ( p < 0.05). Post hoc showed that those who completed a professional degree had significantly higher scores than those with master's degree (mean difference 0.74516, significance of 0.009), bachelor's degree (means difference 1.10881, significance of < 0.001), associate's degree (means difference 2.02797, significance of < 0.001), and high school (means difference 1.97009, significance < 0.001). Respondents with master's degrees were significantly higher scoring than those with associate degrees (means difference of 1.28280, significance < 0.001), and high school (means difference of 1.22493, significance of < 0.001). Those with bachelor's degrees had significantly higher scores compared to those with associate's degrees (means difference of 0.91916, significance of < 0.001) and high school (means difference of 0.86128, significance of < 0.001). The values from those individuals that had no formal schooling, or only completion of elementary school, should be looked at cautiously due to low frequencies.

Socioeconomic class, compared to belief scores, resulting in a Welch statistic of 0.028 and a significance of 0.972 ( p > 0.05). No further analysis was needed.

The type of social media users compared to belief score showed a Welch statistic of 8.011 and a significance of < 0.001( p < 0.05). Games Howell determined that Twitter users had significantly higher scores than Facebook (means difference 0.55094, significance of 0.001) and Instagram (means difference 0.98733, significance of < 0.001).

Hours spent on social media showed a Welch statistic of 3.162 and a significance of 0.016 ( p < 0.05). Post hoc testing showed significantly lower values in those who used social media for 3-4 h compared to 0-2 h (means difference 0.39195, significance of 0.034). No other means from this analysis were significant.

Exposure to posts on social media about vaccinations was not analyzed because there were only two categories and therefore, noncompliant with the Welch analysis. The influence of vaccine posts on social media had a Welch statistic of 312.900 with a significance of < 0.001 ( p < 0.05). Post hoc testing revealed that those who now perceived their opinion of vaccines of being worse than previously thought, had significantly lower scores compared to those who now think vaccines are better (means difference − 7.97280, significance of < 0.001), No influence or change in opinion (means difference − 7.27248, significance of < 0.001), and those who had not seen anything (means difference − 4.97992, significance of < 0.001). Those who thought vaccines were better after seeing social media posts had significantly higher scores compared to worsened opinions, as mentioned before, and to those who were not influenced (means difference 0.70031, significance < 0.001), and those who had not seen anything (means difference 2.99288, significance < 0.001). Also, those who had not been influenced by social media posts had significantly higher scores than those who had not seen any posts at all (means difference 2.29256, significance < 0.001).

Finally, those trusted in immunization related information and decisions were analyzed and found a Welch statistic of 150.953 with a significance of < 0.001 ( p < 0.05). Post hoc analysis showed those who trusted doctors the most had significantly higher scores than those who trusted social media (means difference of 6.50713, significance of < 0.001), family (means difference 7.28796, significance < 0.001), and peers (means difference 7.41258, significance of < 0.001). Individuals who trusted the government the most also had significantly higher scores than social media (means difference 6.87265, significance < 0.001), family (means difference 7.65349, significance of < 0.001) and peers (means difference 7.77811, significance of < 0.001). Trusting of social media should be looked at cautiously due to its low frequencies.

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The "anti-vax" movement: a quantitative report on vaccine beliefs and knowledge across social media - BMC Public Health

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Background Social media use has become a mainstay of communication and with that comes the exchange of factual and non-factual information. Social media has given many people the opportunity to speak their opinions without repercussions and create coalitionS of like-minded people. This also has led to the development of a community know as anti-vaxxers or vaccine deniers.

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Posted February 11, 2020 07:30:00

For decades, if you wanted a divorce in Australia, you had to prove your spouse was to blame.

The grounds ranged from habitual drunkenness to adultery, and many cases involved the use of private investigators.

Some couples who privately agreed to separate would even have to stage adulterous trysts for later evidential use in court.

This all changed in 1975 with the introduction of "no-fault" divorce and the Family Court system.

Family law in Australia has come under intense scrutiny since then, with dozens of reports - including a 2019 Australian Law Reform Commission review - and more than 100 amendments to the Family Law Act.

This year it will be examined again, in a joint parliamentary committee inquiry chaired by Kevin Andrews.

So how did we get here?

A 'moralistic approach': 1959-1975

Marriage and divorce remained state matters for most of the 20th century.

But in 1959, then Attorney-General Sir Garfield Barwick introduced a federal law: the Matrimonial Causes Bill, stipulating 14 grounds for divorce.

This included desertion, adultery, habitual drunkenness, cruelty, insanity and imprisonment.

"You'd hire a private investigator to spy on your spouse," says Shurlee Swain, an Emeritus Professor at the Australian Catholic University.

"He would hang around outside the house ... and then when the light went out in the bedroom he'd then knock on the door and burst in with his camera and take pictures of the couple in the compromising position."

The pictures would then be used in court as evidence of adultery.

This desire to "punish" a party by attributing blame to the "sinner" was deeply rooted in religious principles underpinning marriage at the time.

"It's a very moralistic approach to marriage and one that by the middle of the 20th century was out of sync with the vast majority of the population," Professor Swain says.

The push for reform: 1960s-1975

With cultural and social change sweeping Australia in the 1960s, our conception of marriage also changed.

"There was a shift towards viewing marriage as a loving relationship," explains Henry Kha, a law lecturer at Macquarie University.

"Moreover, there was a rise in de facto relationships ... more and more people felt that marriage was no longer essential in order to affirm a relationship."

The Whitlam government, in power from 1972, proposed a series of social reforms - including laws regulating divorce and parental custody.

The notion of no-fault divorce had support from an eclectic range of organisations, including divorce lawyers - who framed marriage as a contractual obligation both parties should be able to exit equally - and the Divorce Law Reform Association.

Professor Swain says that association "sounds neutral" - but wasn't.

"It was in fact what we now recognise pretty much as men's rights group," she says.

"What they were resentful about was the amount of money going from husbands to ex-wives that they thought should be coming into their families."

But not everybody was in favour of a no-fault system.

"There is also a great amount of fear that women will be short-changed by it because the vast majority of women still at this stage are not in full-time employment, and so marriage has been their career," Professor Swain says.

"So there's a great push from feminist groups to be cautious about how you introduce the law and how you protect women who are likely to be damaged by it.

"They expressed this fear, that if no-fault divorce goes through as it's proposed, that women will be left high and dry and men will just be able to move freely from one marriage to another."

'No-fault' divorce: 1975

In 1975, the government passed the Family Law Act with a firm majority: 80-41 votes.

The law introduced, for the first time, no-fault divorce.

It also established a federal court to deal with family law issues.

"Family law was viewed as run by very strict doctrinal principles that didn't really take into consideration the psychological and social consequences of a breakdown of a relationship," Dr Kha says.

"The aim of the Family Law Act was to remedy those problems by introducing a Family Court of Australia that would not only deal with legal issues but provide counselling services."

In the first year the law was implemented, there was a surge in divorces in Australia.

"The courts are completely overwhelmed from their opening day," Professor Swain says.

"There's these huge queues of people because there is this great pent-up demand of people who actually were no longer living together who wanted to get a divorce but had not been able to do it under the previous situation."

While press coverage of this upswing tended towards the alarmist, she explains, the number of divorces "flattened out" after a few years.

For some, the idea that no-fault divorce would bring about less acrimony was not realised.

"Right from the beginning the expectations of people that people could be civilised is contradicted by the way they in fact act," Professor Swain says.

"It's a minority. The bulk of people don't do that, they don't go to court, they take advantage of it and all is well.

"But it's that group that do end up in the court, that do end up in disputed decisions, that builds the image of the law and the court as a failure."

The need for more reform? 1976-present

Since its implementation, the family law system has been the subject of dozens of inquiries and amendments.

Patrick Parkinson, the Dean of Law at the University of Queensland, says when considering family law reform, it's important to remember that the Family Court deals with much more than just marital disputes.

"It's essential that you start with the proposition that disproportionately we are dealing with violence, abuse, mental illness and drug and alcohol abuse," he says.

"If you understand that then you can probably understand that the adversarial system and decision-making by lawyers, many of whom have commercial law backgrounds, is not fit for purpose for dealing with those sorts of issues."

Instead, Professor Parkinson argues for decision-makers who are more equipped to deal with issues like mental illness.

"At least for self-represented litigants, there should be a multidisciplinary panel consisting of a lawyer, a psychologist or psychiatrist, a third person who might be a drug and alcohol expert or domestic violence expert or something of that kind," he says.

In 2017, the Turnbull government asked the Australian Law Reform Commission (ALRC) to conduct the first comprehensive review of the Family Law Act.

The ALRC received more than 1,200 written contributions, says its principal legal officer, Micheil Paton.

Mr Paton says the major concerns raised were in relation to:

The safety of people involved in the system;

Enforcement of the orders that were made by the courts;

The complexity of the law and the processes;

The expense of going through the system and the time it takes;

The accountability of those who were involved in the system.

The final report, handed down in 2019, had 60 recommendations.

"Recommendation number one was that states and territories should establish specialist family law courts, as already exists in Western Australia, and that ultimately federal family courts like the Family Court of Australia should be abolished," Mr Paton says.

"So in a sense, reversing the effect of the Family Law Act 1975, which created this one national court."

Mr Paton says the primary reason for the recommendation is the "incredible increase" in family violence cases and child protection issues.

"In 1974, when the Act was being designed, family violence hardly rated a mention by the politicians who were establishing it and the documents that were explaining the reasoning for the new law," he says.

"Family law was seen as a private dispute between two people who needed to sort out some arrangements and couldn't agree."

The Federal Government has yet to formally respond to the ALRC report.

However, in the same year, the Prime Minister announced another wide-ranging inquiry into the family law system.

It will be carried out by a committee of politicians from both houses of parliament, including One Nation leader Pauline Hanson - a move which attracted criticism from anti-violence campaigner Rosie Batty.

Many are waiting to see the outcome of the inquiry, due in October this year.

"In an ideal world we'd set up various structures that meant that nobody needed to go to court, that they could sort it out through a long process of mediation," Professor Swain says.

"But we don't live in an ideal world, so I suspect the battle is going to keep going on."

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Marriage story: How Australia introduced 'no-fault divorce'

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Posted February 11, 2020 07:30:00 For decades, if you wanted a divorce in Australia, you had to prove your spouse was to blame. The grounds ranged from habitual drunkenness to adultery, and many cases involved the use of private investigators. Some couples who privately agreed to separate would even have to stage adulterous trysts for later evidential use in court.

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Summary

Introduced with the Religious Discrimination (Consequential Amendments) Bill 2021 and Human Rights Legislation Amendment Bill 2021, the bill: prohibits discrimination on the basis of a person's religious belief or activity in a range of areas of public life, including in relation to employment, education, access to premises and the provision of goods, services and accommodation; establishes general and specific exceptions from the prohibition of religious discrimination; provides that certain statements of belief do not constitute discrimination for the purposes of certain specified Commonwealth, state or territory anti-discrimination laws; creates offences in relation to victimisation and discriminatory advertisements; establishes the office of the Religious Discrimination Commissioner; confers certain functions on the Australian Human Rights Commission; and provides for miscellaneous matters including delegation of powers or functions, protection from civil actions and a review of the operation of the Act.

Progress

Documents and transcripts

Text of bill

Explanatory memoranda

Proposed amendments

House of representatives

Schedules of amendments

No documents at present

Notes

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Introduced with the Religious Discrimination (Consequential Amendments) Bill 2021 and Human Rights Legislation Amendment Bill 2021, the bill: prohibits discrimination on the basis of a person's religious belief or activity in a range of areas of public life, including in relation to employment, education, access to premises and the provision

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political and economical state of the world right now

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political and economical state of the world right now

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Lets post some social issues that we know of! Then we will find some news articles about these social issues.