Federal Government to reveal anti-Semitism plan
Tom Lowrey: Isabella, it's expected to recommend some substantial and really quite sweeping changes in some areas, some of which would require the government to legislate, which gives you an idea of the seriousness here. Jillian Segal was put in this job more than a year ago in response to some fairly high-profile incidents of anti-Semitism. We've seen some since, like the attacks against the Adass Israel Synagogue in Melbourne a year or so ago and another attack on an East Melbourne synagogue only a few days ago as well. There has been some government change along the way as well, like mandatory minimum sentences that were brought in for terror and hate offences. But these recommendations from the anti-Semitism envoy, Jillian Segal, are likely to go towards things like building better knowledge of Jewish culture, particularly in schools. Others might go to areas like migration, policing, even public broadcasting has been one that's been mentioned too. There's other work as well that's informing this. The Executive Council of Australian Jewry has had a 15 point plan for anti-Semitism. It's been pushing for months. Some of these recommendations might have been informed a bit by that sort of work. That's gone to ideas like removing the charity status from groups that promote racism, banning some protests at universities as well. Miss Siegel's plan is expected to be broader than that, but we'll see all the details when it's handed down a little later on today.
Isabella Higgins: And Tom, there is a separate push for tougher hate speech laws.
Tom Lowrey: Look, this is quite interesting. This has been coming from the independent MP, Allegra Spender, along with some others for quite some time. She's been pointing to what she calls a loophole in anti-vilification laws, saying there are strong laws against inciting violence, drawing a link between someone's speech and a violent act that has occurred. But where that violent act hasn't occurred or hasn't occurred yet, she says that speech, that hate speech isn't being fully policed. The laws aren't quite strong enough there. That's where she wants to see some change. Here's a bit of what she had to say on that.
Allegra Spender: We still don't have national laws that stop hate speech. Really the speech that seeks to increase and incite hatred and vilification across our community. We have laws against hate crimes, but not just the speech. And I think that that is still a significant gap.
Tom Lowrey: Allegra Spender says this would help not just the Jewish community in dealing with anti-Semitism in the community more broadly, but also protect other groups like LGBT groups as well.
Isabella Higgins: Tom Lowrey reporting there.
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