Welcome to the first Protest Rights Wrap, a bi-monthly overview of the protest rights landscape in Australia. To receive this newsletter in your inbox ongoing, sign up here.
Communities nationwide are engaging in inspiring protest action, which is too often met with repression. Simultaneously, more and more civil rights organisations are speaking up for the right to protest, with over 120 community organisations endorsing the Declaration of Our Right to Protest – a framework outlining the standards governments must uphold to protect protest.
So what's happening around the country in the protest rights space?
In NSW, a legislative review will soon consider the appropriateness of the 2022 anti-protest laws, which skyrocketed maximum penalties for obstructing traffic from a $440 fine to 2 years imprisonment or a $22,000 fine. Despite being declared partially unconstitutional by the Supreme Court, the laws are still being used against protestors who are spending up to a year on restrictive bail conditions battling the charges. ADN is running a civil society campaign to call for the repeal of these laws and for community consultation to be included in the review process. The government is set to table the review results in a report by 1 October 2024.
Over-policing and the deployment of police violence against peaceful protestors have also impacted the right to protest in NSW. Legal Observers NSW has released a report into the policing of weekly Palestine rallies in Sydney, which details several instances of police violence despite the overwhelmingly peaceful nature of the protests. Over 40 protestors have so far been charged under the anti-protest laws for participation in Palestine rallies.
An open letter coordinated by ADN and NSWCCL and signed by 41 community groups, including human rights organisations, grassroots advocates and unions was released on April 4. The same day, the NSW government announced that it would open the review to public consultation. This will be an important opportunity to show the impacts of the laws on the right to protest in NSW and we will be providing information about how to make your submission soon.
A panel of Independent, Greens and Labor MPs, as well as the NSW Council for Liberties President and a protestor charged under the anti-protest laws together with civil society representatives called for the laws to be repealed at an event at NSW Parliament House on 20 March. Image Credit: NSW Council for Civil Liberties
Six activists faced raids by Queensland counter-terrorism police following an action at Boeing offices that included spray painting and putting up posters. Protestors were ordered to surrender their phone passcodes so police could access their data. They are now facing possible imprisonment of up to one year for not complying with this direction. Widespread surveillance of weekly street marches through facial recognition technology has meanwhile been criticised by the Queensland Council for Civil Liberties.
This continues the recent pattern of digital surveillance against protestors, with several protestors in NSW being forced to surrender their passcodes to police on request as part of bail conditions prohibiting them from using encrypted apps and communicating with other protestors.
Two climate activists are currently in prison serving 2-month sentences after Victoria Police appealed the initial 3 week sentence as being too short. Police used recent street march actions to demand greater powers to move protestors on from public places and also called for the introduction of a police permit system for protests.
Protest permit systems, which exist in NSW and on the council level in several states, make the holding of a lawful street protest conditional on the approval of the police or local council. They are often used as a means of controlling protest activity. In response, ADN coordinated a joint letter from organisations including Liberty Victoria, Amnesty, Environmental Justice Australia and Melbourne Activist Legal Support calling on the government to respect the role of disruptive protest. Subsequently, the Victorian government firmly rejected calls for a protest permit system.
Melbourne Activist Legal Support has published reports on several incidents of police use of pepper spray, rubber bullets and batons against protestors at the Webb Dock picket, Palestine street march and a trans rights rally.
Protestor pepper sprayed by police in the face while peacefully walking past them at Webb Dock picket. Image Credit: Melbourne Activist Legal Support.
In Tasmania, 19 people have been indefinitely banned from entering any of the state’s native forests by Sustainable Timber Tasmania, the public forestry corporation. This is the first time protestors have received indefinite bans, with the usual response to forestry protests being a 14-day ban from the relevant area. The Bob Brown Foundation is running a legal challenge against the bans based on their potentially unconstitutional infringement on the implied freedom of political communication.
A forest activist charged under Tasmania’s 2022 anti-protest laws is spending 70 days in jail prior to his sentencing. The laws mean community members could be jailed for 12 months for obstructing access to a workplace, and two years in prison, or a fine upwards of $13,000 for protesting the destruction of old-growth forests on a forestry site. An organisation supporting members of the community to protest could be fined more than $45,000.
May 16 will mark a year since the introduction of new anti-protest laws in South Australia that upped the penalty for obstructing a public place from a $750 fine to a mammoth $50,000 fine or 3 months imprisonment. Community groups will be coming together on the date of the laws’ introduction to convey their continued opposition to these restrictions on democratic expression.
ADN continues to work with grassroots groups and the South Australia Rights Resource Network to campaign for protest protections. This includes facilitating submissions to the recent inquiry into the need for a Human Rights Act.
Civil society leaders and crossbench MPs in front of SA Parliament House on the day of the introduction of the 2023 anti-protest laws Image Credit: Australian Democracy Network
Woodside is continuing its civil litigation for loss of earnings and brand damage against activists involved in a protest at its headquarters in June 2023, seeking orders to force protestors to hand over any information they have about others involved.
Woodside has already been working to tie up protestors in legal challenges. This included an earlier threat to sue protestors for financial damage, and chief executive Meg O’Neill obtaining violence restraining orders against protestors, which initially included a ban on them referring to O’Neill by any electronic means.
Organisers of an Invasion Day protest in Darwin were forced to fundraise $8,000 for traffic control in order to satisfy the requirements under the state's protest permit system. In the lead-up to the protest, Darwin City Council refused to commit to providing traffic control, despite normal practice being that they do so as part of issuing a protest permit. The Northern Territory requires that permits be obtained from the local council in order for the protest to be protected from obstruction offences. The notice must be given not less than 7 days before the date of the protest and protests must comply with any conditions issued by the council.