Greens consider backing 'horrendous' hate speech laws

Progressive and left-wing groups urge the Greens to oppose bill

The Greens have expressed a willingness to support Labor’s highly controversial hate speech laws provided they agree to amendments.

In a media release issued Thursday afternoon, the Greens say they “will not pass the Bill in its current form”, but are “open to working with the Government”.

The news has alarmed progressive and left-wing groups as well as, Deepcut understands, internal Greens factions, who are all urging the Greens to oppose the bill.

Labor’s ‘radical’ reforms

Labor unveiled a draft iteration of the Combatting Antisemitism, Hate and Extremism Bill 2026 earlier this week, drawing sharp condemnation from civil liberties groups as “radical and unprecedented reforms to our democratic rights and liberties.”

Among the reforms include:

• extraordinary new powers for the Home Affairs Minister to designate organisations as “hate groups” as they see fit, rendering them illegal without the minister “required to observe any requirements of procedural fairness”

• greatly expands the number of prohibited symbols, gestures, public conduct and online activity

• expands government power to refuse and cancel visas, with potential exclusion based on whether an individual “might” incite discord

The first point, in particular, has anti-genocide groups concerned that the new legislation would be used to target their peaceful activities.

“It is clear the Labor party is moving in the direction of Starmer’s Labour government in the UK, seeking to criminalise the anti-genocide movement and move it underground,” Amal Naser, spokesperson for the Palestine Action Group Sydney (PAG), told Deepcut.

On Tuesday, Australia’s main civil liberties groups – the NSW Council for Civil Liberties (NSWCCL), Liberty Victoria and Queensland Council for Civil Liberties – issued a joint statement condemning the draft legislation.

“Laws that inappropriately limit freedom of speech, religion and association are only going to further drive division,” Gemma Cafarella, Liberty Victoria president, said.

Greens considering a deal

The Greens have moved into the box seat in either rejecting or backing the bill, after after the Coalition leader, Sussan Ley, slammed it as unsalvageable. If the Coalition maintains its opposition, Labor would require Greens support in the Senate to pass the bill.

A source familiar with internal Greens discussions, who spoke on condition of anonymity, says the party is considering possible amendments including:

• adding Islamophobia and homophobia as protected categories, in addition to antisemitism

• adding procedural fairness in proscribing hate groups

• including a defence if you are criticising nation-states

Greens Senator David Shoebridge said in the media statement that the Greens “will push for these protections to be extended as part of our negotiations with Labor over this Bill”. He also said proscribing hate groups “needs to come with safeguards and protections, including procedural fairness”.

A separate Greens source told Deepcut, however, that the party has yet to put forth any amendments and is at the stage of consulting legal experts.

Greens urged to ‘vote it down’

A chorus of opposition to the Greens move rung out this afternoon from progressive and left-wing circles.

“The Greens are trying to make a bad situation less bad, but it is ultimately an unwelcome course of action with horrendous consequences for our civil liberties,” Timothy Roberts, NSWCCL president, told Deepcut.

“Rushed laws are bad laws. The government has engaged in this process in bad faith and not taken the community with them. I hope that no party helps them continuing to do so,” he added.

Jordan van den Lamb of the Australian Socialists also urged the Greens to “vote it down entirely”.

“This bill represents the most serious attack on freedom of speech and association in Australia in decades, and one which is clearly targeted at the Palestine movement. Amendments can’t salvage it,” he told Deepcut.

PAG’s Naser also joined the chorus of progressive voices calling for the Greens to oppose the bill.

“Amendments will be insufficient to address the dominant purpose of this bill, which is to crush a peaceful anti genocide movement,” she said.

Pro-Israel lobby wants Coalition to back bill

On the opposite side of the political spectrum, the nation’s most prominent pro-Israel lobby group, the Executive Council of Australian Jewry, is urging the Coalition to reverse its stance and support the bill.

“By all means seek to amend the bill to remove its shortcomings, but a wholesale rejection of the bill would not at all be warranted,” co-CEO Peter Wertheim is reported in the Sydney Morning Herald as saying.

The report also quotes Rabbi Nochum Shapiro, former president of the Rabbinical Council of NSW, who is urging immediate action against protests that are critical of Israel’s genocide in Gaza.

The Sydney Morning Herald article specifically referenced “the use of chants such as ‘globalise the intifada’, ‘from the river to the sea’ and ‘death to the IDF’”.

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