Australia news live: faith leaders express ‘deep concerns’ about Labor bill’s impact on free speech; Sydney prayer hall fined

Plea comes amid standoff between Albanese government, Coalition and Greens over bill. Follow the latest updates live

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Larissa Waters, the Greens’ leader, also says she’s concerned there has not been enough time to evaluate the legislation, warning there are a “raft of unintended consequences that could occur”.

Waters told RN Breakfast:

We’ve only had a handful of days to look at this legislation, and it’s very consequential legislation … And with every turn, experts and stakeholders and faith leaders and academics are finding new concerns with it. A key concern is that you can’t combat hate if you don’t combat it for everyone.

A key concern that we have … is that these laws, as they’re drafted right now, could be weaponised to shut down legitimate political protest.

Given the tightness of the timeframe … there is a real risk that locking in laws that aren’t right could criminalise people for legitimate political expression. That is a dangerous path.

We’ve got serious concerns with respect to whether or not the bill meets its objective …

It really is concerning that we’re in this stage where we’re less than one business day away from parliament coming together and these serious concerns persist. We’re in a situation where we’re dealing with such a significant piece of legislation, complicated legislation, legislation which deals with the raft of matters which are contained in this one monster omnibus bill, which is a totally inappropriate way to address this situation.

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Source: www.theguardian.com

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