The 25 March NSW state election comes at a time when civil liberties in this state are under siege. Our right to protest and freedom of speech have been assaulted by both major parties with their joint support for the now infamous Roads and Crimes Legislation Amendment Bill 2022. The laws criminalise even brief obstruction of a road, train station, port or other piece of public or private infrastructure. The penalty is up to two years imprisonment and or a fine of up to $22,000. Freedom of assembly, political participation and freedom of expression should be core values and beliefs of our political leaders, instead we have leaders who are determined to shut down peaceful protest.

This consultation paper, produced by the ALRC is in response to a referral from the Attorney-General
Mark Dreyfus, in November 2022, for the ALRC to review the exception provisions in the Sex
Discrimination Act 1984 (Cth) and the Fair Work Act 2009 (Cth) that apply to religious educational
institutions.

These provisions have been of concern to NSWCCL and many other community, civil liberties, human
rights and legal groups for a long time. Calls for their review are correspondingly longstanding. The
ALRC previously commenced a review of the provisions which was regrettably suspended by a
previous Government. NSWCCL commends the current Attorney-General for moving quickly to
establish this review. It is a very significant law reform initiative of great importance particularly to
children and young people, in particular, who are connected with in religious educational institutions.

An investigation by the Guardian Australia has made a startling discovery that AI can fool the voice recognition technology used to verify the identity of Centrelink and the Australian Taxation Office (ATO) customers.

Centrelink and the ATO both use voiceprint technology as a security measure to verify customer identities over the phone, without the need for customers to answer various security questions before they can gain access to highly sensitive personal information from their accounts.

Climate activist Deanna “Violet” Coco’s 15-month jail term imposed last December has been quashed due to the 'false fact' and 'false assertation' that the NSW police had added to their case against the 32 year old climate activist regarding an ambulance had been obstructed due to the protest. 

Coco was sentenced to 15 months prison in December for blocking a lane of traffic on the Sydney Harbour Bridge with a hired truck in April 2022 — making her the first person to be imprisoned under the new anti-protest laws, which were passed by The Coalition with Labor’s backing in the same month.

NSW Council for Civil Liberties president, Josh Pallas, called the police’s actions against Coco “shocking”. 

Deanna “Violet” Coco was sentenced to 15 months in prison with a non-parole period of eight months and fined $2500 by Magistrate Alison Hawkins in December 2022. Today, District Court Judge Mark Williams overturned the fine and placed her on a 12 months conditional release order with psychological counselling for the Sydney Harbour offence. For two other minor offences, Coco was convicted but no other penalty was imposed, City Hub's Wendy Bacon reports.

In response to the overturning of Coco's sentence, NSWCCL President Josh Pallas said, "A custodial sentence was neither proportionate nor fair, indeed the cost to tax-payer and waste of court time is outrageous. Justice has been done today, but at too great a cost.”

Both leaders of the two major parties in NSW have restated their support for the draconian anti-protest laws they jointly put in place over a year ago. Over 240 civil society, trade unions and religious groups have all joined to condemn these laws which over the last 12 months have resulted in previously unheard of custodial sentences for peaceful, non-violent protest action.

In response to the court decision this week to overturn the custodial sentence against activist Violet Coco both the Liberal Premier Dominic Perrottet and Labor Leader Chris Minns have doubled-down on their support for these harsh and unnecessary laws.

The 15 month sentence that climate activist Deanna 'Violet' Coco was given for blocking one lane of traffic on the Sydney Harbour Bridge for less than 30 minutes back in April of 2022 has been quashed. 

Coco, 32, was issued with a 12 month conditional release order on Wednesday after judge Mark Williams heard that she had been initially imprisoned due to the false information that was provided by the NSW police. 

She told reporters she would pursue compensation against the police after spending 13 days in prison.

“Obviously we need to continue our right to protest. Protest is such an important part of our democracy,” she said.

Today in Sydney’s Downing Centre Local Court activist, Violet Coco successfully appealed the unfair and harsh 15 month custodial sentence she received last December. Judge Mark Williams SC withdrew all but two of Ms Coco’s convictions and sentenced her to a 12-month conditional release order.

In the lead up to the poll on 25 March, pressure is building on Premier Dominic Perrottet as the reality of the NSW anti-protest laws sinks in for the broader New South Wales community.  NSW Police reportedly told organisers of the weekend’s Sydney International Women's Day March, the School Strike for Climate last week and the organisers of the 2023 May Day Rally that they could not hold these community-based actions in front of Sydney Town Hall if the number of people exceed 2,000 - an arbitrary number that has no legislative or policy basis.

The Australian Human Rights Commission (AHRC) has put forward a new human rights framework which aims to embed human rights considerations as part of the culture of public administration for policy and decision-making in Australia. This would include a requirement for public servants to consult with people who are either directly affected by policies and laws such as First Nations Australians, children and people with a disability, the Mandarin's Melissa Coade reports. 

AHRC president Rosalind Croucher said an ongoing conversation about Australia’s human rights protection system had evolved over the past three years with a view to creating an inclusive and robust legal framework.

NSW police have withdrawn a false allegation that four climate change protesters who stopped traffic on the Sydney Harbour Bridge last year blocked an ambulance.

Police included this false allegation in a statement that the police prepared on the day of the arrests. The false allegation was designed to paint a hostile image of four peaceful protesters and to successfully argue for onerous bail conditions, including severe restrictions on their movements, and tough sentences.

NSWCCL President Josh Pallas described the case as “an outrageous” example of “police misstating the facts which have been consequential in the sentences of others. The police have offered no justification for this misstatement of facts. They must be held accountable and at the very least, explain how they got this so wrong.”

NSW civil society was appalled when Violet Coco received a 15 month prision sentence in respose to her taking part in a Fireproof Australia action that blocked one lane of the Sydney Harbour Bridge for 25 mins. 

During the hearing, NSW police argued that Coco and the three other Fireproof Australia activists conducting the nonviolent direct action had blocked an ambulance trying to get across this bridge with its lights and sirens on responding to an emergency which had been one of the main arguments against these road-blocking protests. 

This allegation has since been redrawn by the NSW police, which prompted NSWCCL president Josh Pallas to release a media statement. 

Attorney-General Mark Dreyfus says incarceration rates and deaths in custody of Indigenous Australians are a national shame but stopped short of backing Aboriginal senator Pat Dodson’s calls for immediate action on 30-year-old royal commission recommendations, SMH's Lisa Visentin and James Massola report. 

In Dodson's powerful intervention, calling out the inaction of successive governments, he said the the Albanese government has an obligation to act on the findings of the royal commission and make sure that people taken into custody have the care that they need. 

Today in Sydney’s Downing Centre Local Court protesters, Alan Glover and Karen Fitz-Gibbon, were sentenced on pleas of guilty to charges arising from blocking one lane of the Sydney Harbour Bridge for about 30 minutes in April of 2022.  This afternoon, both received 18 month Community Correction Orders with a fine of $3000 each.  

The police’s initial allegation that the protest blocked an ambulance with its sirens on was withdrawn in court. That allegation contributed to the Court decisions last year to impose harsh bail conditions and previously unheard of custodial sentences for non-violent, peaceful protesters who were co-defendants of the people sentenced today.

Magistrate Daniel Riess noted that ‘Violet’ Deanna Coco and Jay Larbalestier has both been sentenced of the “false ambulance assertion” and that “no emergency vehicles were obstructed”. The police have now withdrawn the allegation that the protest hindered any ambulance.

Today NSWCCL President, Josh Pallas wrote to University of Sydney Vice Chancellor, Professor Mark Scott to urge Professor Scott to reconsider the reported suspension of two students, Maddie Clarke and Deaglan Godwin, who protested at a University of Sydney University Law Student’s Society event in September 2022.

The NSW Council for Civil Liberties (NSWCCL) considers the reported half-year suspensions of these two students to be excessive and disproportionate. We asked USYD to immediately reverse these suspensions. 

Student protests against invited speakers on campus have a long history and occur in the spirit of academic freedom and the free flow of ideas in educational institutions.  Such speeches and student protests are often controversial but are essential to the interplay between university management and the student body within a community which is meant to foster free thought and thinking.

Prominent members of our society, including the current Prime Minister of Australia, participated as students in disruptive protests on campus.

The CRIS poses a series of questions to further identify the challenges of and options for the sharing of general practice data and the use of eCDS. The objective is to use general practice data to inform government health policy and for public health research. Rather than answering each specific question posed, the NSW Council for Civil Liberties submission focuses on the privacy implications for patient consumers of general practice services and use of eCDS.  The submission covers the four identified problem areas of data sharing and consent; data quality, comparability and linkage; data governance, oversight and coordination; and the increased use of eCDS by GPs.

Update: 9 March 2023 Yesterday Labor the Australian Labor Party joined with the Liberals to vote against the Greens' legislation to evacuate refugees and people seeking asylum from Nauru and PNG to safety in Australia. This is a devastating blow for the 150 people still trapped in limbo. NSWCCL condemn the Labor Party for betraying refugees and people seeking asylum.

The NSW Council for Civil Liberties, civil society and human rights organisations welcome the introduction of the Migration Amendment Evacuation to Safety Bill 2023 in the Senate. This Bill is required to urgently resolve the situation of those refugees and asylum seekers still living in Papua New Guinea and Nauru. Australian asylum seeker policy is a gross breach of human rights and decency. It is inconsistent with its obligations under international law.

The Bill offers the chance to reform the law to bring Australia’s immigration policies in line with our international obligations under the Refugee Convention, by bringing all refugees and people seeking asylum to Australia while determinations are made about durable solutions.

The UN Subcommittee on Prevention of Torture (SPT) has been forced to terminate its suspended visit to Australia signalling to the international community that Australia is shamefully failing in its obligations under the Optional Protocol to the Convention on the Prevention of Torture (OPCAT).  The NSW Council for Civil Liberties call on all Australian governments to prioritise the implementation of the OPCAT and to meet our obligations to the people held in detention.

In compliance with obligations under the OPCAT, Australia must execute two simple functions for the establishment of the principles of the OPCAT into law. First, to set up, designate and maintain a network of Commonwealth, state and territory inspectorates (each referred to as NPM Bodies) responsible for inspecting and making recommendations about places of detention within their jurisdiction. Second, to facilitate visits to Australia, including to places of detention under Australia's jurisdiction and control, by the SPT. NSW has yet to nominate an NPM Coordinator or implement the OPCAT into law.

On February 13 the Albanese Government announced that it would end the cruel and unnecessary policy of temporary protection. This means that those who already have a Temporary Protection Visa (TPV) or Safe Haven Enterprise Visa (SHEV) will be able to apply for a permanent Resolution of Status (RoS) Visa.

This is wonderful news for the thousands of people who have been living in limbo on these cruel and inhumane visas for over a decade. Those granted a new visa will have the same rights and benefits as all other permanent residents, and will be immediately eligible for social security payments, access to the NDIS and higher education assistance. People on TPVs and SHEVs have been living and working in our community, paying taxes, creating employment and strengthening our economy for years. 

The Privacy Act Review Report was released on 16 February 2023. NSWCCL was pleased to see that many of the recommendations the Council made in our submission were supported by the review.

A key recommendation in our submission which was adopted by the review is ensuring the collection of, use and disclosure of personal information is fair and reasonable, including whether the “impact on privacy is proportionate to the benefit”. The Council supports the inclusion of non-exhaustive legislated factors that are relevant to determining whether the collection, use, or disclosure of personal information is fair and reasonable in the circumstances. However, it considers that clear guidance and examples of how these factors may apply in practice must be provided.