'Anti-trolling' Bill will actually protect the powerful from critique
The Social Media (Anti-Trolling) Bill 2022 is a deeply concerning development because it is really about making reforms to defamation laws in ways that could particularly favour politicians and others with sufficient resources to pursue defamation remedies, and not about reducing trolling or the damage caused by trolling.
Read moreSubmission: Modern Slavery
NSWCCL made a submission to the Joint Standing Committee on Treaties Inquiry into the International Labour Organization Protocol of 2014 to Forced Labour Convention 1930 (No. 29).
We strongly support the ratification of this treaty; we also called for the adoption of this protocol so that its provisions become a part of domestic law. Rights with no remedy under Australian law are paper rights only - adoption is essential to ensure full protection for this vulnerable population.
Read moreLetter: Strengthening the Character Test Bill
It now seems certain that, without opposition from the ALP, the Migration Act (Strengthening the Character Test) Amendment Bill will pass. We wrote to Kristina Keneally, the Shadow Minister for Immigration and Citizenship stressing that the issues with the bill, which the ALP had twice rejected, remain. We called on the ALP, if it wins government in the forthcoming election, to set up an inquiry into all the ‘god powers’ in the Migration Act, and into the sections concerned with asylum seekers and visa cancellation, with an eye to substantially redrafting the act.
More information:
News
MEDIA RELEASE: NSWCCL Condemns Announcement of NSW Government Review into Doli Incapax
Posted by Adriana Boisen · May 08, 2025 12:27 PM
Submission: Antisemitism in NSW
Posted by Adriana Boisen · April 23, 2025 12:51 PM
MEDIA RELEASE: Shocking Revelations From Caravan Inquiry
Posted by Adriana Boisen · April 08, 2025 11:23 AM
Submission: Commencement of the Fisheries Management Amendment Act 2009
Update 8 November 2022: The findings from this inquiry examining the extensive 13 year delay of the NSW Government to commence legislation to protect Indigenous cultural fishing and the impact on the community of failing to do so has been handed down. The report is a damning indictment on the failure of the current government to act on its own policy. It calls on the NSW government commence section 21AA by June 30 next year. Read the report here.
Update 1 November 2022: The Fisheries Management Amendment (Enforcement Powers) Bill 2022, to be debated next week, will enable Fisheries Officers to search a person, arrest without warrant, enter premises, or require information relevant to potential charges, prior to charges or arrest. This ammendment was tabled last month and will be debated next week. NSWCCL opposes this ammendment in the strongest terms. Read more here.
Update 30 May 2022: The parliamentary inquiry has published submissions and will hold a community hearing on the south coast on July 28, with hearings in other locations scheduled in August.
Aboriginal people should be able to exercise their traditional rights to fish free from the burden of fearing criminal charges.
In our submission into this inquiry, we outlined how the non-commencement of the Fisheries Management Amendment Act 2009 impacts the fundamental human rights of Aboriginal people living on the South coast of NSW.
We proposed that the Government’s response should incorporate substantial initiatives to enable Aboriginal fishers to obtain a reasonable share of commercial quotas so that they can carry out their traditional activities in a meaningful and sustainable manner.
The Age: CFMEU challenges Visy’s bid to track union official
Our President Pauline Wright spoke to The Age about paper giant Visy electronically tracking workers at a NSW plant, asking whether the trackers were appropriate for the intended purpose. A union official who had also been asked to wear a tracker commented that Visy's actions 'appear intended to discourage their employees from being union members'.
Ms Wright said:
“In this case, it’s probably legitimate to propose perimeter controls … [but] requiring people to wear a device that locates them inside the premises ... it would seem to be disproportionate,” Ms Wright said.
“It sounds pretty invasive to me.”
Read the full article
Letter: the treatment of temporary migrants
Many migrant workers come to Australia to undertake work in order to send money home to support their families. These people’s visa conditions tie them each to a single sponsoring employer, such that if they leave those employers they lose their visas and have to return home.
A recent ABC podcast dealt with an investigation into some most unsatisfactory consequences of this arrangement.
Read moreTime to review the Immigration Minister's ‘god-like powers’
Now that the dust has settled on the Djokovic saga, it’s time to consider the appropriateness of the Immigration Minister’s remarkable powers in relation to visas and how they are exercised.
This isn’t the first time individual visa interventions by the Minister have made the headlines: recall Peter Dutton’s controversial intervention to grant visas to two foreign au pairs in 2015, or the 2004 Phillip Ruddock “cash for visas” scandal, each of which led to a Senate Inquiry.
As Liberty Victoria’s 2017 report “Playing God” pointed out, ‘the Minister for Immigration and Border Protection is granted the most personal discretion of any Minister by an overwhelming margin. More legislative provisions confer ‘public interest’ or ‘national interest’ discretions on him than on any other Minister … He or she has a power over individual lives, relatively unchecked by courts, that is greater than that of any other Minister, including the Prime Minister.’
Read moreSydney Criminal Lawyers: Home Affairs Erodes Oversight to Spying on Citizens, Warns NSWCCL
Our president Pauline Wright voiced her concerns about the National Security Legislation Amendment (Comprehensive Review and Other Measures No 1) Bill 2021, which will expand the reach of Australian intelligence, to Sydney Criminal Lawyers.
Read moreMedia release: Politically motivated Bill is unnecessary & will punish refugees, victims of domestic violence
The Morrison Government is attempting to push the Strengthening the Character Test Bill through parliament for the fourth time; and it is resorting to political attacks in the attempt to do so. The Bill is unnecessary and will do harm. Despite what the Government is saying, the Bill has nothing whatsoever to do with serious offences.
This Bill:
- Targets minor offenders.
- Is totally unnecessary.
- Will subject people who are of no danger to society to the rigours of indefinite detention, or deportation.
There are no exceptions for children. - Will discourage people from reporting family violence, when they are financially dependent on the perpetrator.
More information: Read our media release
