The Coalition will fight Labor’s Misinformation Bill because just like their first attempt – it is an appalling attack on free speech here in Australia.
Already, we have seen top lawyers slam the Bill.
The Victorian Bar Association has made a scathing submission which warned the Bill would undermine free speech by encouraging “chilling self-censorship”.
The Bill, which was introduced to Parliament last week, would impose huge fines on digital platforms, if the Government decides that they have not done enough to “prevent and respond” to “misinformation”.
The digital platforms will want to avoid those huge fines, so they will censor a large amount of free speech of everyday Australians who want to have their say online.
Under Labor’s plan, academics, scientists, and artists are exempted from the Bill – but not everyday Australians.
The Communications Minister can personally order Misinformation Investigations and Misinformation Hearings, on terms of her choosing. These would be extraordinary powers.
This could include investigations and hearings into digital platforms which the Minister believes contain too much ‘misinformation’.
The Minister can choose to exclude a favoured digital platform from the operation of the misinformation laws entirely.
This is wide open to abuse and an extraordinary power for a Minister to hold in a democracy.
The Government is trying to rush this legislation through and gave people barely a week to get their submissions into a Senate inquiry.
The Coalition stands firmly opposed to Labor’s Misinformation Bill because we believe in free speech – not hate speech, free speech – and will fight to defend those rights.
This weak Labor Government – will not – and they will pursue this attempted incursion on the free speech of everyday Australians at their peril.
It’s hard to believe that a government in any democracy would put this forward.
But it has – and it has done it in Australia. T
his bill betrays our democracy.
It incentivises censorship.
It makes the government the ultimate arbiter of truth.
It has no place in our nation.
