By Broede Carmody and Lachlan Abbott
Victoria will strengthen its anti-vilification laws to ban the Nazi salute following a far-right protest at Parliament House on Saturday.
Attorney-General Jaclyn Symes confirmed the move on Monday morning, condemning the behaviour at the protest as “disgraceful and cowardly”.
Neo-Nazis marched on Spring Street on Saturday.Credit: Chris Hopkins
“It’s clear this symbol is being used to incite hatred, not just towards Jewish people but our LGBTIQ+ community and other minority groups,” she said.
“Victorians have zero tolerance of this behaviour and so do we. That’s why we’ll expand our nation-leading legislation banning the Nazi Hakenkreuz to include the Nazi salute – because everyone deserves to feel safe, welcome and included in Victoria.”
It’s not known when exactly the legislation will be brought before parliament. However, Opposition Leader John Pesutto has already flagged his support for a ban.
“We will work constructively with the government,” he told radio station 3AW on Monday morning.
“I think most sensible, decent people are on the same page here. What these salutes mean, and what they have the potential to incite, is a very serious thing. And I believe it’s justified as a limitation of free speech.”
On Saturday, anti-trans rights campaigner Kellie-Jay Keen-Minshull organised to speak to supporters outside the Victorian parliament. A group of about 30 people dressed in black from the neo-Nazi group the National Socialist Network attended in support and performed Nazi salutes on parliament’s steps before being led away by police.
Victorian upper house MP Moira Deeming, who previously said equality has been taken to extremes and has also taken aim at the state government’s approach to gender-diverse young people, was also at the rally. She said she didn’t know the group of men performing the salute and was afraid of them.
Pesutto has announced his intention to expel Deeming from the parliamentary party room because of her involvement in “organising, promoting and participating in a rally with speakers and other organisers who themselves have been publicly associated with far-right-wing extremist groups including neo-Nazi activists”.
Victorian Opposition Leader John Pesutto says he will move a motion to expel Moira Deeming from the party room. Credit: Simon Schluter
The Andrews government last year outlawed the Hakenkreuz, or Nazi swastika, becoming the first Australian jurisdiction to do so. Anyone who intentionally displays the Nazi symbol in public faces a year in prison or a $22,000 fine.
The ban was the result of recommendations from a cross-party inquiry into anti-vilification laws.
Jewish Community Council of Victoria president Daniel Aghion, KC, said he was pleased the state would also move to outlaw the Nazi salute.
“It is an odious symbol of hate,” he said. “[However], it should not be lost in the debate that, on this occasion, the proximate target of this hateful conduct was transgender people and not Jews. There needs to be a broader discussion about vilification of all minorities and criminalisation of such behaviour.”
The director of Monash University’s Australian Centre for Jewish Civilisation, Dr David Slucki, echoed those sentiments.
“Banning the Nazi salute will help to reduce the presence of Nazi symbolism in public places, but it will do little to eradicate Nazism, which thrives in online spaces,” he said. “A broader approach is needed to combat the growing far right.”
Anti-Defamation Commission chairman Dvir Abramovich, who urged the government to ban the Nazi salute in January, described Monday as a historic day.
“A terrible wrong has been made right,” he said. “Anyone who loves this country will support this ban.”
Federal Labor MP Josh Burns, who is Jewish and based in Melbourne, called for other states to announce restrictions on the Nazi salute.
“Not for the first time, the Victorian government is showing strong leadership against neo-Nazi bigotry,” he said. “This is an important step and similar reform should be considered across the country.”
Symes had previously flagged the government’s intention to outlaw the Nazi salute after the gesture was made by a group attempting to gatecrash a ceremony for Indigenous Australians in Melbourne’s northern suburbs on January 26.
Countries such as Germany, Austria, Slovakia and the Czech Republic have already banned the salute. Its use is restricted in Sweden and Switzerland.
Meanwhile, Victoria Police Association secretary Wayne Gatt defended how officers managed the anti-trans rally and ensuing counter-protest on Saturday. Vision circulating on social media of one arrest appeared to show an officer kneeing a counter-protester while they were already on the ground.
“I’m certainly not going to condemn the actions of individual officers who were rushed into quite a volatile melting pot of ideology on that day,” Gatt told ABC radio.
“One demonstration was being actively targeted by others and that is just a recipe for disaster.”
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