Lawyers call out free speech risk of misinformation laws

Lawyers have warned that Labor’s proposed laws to combat online misinformation could ‘compromise freedom of speech’ in the absence of a federal human rights act.

Communications Minister Michelle Rowland. Picture: NCA NewsWire / Gary Ramage

A leading lawyers group has warned that Labor’s proposed laws to combat online misinformation could “compromise freedom of speech” in the absence of stronger protections, calling on the Albanese government to legislate a ­federal human rights act.

The Australian Lawyers Alliance said it was “inevitable that tensions will arise” between communications reform and human rights until these protections are enshrined at a federal level, ­especially when criminal penalties are being considered.

The draft bill, which will grant the Australian Communications and Media Authority heightened powers to fine social media giants millions of dollars for content deemed to be “harmful” misinformation or disinformation, has also been criticised for its broad definitions.

The alliance acknowledged in its submission to a parliamentary inquiry the importance that misinformation and disinformation were addressed, especially when it posed a “threat to public safety and Australia’s democracy”, but called on the government to carry out an analysis of how the bill would affect free speech and human rights.

“The ALA believes that an analysis of how all reforms outlined in this bill might affect freedom of speech, as well as other internationally-recognised human rights, must be more closely considered by the federal government,” the said in its submission.

“The ALA is concerned about some extremely broad qualifiers and seemingly low thresholds within the bill’s provisions for ­establishing whether shared content is misinformation and/or disinformation.

“This has the potential to compromise freedom of speech in the absence of constitutional and legislative human rights protections in Australia.”

Communications Minister Michelle Rowland, who unveiled the draft legislation in June, said there was continued consultation and the bill in its final form would “help keep Australians safe from seriously harmful misinformation and disinformation online”.

The alliance also raised concerns that the bill in its current form contained “extremely broad qualifiers and seemingly low thresholds” for establishing if content was misinformation or disinformation.

“For example, one of the criteria for content being classified as misinformation and/or disinformation for the purposes of activating the ACMA’s proposed new powers is that ‘the content contains information that is false, misleading or deceptive’,” the submission said.

“These qualifiers are subjective and it is unclear how this threshold is met – for instance, who or how many people must have been misled or deceived?”