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Hobart apology
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Friday, 30 January 2009 |
 After a three year battle, Martine Delaney has lost her court challenge against the Liberal Party’s anti-gay election pamphlets. But it wasn’t in vain, writes Peter Hackney.
With the exception of a few leading lights, the Liberal Party has never done much for GLBTI communities. Yet as a self-styled ‘broad church’ purportedly run by civilised people, some might expect the party to be above crude electioneering that demonises minority groups for the sake of votes.
But in 2006, that’s exactly what the Libs did in Tasmania when they produced election pamphlets trying to scare the public off voting for The Greens in that year’s state election.
“DANGER,” screamed headlines in red. “At this election, consider what you’re really voting for.”
The Greens, apparently, stood for “RADICAL SOCIAL CHANGE”, which included “FULL ACCESS TO MARRIAGE LAWS FOR SAME-SEX COUPLES”!
Because they would wreak on Tasmania such “socially destructive change”, they just weren’t “worth the risk”, voters were told.
Many in the state’s GLBTI communities took offence. Transgender activist Martine Delaney was one of them. On behalf of the state’s GLBTI communities, she took the party to court, alleging that their pamphlets incited hatred on the grounds of sexual orientation; a violation of Tasmania’s incitement to hatred laws.
 Under cross examination by Delaney’s counsel, Peter Tree SC, former Liberal Party State Director Damien Mantach conceded that the advertisements may have had a negative impact on same-sex attracted people.
Yet on January 23, Tasmania’s Anti-Discrimination Tribunal found that the Liberal Party did not contravene the state’s incitement to hatred laws. Tribunal chairperson Helen Woods declared: “While the pamphlet may harness or draw out a dislike for homosexuals in some quarters of our society, they would be people prone to such feelings.”
Delaney was deeply disappointed by the decision.
“Hatred is bound to be stirred up when the fundamental human rights of a minority are demonised in this way,” she maintained.
So was it all a waste of time? Or was something still gained by challenging the pamphlets?
Arguably, there was.
Delaney’s efforts, if nothing else, will ensure that the more clueless of Liberal Party officials will think twice before conducting a similar scare campaign during an election. Three years of negative publicity over their bigotry is a poor pay-off for the now infamous pamphlets – especially for the sake of an election they lost.
Delaney’s challenge also puts political parties on notice that they won’t get off scot-free when trying to use minority groups as cheap fodder for electoral gain: at the very least, there will be hearings to attend, questions to answer and decisions to justify.
Shadowy right-wing political group Exclusive Brethren will learn this when Delaney’s separate case against them comes up in court over Liberal Party-backed pamphlets – also from the 2006 state election – which declared that transgender and intersex rights would “ruin families and society”.
The Brethren, who shun disclosure of their inner workings at all costs, will be up for public scrutiny, to their chargrin.
And whatever the outcome on paper, Delaney will have struck another blow for her states GLBTI citizens.
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