The Rationalist Society of Australia has urged the South Australian government to “do the right thing” by the LGBTIQ community and remove religious exemptions to the state’s equal opportunity laws.

In a letter to the state’s Attorney-General, Kyam Maher (pictured), the RSA’s Executive Director Si Gladman said the Albanese government’s decision to abandon its proposal to address federal exemptions to anti-discrimination laws had opened the way for the South Australian government to act.

In the upper house of the South Australian Parliament this week, Greens member Robert Simms is expected to introduce a bill proposing to amend the state’s Equal Opportunity Act to remove discrimination exemptions that apply to religious schools and religious bodies.

The exemptions allow religious schools to fire teachers and religious service providers such as shelters to refuse service on the grounds of sex, sexual orientation and gender identity.

The RSA is urging its South Australian-based members and supporters to write to Mr Maher and to their representatives in the Legislative Council in support of removing the exemptions.

The previous Liberal government had held public consultation into the issue with the view to removing such exemptions.

Soon after the Malinauskas government came to power in 2022, Mr Maher told the RSA he would “give further consideration” to the matter. In February last year, Mr Maher told Mr Simms in parliament that the Malinauskas government would consider amendments to the Act and examine similar changes made in other states.

In the letter, Mr Gladman urged Mr Maher to work with Mr Simms and find an outcome that “delivers for South Australians and removes some of the remaining vestiges of harmful state-sanctioned discrimination”.

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Si Gladman is Executive Director of the Rationalist Society of Australia. He also hosts ‘The Secular Agenda’ podcast.

Letter to South Australian Attorney-General Kyam Maher, 26 August 2024

Dear Attorney-General,

On behalf of the Rationalist Society of Australia – Australia’s oldest freethought organisation promoting reason, secularism, and evidence-based policy – I’m writing to urge your government to take action on the issue of religious exemptions to the state’s equal opportunity laws.

In recent years, we have corresponded with you on this issue a number of times and we were hopeful of reform after you told us in 2022 that you would “give further consideration” to the matter.

Now that the Albanese government has abandoned its plan to address religious exemptions in federal anti-discrimination laws, the Malinauskas government has an opportunity to do the right thing by its citizens and ensure that people in South Australia cannot be discriminated against on the grounds of sex, sexual orientation, gender identity or intersex status by faith-based schools and service providers. This would bring South Australian law into line with Tasmania, Queensland and Victoria.

We note that Robert Simms, your colleague in the Legislative Council, is proposing to introduce new legislation to strip religious schools and organisations of the ability to discriminate against LGBTI people.

We support the intent of his bill and we urge you to work with Mr Simms to find an outcome that delivers for South Australians and removes some of the remaining vestiges of harmful state-sanctioned discrimination.

Regards, 

Si Gladman

Executive Director, Rationalist Society of Australia