Australia cannot credibly advocate for religion and belief rights internationally while different levels of government continue to discriminate against non-religious people at home, the Rationalist Society of Australia has told the foreign minister.
In a letter to Senator Penny Wong, the RSA said the Australian government must address the discriminatory and unfair treatment against non-religious citizens in government institutions and programs to credibly advocate for freedom of religion and belief internationally.
RSA Executive Director Si Gladman told Senator Wong (pictured) that Australia was failing to meet its international human rights obligations – such as in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, and the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights – to protect freedom of thought, conscience and religion.
He noted that the RSA and a coalition of community organisations had raised a number of examples of discriminatory and unfair treatment against non-religious people in a submission to the United Nations Human Rights Council’s Universal Periodic Review (UPR) (Fourth Cycle) into Australia’s human rights earlier this year.
Australia’s delegation to the UPR will appear at the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva on 26 January.
“While Australian diplomacy claims to be a leader in promoting human rights internationally, the Australian government is not fulfilling its human rights obligations and commitments domestically when it comes to providing the equal treatment of people based on religion and belief,” wrote Mr Gladman.
“Minister Wong, in regards to religion and belief internationally when federal and state/territory government institutions and programs continue to discriminate against and unfairly treat non-religious Australians at home?”
Mr Gladman also argued that Australian diplomacy needed to reflect its increasingly non-religious population and advocate more strongly for the fundamental rights of non-religious people abroad.
“Given that Australia is becoming an increasingly non-religious society – with ‘no religion’ on track to surpass Christianity at the 2026 Census – we believe Australian diplomacy should reflect the people it serves, and their values,” he wrote.
“The freedoms of non-religious people are in great danger in the face of religious-based bigotry and hostility in many parts of the world, including in our neighbourhood. Australian diplomacy should be a strong voice in support of their fundamental human rights.”
In 2022, the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade told the RSA that Australian diplomacy strongly advocated for ”freedom of religion or belief, including the freedom to adopt, change or leave a religion” in bilateral, multilateral and development forums.
The department also pointed to the work that it had been doing, as part of the International Religious Freedom or Belief Alliance, to advocate for ending the death penalty as a punishment for blasphemy or apostasy.
In a letter to the RSA last month, Attorney-General Michelle Rowland failed to outline what actions the Albanese government will take to address the ongoing discriminatory treatment of non-religious people in Australian government institutions and programs.
Find here all the updates about out joint submission to the United Nations Human Rights Council’s Universal Periodic Review (UPR) (Fourth Cycle) into Australia’s human rights.
Si Gladman is Executive Director of the Rationalist Society of Australia. He also hosts ‘The Secular Agenda’ podcast.
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Photo: IAEA Imagebank (Flickr, CC)