LGBTI Rights

Over the last three years Anna Brown, Lee Carnie and the rest of the HRLC team helped secure many important reforms, won a number of landmark legal cases, and helped to shift community attitudes in partnership with LGBTIQ+ community organisations.

The Human Rights Law Centre is excited to support the establishment of Equality Australia, Australia’s first national LGBTIQ+ legal advocacy and campaigning organisation to continue the unfinished business of achieving equality for LGBTIQ+ people.

Since joining the Human Rights Law Centre, Anna Brown has been at the forefront of nearly every major reform for LGBTI people in recent years.

Australia’s first national LGBTQI+ legal advocacy and campaigning organisation Equality Australia, welcomed today’s pledge by the Andrews Government to provide in principle support to funding counselling and support services for survivors of ‘gay conversion therapy’ and establish an expert working group to draft legislation to prohibit conversion therapy.

Survivors and LGBTQI+ legal advocacy body Equality Australia, have welcomed the recent changes to the ALP’s platform on religious “conversion therapy”, saying the shift away from a focus on criminalisation to broader strategies in partnership with affected communities will provide better long-term outcomes for LGBTQI+ survivors.

Today’s announcement by Prime Minister Scott Morrison that the religious freedom review report will be released, has prompted calls for stronger federal protections from discrimination for LGBTIQ+ people.

The Morrison Government has proposed a Bill which legal experts and LGBTI groups say would entrench unfair and outdated discrimination against lesbian, gay, bi and trans students, resulting in a stalemate with Labor and the Greens.

Anna Brown, Co-Chair of the Equality Campaign and Director of Legal Advocacy at the Human Rights Law Centre, said the delay by the Australian Parliament is a blow to students and their parents seeking certainty ahead of the new year.

Today the NT Parliament passed new laws that are a significant step forward towards equality for LGBTI Territorians. It’s been almost a year since the Federal Government passed marriage equality. Unfortunately, this wasn’t the case for all Australians due to an outdated and unnecessary law that meant transgender people couldn’t change the gender on their birth certificate without being forced to divorce the person they love.

Exemptions which allow religious schools to turn away transgender students or sack gay teachers should be removed in the wake of an urgent inquiry conducted by the Senate Legal and Constitutional Affairs References Committee.  

Federal laws should be amended to protect students and staff from discrimination, the Human Rights Law Centre said today in its submission to the Senate committee reviewing laws that allow faith-based schools to discriminate against LGBTIQ people.

This week marks one year since Australians overwhelmingly voted ‘Yes’ to the question of whether LGBTI Australians can marry the person they love.

The NT Government has introduced new laws that will help heal the harm caused by discriminatory laws against LGBTI people. NT’s expungement laws, which come into effect today, and the introduction of legislation to reform outdated birth certificate laws are two steps towards achieving justice and equality for all.

In an open letter to Attorney-General Christian Porter, leading legal academics and antidiscrimination law practitioners have strongly criticised aspects of the proposed amendments to the Sex Discrimination Act 1984 (SDA) designed to deal with discrimination by religious schools against LGBT students.

A major report confirms that religious conversion therapy and related practices are pervasive in many faith communities in Australia and causing real harm to lesbian, gay, bisexual and trans people.

The leaked copy of the Morrison Government’s bill to protect students from discrimination has raised concerns and a push for more consultation with the community.

The Human Rights Law Centre has been working with the Equality Campaign and LGBTI community organisations to advocate for the removal of outdated exemptions from anti-discrimination laws which allow religious schools to expel LGBT students and fire LGBT teachers.

LGBTI groups, parents of trans and gender diverse children, teachers, leaders and allies are in Canberra to call on parliament to amend outdated anti-discrimination laws to ensure all lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and intersex (LGBTI) people are treated with fairness and equality.

The Western Australian Government has an historic opportunity to do away with outdated and unnecessary laws that prevent trans and gender diverse people from being recognised as who they are, according to a submission by Transfolk of WA together with the Human Rights Law Centre.

Today 47 organisations and leaders called on the Morrison Government to amend outdated anti-discrimination laws to ensure all lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and intersex (LGBTI) people are treated with fairness and equality.

Every person deserves the right to be who they are. LGBT people are not wrong or broken, and religious conversion therapies that try to ‘cure’ them are harmful.

From today transgender Victorians will be able to stay married to the person they love when they change their birth certificate to reflect who they are. The Andrews Government eliminated an anomaly in Victoria’s birth certificate laws that requires anyone wishing to change their gender to be unmarried.

Today the Sydney Morning Herald released the 20 recommendations from the Religious Freedom Review headed by Phillip Ruddock, leaving LGBTI advocates and human rights experts concerned about future discrimination for LGBTI people.

A dark chapter in Australia’s history has closed for gay, lesbian and bisexual Australians, their friends and families. Today the Western Australian Parliament joined all states and territories in passing laws to allow people charged under unjust homosexual laws to have the convictions removed from their criminal records. 

The Human Rights Law Centre has launched a report calling for stronger protections from hate speech and hate crime in Victoria. End the Hate: Responding to prejudice motivated speech and violence against the LGBTI Community reveals how current laws and policies are failing to protect LGBTI people from hate crime and hate conduct and outlines how the tide can be turned with 23 recommendations for reform.

Ten faith-based family violence services have made a public pledge to provide inclusive and non-discriminatory services to lesbian, gay, bisexual, trans, gender diverse and intersex (LGBTI) people in Victoria. Anna Brown, Director of Legal Advocacy at the Human Rights Law Centre, welcomed the pledge and its significance.

A new nationwide campaign “My ID, My Identity” is calling on states and territories to support trans and gender diverse people to be recognised as who they are. Currently in some states, people can only change the gender on their birth certificate if they are unmarried, if they’ve had invasive surgery on their reproductive organs and are over 18. 

Ethan and his mum Sarah outside South Australian Parliament to support the passage of birth certificate reforms.

The Australian Government has been urged to improve its track record on women’s rights overnight by an expert UN Committee on women’s rights.

The UN Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women made its criticism after a robust review earlier this month to assess Australia’s progress on ending discrimination against women.

People in Queensland who have convictions for historic consensual same-sex activity can now apply to have their criminals records removed through the LGBTI Legal Service.