New laws targeting ‘hate crimes’ have passed through federal parliament, with faith and free speech groups raising concerns about the impact they might have on people’s right to speak freely.

The laws follow a series of antisemitic attacks on Jewish places of worship and property amid ongoing tensions stemming from the October 7 attacks in Israel.

The laws were passed with the support of the Opposition and members of the crossbench. However, some groups have raised concerns that these laws will go much further than antisemitic violence and have an impact on freedom of speech.

Previously, the law prohibited “urging violence” against a person or group based on race, religion, national or ethnic origin. The amendments expand this list to include sex, sexual orientation, and gender identity as protected attributes.

The amended law adds a new offence of “threatening force or violence”, with no clear definition of “force”.

It also lowers the threshold and reduces certainty about when an offence has been committed.

The new law uses a subjective test, based on a “reasonable member of the targeted group”, to determine whether an offence has been committed.

And it removes the existing “good faith” defence by which a Court could consider whether the relevant act was done for some genuine purpose in the public interest.

These laws are meant to curb the recent rise of antisemitism in Australia, but they potentially capture Christian activity, especially around contested issues such as sexual orientation or gender identity.

Proving an offence to a criminal standard remains difficult, and most Christian activity is unlikely to be captured by the Criminal Code. But these laws increase the possibility for  political adversaries to frame legitimate discussion as “threatening”. Expansive hate speech laws create a chilling effect on important public discussion, and the lower thresholds and greater uncertainty of the amended law may have unintended consequences. 

Christian think tank and advocacy group Freedom for Faith says that parts of the laws “create scenarios where legitimate debate about religion or sexuality can be considered psychologically ‘violent’ and hence illegal”.

“This represents an unacceptable limitation on the fundamental human rights of freedom

of speech, thought and religion,” they wrote in their submission to the Senate inquiry on the laws.

Only time will tell if the new law will be used to curb antisemitic violence or will instead further stifle freedom of speech.