One Nation’s NSW leader, Mark Latham, is moving to significantly raise the bar for complaints being made to the Anti-Discrimination Board, saying the agency is being exploited by political activists and vexatious litigants whose goal is to financially ruin their opponents.
Mr Latham moved a private member’s bill in the NSW Legislative Council on Thursday seeking to end the “political persecution” and “lawyers’ picnic” incentivised by lax legal standards enshrined in the Anti-Discrimination Act.
At present, the law allows complaints to be lodged without any cost. The board’s president can choose to discontinue the matter if they are satisfied the complaint is frivolous or vexatious, but if that occurs, an appeal can be lodged with the NSW Civil and Administrative Tribunal, where penalties of up to $100,000 can be awarded. If the board accepts the complaint, it is referred to the same tribunal.
Mr Latham told parliament the law had been passed in good faith before the advent of social media, and was now being abused by political activists and others to settle personal vendettas. “If the board, in a rare moment of common sense, decides to terminate an investigation into a frivolous and vexatious complaint, that is where the matter should end,” he said.
His amendments were brought on in part by a serial complainant named Garry Burns, a self-described gay rights activist who has lodged hundreds of complaints that have been accepted by the board for further investigation.
Several dozen of these were aimed at Bernard Gaynor, a Catholic blogger and father of eight living in Queensland.
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Mr Gaynor invoked the ire of Mr Burns after posting a statement online claiming he did not want his children taught by gay teachers. According to an email, read out by Mr Latham in parliament, Mr Burns said Mr Gaynor “has an asset, namely his house”, and that if enough complaints were substantiated at NCAT then “we can look at taking his house through bankruptcy”.
In a separate case, Mr Latham said a brain-damaged man named John Sunol, who was injured in an accident, had been pursued by Mr Burns for a “rant about gays in a random and incoherent fashion” on social media.
“He has few followers, no real impact and no political influence,” Mr Latham said. “The legal types are now circling the trust fund that controls Sunol’s $400,000 compensation payment.”
The amendments seek to stop NCAT from taking discontinued referrals from the board and stop complaints being accepted against people with a known brain injury, among other proposed changes.
YONI BASHAN
STATE POLITICAL REPORTER
