Senator complains to Human Rights Commission under section 18C of the Racial Discrimination Act, which he is fighting to have repealed

This article is more than 4 years old

This article is more than 4 years old

Senator David Leyonhjelm has launched a discrimination complaint over an opinion article describing him as an “angry white male”, saying it shows why the race speech law is absurd and needs to be repealed.

Leyonhjelm has made a complaint to the Australian Human Rights Commission over an article by Fairfax Media’s Mark Kenny in which he described Leyonhjelm and the One Nation senator Malcolm Roberts as a “gormless duo” who displayed “angry-white-male certitude”.

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Kenny was taking aim at the pair over comments on ABC’s Insiders on 7 August that section 18C – which prohibits speech that offends or insults a person based on their race – should be repealed because “offence is always taken, not given”.

The senators have initiated a new push by the crossbench to repeal section 18C.

Leyonhjelm made a complaint about the article because “colour was one of the reasons the comments were made”.

“The comments are reasonably likely in all the circumstances to offend or insult some white males,” he told the Daily Telegraph. “My colour was one of the reasons the comments were made.”

Leyonhjelm told Guardian Australia it was not contradictory to bring a complaint under the race speech law he advocates repealing.

“The intention is to highlight the absurdity of the law,” he said. “I only have one vote in the Senate. The government and opposition both say they are not in favour of repealing section 18C.

“If I’m going to succeed in having it repealed, I need to change minds. If I’m going to change minds I have to show absurdity of the law.”

Leyonhjelm said he believed Kenny’s article was unlawful under section 18C and the complaint would “highlight that what he is entitled to say shouldn’t be unlawful”.

He said he was not worried this would be perceived as a use of the law in bad faith because “that would be a ridiculous suggestion to make”.

The spat comes after the Western Australian branch of the Liberal party voted in favour of removing the words “insult” and “offend” from the provision on Saturday.

The motion to remove the words was agreed to instead of an original proposal by chairman of the policy committee Sherry Sufi to repeal the section altogether.

Removing the words would leave in place the parts of the provision banning speech that humiliates or intimidates a person based on race.

The motion is not binding on the parliamentary party but will cause trouble for the Turnbull government, whose leadership opposes changing the law.



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The attorney general, George Brandis, told the ABC late last month: “In September 2014 the then prime minister Abbott made a decision to take reform of 18C off the table and that remains the government’s position.”

Last Monday a spokesman for the prime minister said: “We have no plans to change the [Racial Discrimination Act].”

According to an ABC report the Indigenous Liberal MP Ken Wyatt warned the WA conference that the ramifications of repealing section 18C were “not confined to the Indigenous community”.

“It is much broader in the groups that will react to us,” he said.