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by Angeline Tan, LifeSiteNews

A South Australian lawmaker plans to table a new bill that would require religious schools to employ homosexual teachers.

Robert Simms, an openly homosexual member of the upper house of South Australia’s Parliament and member of the leftist Greens Party, told Australian newspaper The Advertiser that he hopes to propose the aforementioned bill in August to eradicate exemptions for religious institutions.

“It is outrageous that in 21st-century South Australia, a gay teacher working in a religious school can be in fear of losing their job simply because of their sexuality… Surely all South Australians deserve equal protection before the law?” Simms said in comments cited by Russia Today.

Simms also told The Advertiser that it was “disappointing to see the Federal Government dragging their heels” on the issue, urging the South Australian government to “step up” and introduce the amendments, Russia Today added.

Hypocrisy

In statements to LifeSiteNews, Warwick D’Silva, national president of the Australian Family Association (AFA), criticised Simms’ proposal, declaring:

Robert Simms’s plan to remove current exemptions for faith-based schools from South Australia’s anti-discrimination law smacks of hypocrisy. Would Simms support legalisation taking away the freedom of his Greens Party to employ only those who support Greens’ policy? Would the Greens support legislation that denied them the freedom to refuse employment to a member of the Liberal Party who was also a strong opponent of the Greens?

D’Silva added:

Simms says that these exemptions ‘allow discrimination’ against people on the basis of their sexual orientation and gender identity. They don’t allow discrimination, they allow religious schools the freedom, the liberty, to employ teachers and staff in accordance with the deeply held beliefs on matters of sex, natural marriage and family.

The current exemptions for faith-based schools in the South Australian Equal Opportunity Act protect the inherent right of parents to have their children raised and educated in accordance with their beliefs, as recognised in the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights.

Article 18(4) calls on governments to have ‘respect for the liberty of parents and, when applicable, legal guardians to ensure the religious and moral education of their children in conformity with their own convictions.’

Mr Simms’s proposals would violate this fundamental human right of parents, just as taking away the rights of political parties to employ only those who respected the principles and policies of their party would violate the civil and political rights of all political parties.

Federal Law

Meanwhile, removing faith school exemptions at the state level would not dispense with federal protections.

“Should Simms succeed in removing the exemptions for faith-based schools in South Australian law, current federal exemptions for religious schools would take precedence,” D’Silva told LifeSiteNews. “This means that the freedom of SA religious schools to choose who they wish to employ would be preserved under the Federal Sex Discrimination Act.”

Simms’ suggestion comes in the wake of a heated debate over the employment of LGBT staff in faith-based organizations, such as religious schools, in Australia.

In May, non-profit LGBT organisation Equality Australia urged the Australian federal government to “protect” LGBT staff and students in religious schools.

“Every day the government delays is another day more harm is being done because religious schools are allowed to discriminate against staff and students who are gay, trans, pregnant, divorced, or unmarried,” CEO Anna Brown claimed in remarks cited by City Hub.

Also, in March, the Australian federal government published a report finalised by the Australian Law Reform Commission (ALRC) in late 2023. Notably, the ALRC suggested removing the exemption in Section 38 of the Sex Discrimination Act that permits religious schools to hire staff in accordance with their beliefs.

An excerpt of the ALRC report reads:

… the Australian Government’s commitment is that an educational institution conducted in accordance with the doctrines, tenets, beliefs or teachings of a particular religion or creed: must not discriminate against a student on the basis of sexual orientation, gender identity, marital or relationship status or pregnancy; must not discriminate against a member of staff on the basis of sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, marital or relationship status or pregnancy.

Furthermore, the ALRC suggested that religious institutions be permitted to choose like-minded staff as per their religious beliefs if it is “reasonably necessary” and “proportionate” to ensuring a community of faith without violating sex discrimination laws, as per a March report by Crux.

In response to the ALRC’s suggestions, Crux reported that Australian churches submitted a letter to Prime Minister Anthony Albanese objecting to any efforts to remove legal exemptions for faith-based schools.

Australian National Catholic Education Commission executive director Jacinta Collins, Melbourne Archbishop Peter A. Comensoli, Sydney Archbishop Anthony Fisher, Melkite Bishop Robert Rabbat, Maronite Bishop Antoine-Charbel Tarabay, Chaldean Bishop Amel Nona and Catholic Schools NSW chief executive Dallas McInerney were some of the Catholic signatories of the letter.

Jacinta Collins underscored that current Australian law enables Catholic and other faith-based schools to employ and enrol staff and students based on their faith.

“The recommendations would severely limit the ability of our schools to operate and teach according to our ethos and are at odds with the Inquiry’s terms of reference, and the desire of families to choose a faith-based school for their children,” she said in comments cited by Crux in March.

“The ALRC has critically neglected the Attorney General’s third term of reference to ensure that religious schools can ‘continue to build a community of faith by giving preference, in good faith, to persons of the same religion as the educational institution in the selection of staff.’”

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Republished with thanks to LifeSiteNews.