Freedom of Association is as fundamental as Freedom of Speech, and is under as much attack.

We’ve seen ‘Vicious-Lawless Association Disestablishment’ laws in Queensland, purportedly to ‘crack down on bikies’ and ‘protect the public’ (that old chestnut), which in reality led to a string of embarrassing and wasteful prosecutions against people who were paying bills;

The three people were at Versace, they were lawfully there, they spent the night in the accommodation which was lawful but when they attempted to pay the bill regrettably the third person came over to check the bill and that’s when their conduct became unlawful,

buying icecream;

Bill Potts said his clients spent three weeks in custody and taxpayers had paid about $500,000 for the case to be pursued. “Their only sin, their only crime, was to buy an ice-cream in a public place – the great controversy here was whether it was going to be choc top or vanilla,” he said.

and delivering pizzas;

Joshua Shane Carew sat in solitary confinement for 15 days in Bisbane’s Watchhouse where there is no TV, no radio, just a basin, toilet and a concrete bed with one blanket. He is now in Queensland’s Arthur Gorrie Correctional Centre. His wife and two young children Holly (4) and Jake (2) have missed him terribly over Christmas and he has not been allowed to phone them or have them visit him.

He has been in jail for the past 21 days, and has only recently been allowed a shower and had not had a change of clothes for 15 days. He was told by QLD Chief Justice Carmody, when refusing him bail, to reflect on the cost to his family over the festive season…

…Unfortunately three weeks ago Joshua was delivering an order to the Yandina pub. Now, Yandina is a pretty small town and the person he was delivering the pizza to happened to be his brother-in-law, a Rebels bikie, who was noticed by police accepting the pizza on the pub’s surveillance video.

Joshua didn’t stay for a drink as he had lots of rapidly cooling pizzas yet to be delivered but he unknowingly had just committed a serious offence under Premier Campbell Newman’s new anti-association laws. He was arrested by Sgt Wade Lee of the Sunshine Coast Police and placed in solitary confinement, where he sat wondering what the hell he did wrong.

The picture you see at the top of this article is the children of the five men arrested, awaiting the return of their fathers who had been imprisoned for this criminal pizza-buying behavior.

This flagrant abuse of power, this assault on basic principles of law including freedom of association, presumption of innocence, and the need for a ‘victim’ before there can be a ‘crime’, was imposed by the reckless and power-mad Liberal-National Party which was in power in Queensland at the time. It stands as one of the worst abuses of governmental power in modern Australia.

But South Australia didn’t want to be left behind (why not? They’re behind in everything else…) and introduced their own version of the VLAD laws. This time it was the Labor Party in power, making the VLAD laws a bipartisan attack on freedom. However Liberal MLC Andrew McLachlan had the balls (sorry PC Brigade, I should have given you a ‘trigger warning’ before I referred to courage as ‘balls’) to cross the floor and vote against the legislation, saying;

“We must not, in seeking to fight organised crime, undermine our hard-fought freedoms at the same time,”

“South Australian politics seems incapable of self-restraint and keeping faith with its core values… Instead the Parliament creates precedents for even more dangerous and oppressive laws, while being cheered on by a police force that appears to have forgotten its privileged role in the community… The passing of this bill shows us that there is a gaping wound in our political culture and leadership.”

Well said.

And New South Wales’ lockout laws essentially amount to the same thing, only this time aimed at everybody. “You may not associate with each other if we think there’s a chance you might do something bad at some point… maybe.” That’s the message from these state governments who have decided that ordinary people cannot be trusted to spend time with each other.

And whilst Queensland have now repealed their VLAD laws, they’ve replaced them with other laws just as clumsy and perverse.

Well Victoria was feeling left out of the party, and Daniel Andrews’ Labor Party decided to one-up the VLAD laws and even the lockouts by going after freedom of religious association. The Victorian Labor Party introduced the ‘Equal Opportunity Amendment Bill’, also known as the ‘Religious Exceptions Bill’.

Predictably, The Age were very much in favor of taking basic freedoms away from God Botherers:

Proposed legislation introduced into State Parliament this week reinstates an “inherent requirement” test that would weaken the powers of Victorian religious bodies and schools to turn away employees because of their sexuality, sex, gender identity, religious beliefs or marital status.

This bill was not about ‘equal opportunity’, but rather about taking away from churches rights which were reserved for political parties, and taking away from non-approved victim groups rights which were reserved for the approved victim groups. It was all about creating un-equal opportunities to choose who you spend time with and employ.

Let me say that again. Political parties would still be free to discriminate in their hiring practices based on the political views and activities of their employees, but churches would be outlawed from doing the same.

One law for the rulers, another for the ruled.

If we are to be considered a ‘free country’, then we must be free individually. You cannot have ‘collective freedom’ without individual freedom. That means being free to choose where you work, and being free to choose who you employ. Being free to choose where and whether you worship, who teaches your children, and what they teach.

Freedom of Association. It’s as important as any other freedom, and as under attack.

But thankfully the people of Victoria have been given a minor reprieve. The legislation was defeated thanks to the Victorian Opposition as well as the cross-bench, who saw this appalling legislation for what it was:

On Tuesday afternoon, Victoria’s upper house of Parliament voted down the Labor Government’s Equal Opportunity Amendment Bill. The Bill was a direct attack on religious groups in Victoria, as it restricted the ability of religious groups to make employment decisions based on whether a candidate or employee agreed with and practised the religion.

A welcome bit of sanity, but you can be sure that the Andrews Government or their successors will try again, and given their terrible track record on freedom of association with the VLAD and lockout laws, I’ve no doubt that State LNP governments around Australia may very well have a crack at religious freedom of association themselves sooner or later.

It is utterly unacceptable that we call ourselves ‘free’ and a ‘liberal democracy’, but in reality were fighting battles for the most basic freedoms of all.

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