The Northern Territory Government's plan to remove vilification protections from the Anti-Discrimination Act has been criticised as likely to make the community less safe.
The proposed repealing of hate speech provisions, which Chief Minister Lia Finocchiaro said last week would "remove the ridiculous inclusion of offending someone as some type of discrimination", would mean the NT would be the only jurisdiction without legislation enabling public incitement of acts of racial hatred to be considered an unlawful and/or criminal offence.
Attorney-General Marie-Clare Boothby argued laws already existed to "protect people against abuse and threats".
"The CLP government is committed to enforcing those laws when and if they are broken," she said.
When the Anti-Discrimination Act reforms were initially debated in 2022, Ms Finocchiaro, then as opposition leader, opposed the hate speech provisions, arguing that while nobody was for "dangerous hate speech", the laws set an "extremely low bar".
At the time Labor attorney-general Chansey Paech described the criticism as fearmongering, arguing the anti-discrimination commissioner would be able to ensure vexatious complaints wouldn't progress through the system.
Since the laws were introduced, only eight out of the 40 complaints made to the NT Anti-Discrimination Commission have been accepted.
Labor leader Selena Uibo said the government's plan to "strip laws that protect our diverse community from discrimination, harassment, and victimisation is unacceptable".
The first Aboriginal woman to lead a major political party in Australia said everyone in the NT deserved the chance to "live in a community where everyone is protected from harmful attitudes and behaviours that diminish us and make our society less safe".
"We have seen a troubling rise in race-based attacks in southern states, driven by disinformation, fearmongering, and hate speech," Ms Uibo said.
"We should be doing everything possible to send a clear message that intolerance and hate have no place in the Northern Territory—instead, the CLP is doing the opposite.
"Repealing these protections would also leave the Territory out of step with other Australian jurisdictions, federal law, and international human rights conventions."
NT Anti-discrimination Commissioner Jeswynn Yogaratnam said the removal of the vilification protections would be a "setback for human rights and equality in the Territory".
"These changes threaten to strip essential protections for vulnerable communities, exposing Territorians to the risk of hate speech and discrimination," Mr Yogaratnam said, the NT News reports.
Conservatives have long criticised the 18c aspect of the federal racial discrimination act, arguing in attacks free speech.
Both News Corp columnist Andrew Bolt and Senator Pauline Hanson have been found guilty of breaching the act in the recent past.
The controversy around the change in vilification laws announcement last week was heightened over the weekend after the NT News reported a neo-Nazi poster reading "Australia for the white man," as well as imagery linked to Mussolini's regime had been plastered at a bus stop near the religious adult education centre for Indigenous Australians, Nungalinya College.
The poster claimed to be from Nazi group, the National Socialist Network, whose saw a number of their members arrested in Adelaide last month for allegedly displaying banned symbols.
