Weekend Wrap for 3 October 2026
Welcome to the NSL Weekend Wrap for 3 October 2026. The Wrap covers Australian secular politics — religious privilege and funding, religion in public schools, discrimination laws, voluntary assisted dying, and many other related issues. If someone forwarded this to you, you can subscribe on our website.
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At the University of Notre Dame's annual religious liberty conference, backed by Freedom for Faith, speakers argued that protections for conscientious objectors to assisted dying and abortion don't go far enough, that religious schools must be free to keep their character, and that the Commonwealth should think again before criminalising hateful speech. Sharing the platform was the Australian Human Rights Commissioner, Lorraine Finlay, who spoke of the need for "universal religious freedom". The common request is more room for religious bodies to decline services, choose staff by belief, and speak without the limits others face.
Turning that agenda into law and institutions is another matter. A federal Faith Affairs Council — a standing body giving religious leaders a seat at the policy table, modelled on the one already running in New South Wales — was floated with ministers late last year, and this week the Attorney-General's Department confirmed to the Senate that it has done no work on it. The NSW council's chair, Anglican Bishop Michael Stead, was among the Notre Dame speakers, and the body he runs is the proposed template. The government's long-promised Religious Discrimination Bill sits in much the same place, parked behind a demand for bipartisan support the Coalition has no reason to supply.
In Western Australia, a publicly funded school welfare programme is staffed through a provider that hires only Christians. The Governor, Chris Dawson, is its patron, hands out annual chaplaincy awards from Government House, and promotes "treasured chaplains" on his official website. The state's own Equal Opportunity Commissioner called that hiring restriction prima facie religious discrimination in 2021. It stands today, and the public-school parents' committees that keep asking to employ secular wellbeing officers instead are refused.
In Tasmania, Liberal MPs now have a conscience vote on the Greens' bill to ban conversion practices. Ministers and the Australian Christian Lobby say it would criminalise parents, prayer and careful medical advice. A fact-check this week read those claims against the bill and found they don't stand up: it protects parents, prayer and good-faith care, and reaches only attempts to change or suppress who a person is.
The same assumption runs under all of these stories: that a religious claim should get access, exemptions and public money on terms a secular one wouldn't.
News this week
National: Attorney-General's Department "has not undertaken work" on proposal for federal faith affairs body (27 September 2026)
The push for a federal faith advisory body, modelled on the New South Wales government's Faith Affairs Council, has stalled. In an answer to Senator Fatima Payman at Senate estimates, the Attorney-General's Department confirmed it had done no work on a federal Faith Affairs Council, despite Attorney-General Michelle Rowland and other ministers reportedly expressing interest at a December roundtable with faith leaders. The idea had reached Rowland through Anglican Bishop Michael Stead, who chairs the NSW council. The Rationalist Society, which warned the body would entrench religious favouritism and sideline the non-religious, notes the government's Religious Discrimination Bill is also stalled behind its bipartisan-support condition.
➧ READ MORE:
Rationalist Society of Australia
VIC: Imams' council condemns Melbourne Islamic preacher's call to 'take up arms' against enemies (29 September 2026)
The Australian National Imams' Council said it was deeply concerned after Nine newspapers reported that a Melbourne preacher using the name Abu Ahmad told followers, in a July sermon, not to "take the Jews and the Christians for friends" and to take up arms against Islam's enemies. The preacher said he had been reading and explaining a passage from a book, not issuing a call to violence, and ANIC condemned any call to arms against civilians or religious communities. It also reopened the hate-speech-law question. The Albanese government abandoned its anti-vilification bill after the Nationals and the Greens withheld support, and independent MP Allegra Spender said the comments show why nationally consistent laws are needed.
➧ READ MORE:
The Guardian
WA: WA Governor's support of religious chaplaincy puts him at odds with public school communities (1 October 2026)
Western Australia's Governor, Chris Dawson, is patron of YouthCARE, the dominant supplier of chaplains to the state's public schools, and sponsors the annual Governor's Chaplaincy Awards from his taxpayer-funded office. The Rationalist Society, which wrote to him in March and received no reply, says that promotion sits badly with the many public-school communities asking to hire secular wellbeing officers instead. YouthCARE employs only Christians, a practice the state's Equal Opportunity Commissioner called prima facie religious discrimination in 2021. Documents obtained under freedom of information laws show up to 39 per cent of the chaplaincy and wellbeing funding goes to the religious providers' administration overheads.
➧ READ MORE:
Rationalist Society of Australia
National: Notre Dame conference highlights pressures on religious freedom (2 October 2026)
The religious-freedom sector set out its agenda at the University of Notre Dame Australia's annual religious liberty conference, an event supported by Freedom for Faith. Keynote speaker Michael Quinlan argued that New South Wales protections for conscientious objectors to voluntary assisted dying and abortion are inadequate, and are undermined by departmental guidelines. Other speakers defended religious schools' freedom to maintain their character, and a Freedom for Faith speaker warned against criminalising "harmful speech" in the Commonwealth's antisemitism and hate-speech laws. Anglican Bishop Michael Stead spoke to the work of the NSW Faith Affairs Council, and Human Rights Commissioner Lorraine Finlay addressed the conference on universal religious freedom.
➧ READ MORE:
CathNews
Commentary and analysis
Katy Hall: She's an Australian law professor. Her husband says they 'don't do consent' (29 September 2026)
Hall uses a remark by Joanna Howe's husband on her podcast, that in their marriage he doesn't "do consent", to open an account of the anti-abortion movement Howe leads. The Adelaide University law professor has built a large following campaigning against abortion and against school consent education, which the Howes cast as "brainwashing"; she has shared a platform with Pauline Hanson and drawn One Nation figures to her rallies, and kept promoting an image of "aborted twins" she conceded was of sugar gliders. Hall sets Howe's claims about consent education against the research, and names the conservative-Christian frame behind them.
➧ READ MORE:
The Age
Tor Hundloe: Royal Commission needs to put Bondi attack into a global and historical context (30 September 2026)
As the Royal Commission on Antisemitism and Social Cohesion turns from hearings to findings, Hundloe argues it should set the Bondi attack in a global and historical frame rather than treat it in isolation, and should press extremists of every kind — Islamist, neo-Nazi, far-right — to account for their views in public. His prescriptions reach well into foreign and social policy, which others will contest, but the piece is a secular-humanist statement of what the Commission is being asked to weigh.
➧ READ MORE:
Rationale Magazine
Tessa Ogle: Fact check: The claims being made about Tasmania's conversion practices bill (2 October 2026)
With Tasmanian Liberals granted a conscience vote, opponents including Police Minister Felix Ellis, Deputy Premier Guy Barnett and the Australian Christian Lobby have warned the Greens' bill would criminalise parents, prayer and cautious medical care. This fact-check reads those claims against the bill itself and finds protections for parental discussion, good-faith healthcare, and religious expression and prayer, and no general duty to report. The prohibition reaches only conduct directed at changing or suppressing a person's sexual orientation or gender identity.
➧ READ MORE:
Q News
Paul Begley: Australia's institutions yet to follow court rulings on antisemitism (3 October 2026)
Courts have found that criticism of Israel is not in itself antisemitic: Justice Desmond Fagan called the IHRA definition "inept", the Federal Court held the ABC acted unlawfully in sacking Antoinette Lattouf, and a defamation case against journalist Mary Kostakidis was dropped. Begley argues universities, the ABC and writers' festivals have been slow to absorb those rulings, adopting contested definitions that narrow what can be said. It reads as a counterweight to the week's calls for tougher hate-speech laws, warning that public institutions can themselves reach too far.
➧ READ MORE:
Independent Australia
Opportunities for action
TAS: Write to your Tasmanian MPs on the conversion practices bill. The Liberals have a conscience vote on the Greens' Conversion Practices Prohibition Bill 2026, and this week a published fact-check picked apart the claims — from Police Minister Felix Ellis, Deputy Premier Guy Barnett and the Australian Christian Lobby — that the bill would criminalise parents, prayer and medical advice. With the vote unbound by party lines, individual members are the audience, and the bill is expected to be debated in October or November. Find and contact your local members via the Tasmanian House of Assembly member list.
WA: Have your say on Christian prayers in the WA parliament. The Legislative Assembly's Procedure and Privileges Committee is still considering whether to replace the daily Lord's Prayer with a more inclusive opening, with Premier Roger Cook opposed to change and Pentecostal pastor Margaret Court campaigning to keep the prayers and add the Ten Commandments to schools. Write to the Premier and your local members urging a parliament that is neutral on religion. Find your members via the Parliament of Western Australia member list.
National: Support reform of religious charity privilege. The Rationalist Society is pressing for the "advancement of religion" to be removed as a standalone charitable purpose and for the charities regulator to be given real power to enforce the rules — the thread running through this year's scrutiny of Catholic school authorities during the federal election review. Follow and support the campaign via the Rationalist Society's tax and religion campaign.
QLD: Sign the Queensland parliament e-petition to keep state schools in Pride in Diversity, a not-for-profit program dedicated to improving LGBTQ+ workplace inclusion. After the education department withdrew from the programme as a result of pro-religious lobbying, PFLAG's Shelley Argent lodged an e-petition asking it to rejoin and to restore support for staff. Queensland residents can sign until 20 November 2026 via the Queensland Parliament e-petition 4694-26.
National / NT: Email the Attorney-General on voluntary assisted dying and telehealth. A line in the Commonwealth Criminal Code bans electronic communication about VAD and forces regional patients to wait for scripts by post. Greens senator Sarah Hanson-Young's Criminal Code Amendment (Equal Access to Voluntary Assisted Dying) Bill 2026 is before the Senate, and the South Australian government has now added its voice, with Health Minister Blair Boyer and Attorney-General Kyam Maher urging the Commonwealth to act. Email Attorney-General Michelle Rowland via Go Gentle Australia's telehealth campaign page.
VIC / National: Register for VADCON26, the Voluntary Assisted Dying Conference, in Melbourne on 19–20 October 2026. The conference brings together clinicians, advocates and researchers working on access to and improvement of VAD laws. Details and registration via Go Gentle Australia.
National: Sign the Census – Not Religious? campaign's petition to fix the Census religion question for future censuses. Census night has passed for 2026, but the leading question the ABS's own documents concede "may lead respondents to a particular response" will be back in 2031 unless it is changed. Sign the Change.org petition, and read why the wording is loaded.
National: Push back on the $1.2 billion Choice and Affordability Fund. Private school organisations are campaigning to extend the fund beyond 2029 — money available only to Catholic and Independent schools, outside the needs-based model. Support the AEU's For Every Child campaign.
National: Support an Australian Charter of Human Rights & Freedoms. The Human Rights Law Centre runs a site for supporters. Visit the Human Rights Act campaign website.
Our activities
We recently made a submission to the NSW Law Reform Commission's review of the Anti-Discrimination Act. You can read it here.
NSL was a partner in the joint 2026 Census – Not Religious? Mark 'No Religion' campaign, which ran through census night on 11 August and has now concluded. The petition remains open: visit the campaign website to learn more, or sign the Change.org petition calling on the ABS to change the leading religion question in the Census.
As always, the full videos of presentations and panel discussions from the 2023 Secularism Australia Conference (co-organised by NSL and other groups) are freely available for viewing on the Secularism Australia website and on YouTube!
More coming soon!
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