Climate activists have been “intimidated” and “frightened” from protesting by sweeping new laws that impose jail terms for demonstrations that disrupt major roads or public facilities, Australia’s New South Wales (NSW) Supreme Court has heard.
So broad are the new laws’ powers that simply gathering near a train station could result in the arrest of protesters, environmental campaigners told the court.
“The impact of these laws have been to intimidate me,” environmentalist and member of the Knitting Nannas, Helen Kvelde, told the court in an affidavit, part of a constitutional legal challenge to the laws.
Photo: EPA-EFE
“I want to be tougher and braver and to participate in protest actions without fear, but instead I am not,” she said.
The new laws — amendments to the Crimes Act passed by the New South Wales parliament late last month — impose jail terms of up to two years, and fines of A$22,000 (US$14,851), for protesters who cause “damage or disruption” to major roads or major public facilities.
The legislation empowers government ministers to designate any road or public facility as a “major road” or “major infrastructure” by regulation. Disruption can include people “being redirected” from a major facility, such as a train station.
Environmentalist Deanna “Violet” Coco was the first person to face jail under the new laws.
Coco was initially convicted and sentenced to 15 months in prison for a protest on the Sydney Harbour Bridge last year.
However, her conviction was quashed on appeal after it emerged that police lied to the court about her protest, alleging her action had blocked an ambulance, which police later conceded was untrue.
Two members of the Knitting Nannas environmental advocacy group, Kvelde and Dominique Jacobs, supported by the New South Wales Environmental Defenders Office, have challenged the constitutionality of the new laws in the supreme court.
They say in their case that the new laws are unconstitutional because they infringe on protesters’ freedom of political expression.
“The explicit purpose of the law is to impose a burden on political communication, because it is perceived ... a particular form of protest ... should be prohibited and subject to severe penalties,” Stephen Free, representing the protesters, told the court.
Free said that a political protest held at Sydney Town Hall — a commonplace occurrence — could fall afoul of the new law, with all of its participants facing imprisonment, because the demonstration could be deemed to be near to, or affecting, major facilities, such as a train station or significant road.
In an affidavit read in court, Kvelde said she had regularly participated in democratic protests since the 1960s, when she marched against the Vietnam War.
However, the new laws had cowed her from attending recent climate protests, she said.
“I am intimidated at the thought of arrest and going to prison,” she said.
Jacobs told the court she had refused to attend several protests because she feared being arrested and imprisoned.
“I have a family. The idea of two years in prison really does frighten me. The new laws have made me more apprehensive about protests,” she said.
Kvelde and Jacobs have previously been arrested for protesting in New South Wales, over a protest at Port Botany in March last year.
That protest was the catalyst for the state government introducing the new anti-protest laws they are challenging.
The state says that the climate protesters do not have standing to challenge the new laws because they have not faced charges under the new legislation, section 214A of the Crimes Act.
Michael Sexton, the solicitor general for New South Wales, told the court that the legislation carried a “legitimate purpose” in wanting to deter conduct that deleteriously impacted upon major roads and public facilities, and the right of others to use them.
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