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Protestors taking part in this Saturday’s NoToPope Coalition rally will no longer be fined $5,500 for ‘annoying’ World Youth Day pilgrims, thanks to a federal court ruling this week.
Two weeks ago the coalition announced its intention to hand out condoms to pilgrims and wear t-shirts criticising the Pope. Then the NSW government brought in emergency laws for July which stated that anyone doing anything to ‘cause annoyance or inconvenience’ to the Catholic pilgrams could be fined $5,500.
Activists Rachel Evans and Amber Pike from the NoToPope Coalition took the NSW government to court, arguing that the laws were unconstitutional.
On Tuesday this week Justices Catherine Branson, Robert French and Margaret Stone ruled the specific clause relating to annoying and inconveniencing pilgrims went beyond the intention of State Parliament, although the ‘inconvenience’ aspect remains in tact.
President of the New South Wales Council for Civil Liberties (NSWCCL) Cameron Murphy hailed the ruling a “victory for freedom of speech”.
“Only a week ago we had the Police Commissioner acting as a self-appointed censor, saying ‘If you want to wear a particular t-shirt, come and see me first and I’ll tell you if it’s ok or not’,” Murphy told SX. “Now we have a position where the court has accepted all the things outlined in the applicants’ affadavits about how they are going to protest – the stickers, the condoms. They are not in breach of this [annoyance] regulation; they are entitled to do that.”
Evans said the ruling had boosted the confidence of activists and was a victory for the protest movement.
“We never wanted to be annoying or inconvenient,” Evans told SX. “Our rally was always going to be peaceful. We will be peaceful and come out with more confidence that we won’t be fined wearing t-shirts criticising the pope’s policy on condoms, abortion, homosexuality and reproductive rights in general. So it’s a real victory not just for us but for the protest movement as a whole.”
In addition to events taking place this Saturday, the NoToPope Coalition has inserted a letter of welcome and condoms into envelopes addressed to WYD pilgrims hosted at hundreds of schools around Sydney. And at press time the group had plans to unfurl a large banner in a public place before Saturday, listing ten alternative ‘commandments’ such as ‘thou shalt respect the right to protest’ and ‘thou shalt not be a bigot and be anti-queer’.
Human Rights Monitors – a group that monitors police activity at protests – will be out in force this Saturday, making note of any inappropriate and unlawful actions by police.
Anyone fined or arrested should contact a lawyer or the NSWCCL, Murphy said.
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