Newsroom

June 14, 2018

State KAP Leader Robbie Katter and colleagues Shane Knuth and Nick Dametto today announced they will introduce new laws to protect everyday people from persecution and punishment for using gender-based language.

Mr Katter said the KAP will introduce the ‘He Said-She Said’ Bill into Parliament as early as September to provide protection for people who use gender specific terms such as ‘he’ or ‘she’ and face punishment from their workplace, school or university.

“We want to ensure that individuals and organisations will not be subjected to frivolous discrimination claims or any kind of punishment just for using every day speech,’’ he said.

“Our world is a rapidly changing environment and people find it impossible to keep up with the latest attack on their freedoms and values by radical ideologists.

“People shouldn’t be punished for using gender specific terms such as boys and girls or ladies and gentleman or not providing genderless toilets.

“There have been recent claims universities are punishing students for using language that could be considered ‘gender exclusive’, even when that language is grammatically correct.

“We witnessed what our Commonwealth Games volunteers had to adopt to ensure they didn’t cause offence regarding gender.

“The Queensland government has changed driver’s licences to remove a person’s sex or gender and Births, Deaths and Marriages certificates that are no longer based on a person’s natural sex.’’

Mr Katter said there were proposals in the public domain that would require public and private services to cater for individuals who claim to be neither male nor female but ‘gender fluid’ or ‘non-classified.’

“This aggressive push away from classifications of gender, based on a person’s natural sex, is undermining traditional Australian values and social norms,’’ he said.

“The plebiscite was not a blank cheque to completely overhaul our values.

“Some people may think these changes are an acceptable flow-on from the recent same sex marriage plebiscite. However, there was nothing in the plebiscite that gives a mandate for radical, gender ideologies and a complete attack on social norms and values.

Mr Katter said people using gender specific language such as ‘him’ or ‘her’ were being intimidated by being characterised as ‘bigots’, ‘insensitive’ or ‘hate-filled’.

“I expect the drafting of the He Said-She Said Bill will be quite complex but we are hoping to introduce the Bill at the next sitting of Parliament in September,’’ he said.