Pro-Palestine advocates have slammed Chris Minns after the NSW Premier claimed protests should be banned because of their “huge drain on the public purse”.
Minns’ comments came after he ordered a review into the taxpayer costs around policing for the protests, which have taken place in Sydney every week since the Hamas attacks last October and Israel’s subsequent strikes on Gaza.
The Premier said the review found policing for the protests has cost “at least $5 million in 2024” and as a result, he has backed calls for police to block the permits needed for pro-Palestine rallies.
“Ultimately this is a huge drain on the public purse,” Minns said in a 2GB radio interview on Tuesday.
“It’s my view that police should be in a position to deny a request for a march due to stretched police resourcing… [They] should be in a position to say, we can’t do it this weekend because you’ve done it for the previous 50 weekends.”
“We want police doing other work,” Minns added. “Ultimately, this is taxpayer funds.”
Now, pro-Palestine advocacy groups have come forward to denounce Minns’ comments, saying they are an infringement on the democratic right to protest in Australia.
The Australia Palestine Advocacy Network (APAN) said in a statement that Minns’ remarks reveal “a troubling disregard for fundamental rights and democracy, which is particularly concerning coming from a democratically elected representative”.
APAN reiterated that protests and rallies are “a cornerstone of democracy” which should not “be contingent on financial considerations,” adding that the true cost has been the human suffering in Palestine and not “the voices that rise in solidarity with their struggle”.
The advocacy group also pointed out that the policing costs of protests could be reduced on the government’s end, since police presence at pro-Palestine rallies has been “unnecessary and discriminatory”.
“It is a fact that the vast majority of Palestine solidarity protests in NSW and across the continent have been peaceful,” the APAN’s statement read.
The issue of policing at rallies reared its head last year, when NSW police controversially sought “extraordinary powers” to stop and search pro-Palestinian protesters and conduct mandatory identity checks.
For his part, Unions NSW secretary Mark Morey said in response to Minns’ comments that “democracy should not be monetised,” and that the government “should uphold the right to conduct [protests] in a safe and coordinated fashion”.
Meanwhile, NSW Greens justice spokesperson Sue Higginson said Minns’ support of blocking rallies because of costs sets a dangerous precedent.
“Threatening to interfere with the right to protest creates a dangerous environment where important voices of democracy are strangled out of existence,” she said.
Minns’ remarks come a few months after a report by the Human Rights Law Centre found that NSW had enacted the highest number of new anti-protest laws of any Australian state.
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