NSW Labor Left Demands that Minns Government Revoke Antiprotest Regime

The New South Wales Labor Left has agreed to prioritise the upholding of protest rights, which have been under legislative attack in this state for years now, at the upcoming 4 July 2026 NSW Labor Annual Conference. The Left Faction made this determination at a 23 May meeting, and the demand will be that the NSW Minns Labor government revokes the NSW antiprotest regime.

The NSW Council for Civil Liberties and the Australian Democracy Network (ADN) are both supporting the NSW Labor Left stance, and they’re calling on all rank-and-file members, unions and conference delegates to support this challenge to the ongoing campaign against the right to protest in NSW, which has become a bipartisan project, that commenced in a significant way in early 2022.

That a large number of NSW Labor members have been opposed to the mounting laws that deter and restrict protest has been understood since the Perrottet Coalition government first moved its 2022 roads and crimes bill, of which Labor supported under the leadership of Chris Minns, and this has continued as the now premier and his government has further cracked down on protest in NSW.

A number of Labor MPs have been outspoken in response to these attacks on the fundamental democratic principle under the Minns premiership, which have included places of worship antiprotest laws and the recently struck down PARD regime, along with having raised concerns over the policing that these laws have led to.

The Labor MPs have included Stephen Lawrence, Anthony D’Adam, Cameron Murphy, Jihad Dib and Sarah McKaine.

The NSW Labor Left decision has been predicated upon 56 motions that various NSW Labor branches and local unions have progressed in order to end these antidemocratic laws that have served to increasingly criminalise protest, and this mass of motions represents the largest coordinated internal pushback against Minns’ laws and those of the Coalition that he threw his weight behind.

Reinstating the right to protest

“The Labor movement has always stood for democratic rights, collective action and the right of ordinary people to speak out for justice,” said Asrah Sobh, an Australian Labor Party member from Parramatta. “As the state conference approaches, we have a responsibility to defend those values and reject attempts to criminalise peaceful protest.”

“The submission of more than 56 motions from branches and unions shows the depth of concern within the party about the erosion of civil liberties and democratic freedoms in NSW,” the teacher continued.

With bipartisan approval, the Perrottet government passed the Roads and Crimes Legislation Amendment Bill 2022 on 1 April that year. The laws served to heighten the penalties around “unauthorised protests” that disrupt major roads, tunnels and bridges, as well as a list of major facilities, via the threat of up to 2 years imprisonment and/or a $22,000 fine.

The other laws that Labor Left has its sights on are the Minns government’s February 2025 passed places of worship laws, which established the two new antiprotest criminal offences of intentionally blocking access to a place of worship and harassing, intimidating or threatening those accessing or leaving one, as well as a since revised move on power that applies under the same circumstances.

“Attending the Herzog protest was deeply confronting,” stressed Sobh. “Seeing peaceful demonstrators met with aggressive policing reinforced for me why the right to protest matters so much. No one should fear police violence or political repression for peacefully standing up for what they believe in.”

Resisting the silencing of dissent

In terms of the “aggressive policing” the Parramatta Labor Left faction member is referring to, it was that which was unleashed by the NSW police upon constituents protesting the official visit of Israeli president Isaac Herzog on 9 February 2026. This involved the NSW police literally beating up and excessively pepper spraying demonstrators, whom officers had also kettled in at the same time.

The protesters had sought to march on Gadigal land from Sydney Town Hall to NSW parliament. However, NSW police prevented them from doing so because a public assembly restriction declaration (PARD) was in place in the Sydney CBD.

A PARD was a since-struck-down law that permitted the NSW police commissioner to blanket ban protest marches in specified zones, after an incident had been declared terrorism-related.

Sixty nine civil society groups produced an open letter addressing the NSW premier, two days after this unprecedented display of police excessive use of force on civilians, and it called on Minns to establish an independent inquiry into the police brutality, and these organisations underscored that “it is the responsibility of the government and police to peacefully facilitate protest”.

But Minns refused to do this. Instead, the premier, NSW police minister Yasmin Catley and NSW police commissioner Mal Lanyon have all refused to apologise for the violence and have repeatedly stressed that officers did as they were asked, meaning this was state-sanctioned violence. And the Law Enforcement Conduct Commission’s inquiry into the incident is actively being undermined.

“Community organisations around NSW have consistently called on Labor to respect and protect the right to protest. These calls have so far fallen on deaf ears,” outlined ADN protest rights campaigner Anastasia Radievska. “The Minns’ government ignored an overwhelming number of submissions calling for the Liberals’ antiprotest laws to be repealed and instead passed three more of their own.”

The Australian Democracy Network campaigner further insisted in a 25 May 2026 statement that NSW Labor needs to realise that its constituents expect to be able to “peacefully assemble, demonstrate and speak out without facing disproportionate legal restrictions” or the threat of violence from law enforcement.

Opposing the tinpot

“The protest laws in NSW are among the harshest in Australia and are undermining democratic freedoms and community trust,” explained NSW Council for Civil Liberties president Timothy Roberts. “The NSWCCL is calling for a full repeal of antiprotest laws and will continue campaigning for protest rights to be respected.”

As Radievska pointed out, the Minns government has passed three antiprotest laws, however NSW Labor Left is only calling for the repeal of two, and this is because activist groups challenged the validity of the PARD law, and the NSW Supreme Court found that it was unconstitutional, as it restricted the freedom of political communication implied in the Australian Constitution.

And the reason that the Minns government’s places of worship antiprotest move on power has been revised is that this measure was challenged in the court by Palestine Action Group organiser Josh Lees and it was too struck down for impeding political communication. The original move on power had been so vague in construction that someone down the road from a church could be moved on.

Numerous legal minds consider that Minns’ PARD law led to the police violence at the anti-Herzog rally. And the unconstitutional move on power was behind an incident that led a senior police officer to punch legal observer Hannah Thomas in the face at a morning protest. But the premier simply throws his hands in the air and deems it absurd to connect the illegitimate laws to the violence.

Minns rubbished the ruling of NSW Chief Justice Andrew Bell and two other Supreme Court justices, which saw his PARD law struck down. The premier said that judges and lawyers have it easy, and he went on to suggest that he’d passed the laws in the direct aftermath of the 14 December 2025 Bondi Beach massacre, as something had to be done in a hurry to protect the community.

The premier implied that at certain times ministers have to act in a manner that could be beyond constitutional limits in order to promote community safety. Yet, Minns has never properly explained how banning street marches had any tangible link to an ISIS inspired mass shooting targeting a Jewish event. And try as they may, no one else has been able to identify the connection either.

But while the NSW Greens and other crossbench MPs have long opposed all the antiprotest laws that have been rolled out since early 2022, numerous water cooler discussions have concluded that the only way that these laws are going to be revoked in the current political environment is if the mass of Labor members who obviously oppose them do something about it.

“Labor Party members and union leaders now have an opportunity to show leadership at the state conference and help turn a new page on protest rights in NSW,” Roberts, a respected lawyer, made clear. “Protecting democratic freedoms is essential to maintaining a peaceful and cohesive community.”