A senior lawyer has launched a stunning rebuke of the government’s so-called anti-trolling bill, labelling it a “violent assault” on defamation law.
Sue Chrysanthou SC was appearing before a Senate inquiry into the contentious proposal when she made the comments.
“My colleagues and I think that this legislation is misconceived and should not proceed,” she said.
“This bill is a violent assault on the tort of defamation by the Commonwealth, for which no rational basis or reason has been provided.”
Despite the name, and government’s representation of the bill, the proposal will do little to reduce online trolling.
Instead, it would create a new court order to “unmask” users if comments posted were defamatory in nature.
The bill was established following a High Court judgment, which ruled media outlets were considered publishers of third-party comments on their social media pages.
But the defamation lawyer said assumptions made in the drafting of xjmtzywthe bill were a misreading of that case.
“Anyone who knows anything about defamation will tell you that,” she told the inquiry.
“(The ruling) has not caused an influx of reactions against unsuspecting hosts of Facebook pages, like sporting clubs or groups.”
However, Liberal committee chair Sarah Henderson, who herself claims she was defamed on Twitter, took issue with the fact Ms Chrysanthou had not run a case against the social media platform.
“This bill is all about … it’s about unmasking the anonymous abusers, about giving redress. It appears that in your practice, you don’t actually run cases in relation to these social media platforms,” Senator Henderson said.
But Ms Chrysanthou said there hasn’t been a need to sue the companies directly.
“It is a large part of my practice; suing or asking for people to sue over social media posts,” she told the inquiry.
“But so far, there hasn't been a need to deal with Twitter or Facebook.
“It’s only a theoretical question with Twitter and Facebook, because as far as I am aware, they have not been sued.”
Earlier, Twitter claimed it had received 50 law enforcement requests in the past year, and had complied with the majority of them.
With only three days left on the parliamentary sitting calendar before the federal election, it is unlikely the bill will pass the Senate, and will instead lapse.
