Abbott defends church on job stand Tuesday, 12 September, 2000 Hindu organisations would be able to ban meat-eating staff and Jewish charities sack workers fond of a Friday night boogie under a proposal from Employment Services Minister Tony Abbott. Mr Abbott said suggested Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission employment guidelines for agencies contracted to provide community services were political correctness run amok. He backed Catholic agency CentaCare's right to sack gay employees, saying religious organisations had a right to refuse employment to people who opposed their teachings. "No Australian Government has ever interfered with the freedom of religious organisations to run themselves," he said. "The guidelines . . . are more concerned with freedom from religion than freedom of religion. "The commission's desire to prevent organisations asking for 'Christian names' on employment application forms is political correctness run amok." Mr Abbott's stance comes after four religious-based Jobs Network agencies earlier this year dropped claims to favour Christians in hiring their own staff after pressure from HREOC. Mr Abbott, a former trainee for the priesthood, has written to the commission urging it to amend the draft guidelines. But he denied he was lobbying on behalf of the Catholic Church, which is still preparing its response to the guidelines. A spokeswoman for the minister said the principle applied to all religious organisations and they should be allowed to hire and fire according to their own criteria - including diet, lifestyle or sex life. Catholic Bishops Conference research head Warwick Neville said the state had a long history of not interfering with religious organisations and there was no reason for it to start now. "It would be quite inconsistent to have neo-Nazi activists on the staff of the HREOC because they would obviously be working against what the mission of the HREOC is," he said. "All we're saying is surely religious bodies, the Catholic Church or otherwise, are entitled to employ staff who have a religious affinity or ethos similar to or sympathetic with . . . the goals of the organisation." Liberty Victoria said religious organisations had a right to dictate moral standards for members and clergy, but no-one else. Vice-president Jamie Gardiner said, "Membership . . . within the Church is quite different from employment in things not purely religious and it is fundamentally wrong for the Federal Government to seek to be an accomplice in discrimination which Australia has in fact already promised the world it won't do." - AAP -- ********************************** 'Click' to protect the rainforest: Make the Rainforest Site your homepage! http://www.therainforestsite.com/ ********************************** ------------------------------------------------------ RecOzNet2 has a page @ http://www.green.net.au/recoznet2 and is archived at http://www.mail-archive.com/ To unsubscribe from this list, mail [EMAIL PROTECTED], and in the body of the message, include the words: unsubscribe announce or click here mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]?Body=unsubscribe%20announce This posting is provided to the individual members of this group without permission from the copyright owner for purposes of criticism, comment, scholarship and research under the "fair use" provisions of the Federal copyright laws and it may not be distributed further without permission of the copyright owner, except for "fair use." RecOzNet2 is archived for members @ http://www.mail-archive.com/recoznet2%40paradigm4.com.au/
