Case Explained: Unanimous Support For Stronger Hate Crime Laws – Legal Perspective

Parliament has unanimously passed legislation to strengthen sentencing for hate crimes, acting on key recommendations from the Sentencing Advisory Council’s Final Report on Prejudice and Discrimination as Aggravating Factors in Sentencing.

Released in February 2024, the report identified Tasmania as the only Australian jurisdiction previously limiting statutory aggravating factors solely to racial prejudice. The Council highlighted research showing that victims of bias-motivated assault experience a 150 per cent greater likelihood of suffering traumatic feelings compared to non-bias offences. Consequently, the report recommended expanding Section 11B of the Sentencing Act 1997 to cover attributes including sexual orientation, gender identity, disability and religion.

The reforms adopt a combined model of subjective motivation and ‘demonstrated hostility’, allowing courts to consider prejudicial conduct occurring immediately before or after an offence. The Council argued this measure was necessary to reflect the elevated harm caused to vulnerable groups and the wider community.

Media Release – Equality Tasmania, 11 December 2025

STRONGER PENALTIES FOR HATE-MOTIVATED CRIME WIN PARLIAMENT’S UNANIMOUS SUPPORT

Equality Tasmania has praised unanimous support in Tasmania’s Parliament for the passage of what it says are nation-leading new laws allowing stronger penalties for hate-motivated crime.

Following recommendations from the Sentencing Advisory Council, the Tasmanian Government moved to allow courts to hand down stronger penalties for prejudice and hate-motivated crimes.

Today, the Tasmanian Upper House unanimously passed the new law following its unanimous endorsement by the Lower House in September.

Until now, stronger penalties only applied to crimes motivated by racial hatred, but the new provisions extend the potential for stronger penalties to a range of other attributes including disability, religious belief, sexual orientation, gender identity and sex characteristics.

Also, the new provisions are the best in the nation and some of the best in the world when it comes to the evidence a judge can consider when determining if a crime was hate motivated.

Equality Tasmania spokesperson, Rodney Croome said,

“Unanimous support in Parliament for these provisions sends the message that hate-motivated crimes against LGBTIQA+ Tasmanians are as serious and as unacceptable as other forms of hate crime.”

“Too often courts are blind to the prejudice and hatred behind attacks on LGBTIQA+ people, so we applaud the Government, Labor, the Greens and the independents for supporting the nation-leading provisions that will help judges determine when crimes are motivated by hate and prejudice.”

“We particularly welcome new provisions that allow courts to consider patterns of hate and prejudice by perpetrators, both before and after crimes are committed.”

“The provisions in relation to hostility demonstrated before and after crimes are committed are nation-leading and we call on other states and territories to follow Tasmania’s lead.”

“To ensure these new provisions have their desired effect it’s important there is more training for police in identifying hate-motivated crime, and better data-collection and evidence-gathering at the time of the crime.”

“Our focus will now be on ensuring police know how to identify, investigate and record prejudice and hate as motivations for crime.”

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