The federal government will defer its response to Jillian Segal’s contentious plan to address antisemitism on campuses until after it has received a broader review of racism at universities and a separate report from the Islamophobia envoy, the education minister has confirmed.
Jason Clare outlined the process to reporters on Wednesday, saying he wanted to “tackle racism in whatever form it comes”.
The antisemitism envoy’s 20-page plan, released last Thursday, made a range of recommendations for the higher education sector, including launching a “university report card” and withholding government funding from universities that “facilitate, enable or fail to act against antisemitism”.
The powers would also allow public grants provided to university centres, academics or researchers to be terminated “where the recipient engages in antisemitic or otherwise discriminatory or hateful speech or actions”.
Peak Jewish groups backed the envoy’s plan, with the Executive Council of Australian Jewry saying the measures were“urgently needed”. But some academics, human rights groups and peak bodies have expressed concerns that moves could be weaponised to stifle free speech and dissent.
Speaking to reporters on Wednesday, Clare said racism existed at universities “in all its ugly forms”, not just antisemitism.
He said he would wait until a report from the special envoy in combating Islamophobia was handed down in August, and a broader review into racism at universities was released by the Australian Human Rights Commission in October, before his government responded to Segal’s plan.
“Before we consider those recommendations to their final conclusion, I want to look at the recommendations of the special envoy on Islamophobia, and I also want to see the work of the race discrimination [commissioner],” Clare said.
“I think that’s fair, I think that’s the right thing to do. But it’s not just antisemitism and it’s not just Islamophobia. Ask Indigenous kids at university today and they’ll say ‘Well, don’t forget me’.
“I do think I need to look at all of those reports that might make different recommendations. I want to tackle racism in whatever form it comes.”
Asked if providing the capacity for the federal government to intervene in funding mechanisms might echo the Trump administration’s intervention into universities including Harvard and Columbia, as the Jewish Council of Australia has argued, Clare said he made “no comment on that”.
“Teqsa, the regulator, has powers here already,” he said.
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“They’re different in kind to what’s being recommended in this report, but they enable Teqsa to go in and either put conditions on a university or to penalise them, to apply to a court to issue fines.”
The federal government first tasked the Australian Human Rights Commission with undertaking a study into racism at universities in May 2024, with initial consultations taking place among First Nations, Jewish, Muslim and other “negatively racialised communities”.
The race discrimination commissioner, Giridharan Sivaraman, said when the interim report was released in December that one of the “catalysts” of the project was the need to respond to the “alarming increase in antisemitism on university campuses over the last 12 months”.
“Themes emerging from our consultations so far include … dissatisfaction with complaints mechanisms, the disconnect between universities’ policies on racism and their practice, and the challenge of finding a common language and understanding around racism,” he said.
Labor MP Ed Husic on Wednesday raised concern with the envoy’s recommendation of wider adoption of the IHRA definition of antisemitism, which is contested in some quarters due to concerns it was being used to conflate antisemitism with criticism of Israel, and is already facing pushback from Labor MPs and rank-and-file members. Husic said the government should be “very careful” about such a move, adding: “It’s not antisemitic to criticise the actions of the government of Israel.”
The prime minister, Anthony Albanese, and the home affairs minister, Tony Burke, have not indicated which parts of the plan the government will take up, but Labor sources downplayed the prospect of terminating university funding. It is widely expected the government could focus its response on the education and prevention measures in Segal’s plan.
The Coalition has endorsed Segal’s plan, but also not nominated specifically which measures it would support. In comments to Guardian Australia,
the shadow home affairs minister, Andrew Hastie, urged the Labor government to focus on a judicial inquiry into antisemitism at universities, a visa crackdown and a dedicated law enforcement taskforce.
Hastie said the Coalition would “work constructively” with the government on its response. He also said a Coalition priority would be “preventing taxpayer money going to organisations with extremist views”.
“The Special Envoy’s plan makes it clear that there is an antisemitism crisis gripping Australia, and it is past time the prime minister stopped admiring the problem and started showing leadership,” Hastie said.