Migrant community groups have backed calls to reform racial vilification laws in New South Wales.
Last year, Premier Barry O'Farrell launched a parliamentary inquiry into the current laws which date back to 1989.
Mr O'Farrell believes the laws have been ineffective because there have not been any successful prosecutions, despite over 27 public complaints being made about alleged breaches.
The inquiry is being conducted by the Upper House Standing Committee on Law and Justice, comprising three coalition members, two from Labor and one from the Greens.
It will focus on one particular aspect of the NSW Anti Discrimination Act, which has generated the most concern from migrant community groups and lawyers' associations.
Section 20-D of the Act deals with the criminal offence of "serious racial vilification" and requires proof "beyond a reasonable doubt" for a prosecution.
Those prosecuted could face penalties of up to $5500 and six months' jail.
However, they need to be found guilty of inciting hatred, serious contempt or severe ridicule of a person or group by threatening physical harm to them or their property.
They could also be prosecuted if found guilty of inciting others to do so on the basis of their race.
The President of the NSW Anti Discrimination Board Stepan Kerkyasharian believes the current laws are too restrictive and should be broadened beyond the current focus on physical harm to also cover verbal insults.
"At the moment, the way that the racial vilification laws are structured- unless there is physical harm or physical violence, it is almost impossible to get a prosecution going and it is quite clear that verbal attack or oral attack and vilification can also be very harmful to individuals and it's important that the law captures that."
Similar views have been expressed by a range of community groups which put in written submissions to the inquiry.
The NSW Jewish Board of Deputies says it has come across numerous cases where members of the Jewish community have launched serious complaints about vilification that were rejected because they did not meet the strict criteria for prosecution under the current laws.
In its submission to the inquiry, the Board of Deputies singled out a case where a public billboard on a prominent Sydney road included a statement which read "Jews make great lampshades".
During the Holocaust, a commandant at a Nazi concentration camp at Bergen Belsen arranged for the skin of a Jewish inmate killed in the camp to be used to make a lampshade for the commandant's wife.
Despite raising a complaint over the billboard, the Director of Public Prosecutions argued that the billboard writer could not be prosecuted because the sign did not incite others to physically harm Jewish people.
A spokesman for the NSW Jewish Board of Deputies David Knoll says he believes the case highlights the need to expand the public definition of vilification to specifically cover public billboards and cyberspace.
"It's not a difficult thing to provide that public conduct includes electronic communication, including over the internet. That I think is one of the easier aspects of the law reform process. It would deal with it from the criminal perspective. There still needs to be adequate education of communities much more broadly as to how the internet works, who it affects and where it can actually result in influencing people to engage in bad behaviour. But getting the law right is an important step forward."
A Muslim community group has also called for the laws to be changed.
In its submission to the inquiry, the Forum on Australia's Islamic Relations says members of the Muslim community have suffered more vilification since the September 11 attacks in 2001.
It believes one area where the Muslim community has encountered a lot of prejudice is through the development application process for new mosques and prayer centres in NSW.
FAIR believes some local councils have given in too easily to community concerns over noise or falling property prices and have blocked mosque applications on these grounds.
In its submission, it has called on the NSW Government to put specific provisions into the Discrimination Act, protecting places of worship from such treatment.
However a conservative research institute believes any changes to the current laws are unnecessary.
The Institute of Public Affairs claims there is currently too much duplication between state and federal anti-discrimination laws.
The Director of the Institute's Legal Rights Project Simon Breheny also believes there could be serious consequences if the NSW Government pushed ahead with changes to the current laws.
"Any weakening of this law may have really significant implications for freedom of speech. There is no way that anyone in Australia should ever be convicted for expressing an opinion, even if it's one that offends or insults someone."
The NSW Jewish Board of Deputies' spokesman David Knoll believes there has been unnecessary scaremongering on the issue.
"Nobody and not least the Jewish community, want to cut off robust debate. Robust public debate is part of a healthy democracy. But just like you can't shout 'Fire!' in a crowded theatre, you can't intimidate and harass people to the point where they can't engage in their own right of free speech".
The parliamentary commitee will now consider more 40 written submissions and evidence gathered from two days of public hearings in Sydney.
The committee is due to hand down its final report and recommendations to the O'Farrell government by May the 31st.
