A representative of the Australian Council of Trade Unions (ACTU) has attacked the government over its timing of the religious discrimination bill arguing that “if we were going to have a debate about a divisive bill, it could not have come at a worse moment.” Liam O’Brien, Assistant Secretary of the ACTU, argued that the Australian Coalition has had three years to introduce a conventional anti-discriminatory bill to protect people of faith from religious discrimination and therefore criticised the currently proposed bill for being “confusing” and “complex”. He argued that frontline workers were already stressed during the Omicron crisis, and the bill’s introduction with the provisioning that a “statement of belief” should not be considered “discriminatory” during this time will only introduce more discrimination and distress as it potentially overrides other discrimination laws. Currently, on the bill, statements of belief are not constituted as discrimination, giving people of faith a level of …