EXCLUSIVE: Internal Documents reveal Victoria Police’s ‘Human Rights’ Charade
Bombshell Freedom of Information requests reveal Victoria Police's Human Rights Impact Assessments around the anti-trans rallies are more concerned about PR than Queer Lives.
Freedom of Information documents received from Victoria Police paint a damning picture of a government agency with a PR focus, above any concerns for the material well-being of the community it is tasked to protect.
A trove of documents, including Human Rights Impact Assessments released to me make pretty clear that the overwhelming concern of theirs is how police tactics relating to the Let Women Speak rallies look to the public—particularly how their actions will be “scrutinised by… the LGBTIQA+ community specifically” and how their own behaviour will impact future policing. In fact, the document states:
“Engagement with community has been managed via PSCD to understand current community sentiment and tension between the LGBTIQA+ community and police, as a consideration that may influence crowd behaviour.
Any police action or inaction will be heavily scrutinised by community overall and the LGBTIQA+ community specifically.”
Victoria Police Uniquely Victimise Trans People
In the Human Rights Impact Assessments; There’s no real, detailed discussion about actual harm to trans and gender-diverse protesters that could and will happen as a result of both the anti-trans rally and the policing response to it, or how best to respect trans people’s bodily autonomy beyond a single one line mention of our rights as trans people to not be uniquely victimised.
Searches of a transgender or gender diverse person should be conducted by a member of the same gender.
Note the use of the word “should”. Our legal, human rights to privacy and not be assaulted and unjustly uniquely victimised as gender-diverse people are just a recommendation as far as Victoria Police is concerned.
I am personally aware of several cases in 2023-24 where transgender people have been victimised in this way by Victoria Police.
Sure, that procedure matters—but it’s less than the bare minimum. And reading the rest of the text is like wading through a brand-protection manual. The actual, tangible rights of trans folks to protest without being punched, shoved, or traumatized barely get a look-in.
“Equality” That Isn’t Equal
At one point, the documents boast:
“Police do not discriminate in our application of the law… The Op Order requires that police powers are exercised in a non-discriminatory way.”
And yet, trans rights protesters have been singled out, battered, punched, arrested (often only for charges to be dropped later), and left anxious about ever attending future protests.
It’s easy to claim “non-discriminatory policing” from behind an office desk. It’s another thing to see riot cops punching a trans person in the face.
These FOI documents confirm what many of us suspect: that for Victoria Police, the treatment of LGBT people is a PR problem, not a human-rights problem.
As the timestamped notes from the 2023 event put it:
“All groups (except [TERFS]) [were] combative and attempting to break police lines.”
Without mention of how the so-called “TERF” group—entirely concerned with delivering hateful messaging toward and about trans people—was apparently indulged enough to hold their space while all others were physically shoved and corraled.
From the start of any protest, the Police consistently face the trans demonstrators, signalling that they are on the side of the transphobes, forcing us to confront them.
Where To From Here?
For starters, it’s time Victoria Police do more than pay lip service to the Human Rights Charter. We need real accountability—trans people have the right to protest, to speak for ourselves, to exist in public space.
Victoria Police can not be allowed to continue to create “no trans zones” on behalf of the anti-trans TERF and Nazi groups in the centre of our city, where anti-trans activists are free to unlawfully vilify and antagonise transgender people for being who they are.
Instead of fixating on how to manage negativity or preserve trust, the police could literally earn community trust by genuinely protecting us from violence—whether that violence comes from bigoted counter-protesters or from their own riot squads.
Until then, this serves as a bleak reminder that Victoria Police is treating us more like a PR risk to be managed, rather than human beings with rights to be safeguarded.
Why do the police feel so thteatened?