New South Wales has broken from a centuries-old legal principle by passing a law removing “good character” as a mitigating factor in criminal sentencing, following a report that found it “benefits White men”.
The reintroduced Crimes (Sentencing Procedure) Amendment (Good Character) Bill 2026 passed the Legislative Council on Thursday night, despite the reforms being opposed by the NSW Bar Association, Legal Aid NSW, and the Law Society of NSW.
“Legislation abolishing ‘good character’ as a mitigating factor for all offences including homicide, domestic violence and road crimes passed the Legislative Council on Thursday night,” Attorney-General Michael Daley said on Friday on behalf of the Minns Labor government.
“It ensures convicted offenders will no longer be able to argue their sentence should be mitigated because they are of otherwise ‘good character’. After the Government passed legislation preventing people convicted of sexual offences from relying on ‘good character’, this reform extends that protection to all offences.”
NSW Bar Association President Dominic Toomey SC called the reforms “disappointing, disproportionate and inconsistent with the important principle of individualised justice”.
“The reforms undermine the ability of sentencing courts to assess each offender as a whole person, including those from disadvantaged backgrounds,” he said.
“The previous reforms were more measured as they only removed good character as a mitigating factor in relation to sexual offences and provided the court with discretion to assign good character no weight in other matters, where appropriate.”
Greens MP Sue Higginson said the reforms should have stopped at sexual offences, and said the idea that only “privileged” people benefited from good character references was a “gross misunderstanding” of the legal system.
The controversial bill was first introduced after a report released in February by the NSW Sentencing Council found that good character evidence “is likely to be more readily available to some groups than others”, “can exacerbate existing inequality and reinforce systemic biases”, and “can embed and perpetuate social privilege, and disadvantage those who experience systemic marginalisation”.
The report heavily featured submissions from far-left and aboriginal activist groups, including one from the Community Restorative Centre, which flies aboriginal and homosexual flags but not the Australian one, claiming good character evidence is racist.
“In our decades of experience providing support to people affected by the criminal legal system, we hold that it is generally White, middle-class men who most benefit from prior good character considerations,” the submission stated.
The report also took into account submissions from aboriginal groups that claimed good character references perpetuated “White privilege” and were biased against indigenous people.
“Wirringa Baiya [Aboriginal Women’s Legal Centre] submitted that good character sits within a colonial western framework and does not account for the ‘nuances and cultural differences’ of what may be good or bad character within indigenous communities and family and kin networks,” the report stated.
“Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander offenders may be disadvantaged, because they do not have the same access to good character evidence as other offenders do. Even if they are considered a person of good character within their community, this character may not be accepted by a court because it looks different from the ‘White and western cultural construct of these terms’.
“Another submission, from the NSW Aboriginal Women’s Advisory Network, suggested that good character references are an extension of White privilege, noting that ‘the ability to benefit from a good character reference is connected to White privilege and proximity to institutional power’.”
The report concluded that in addition to contributing to “systemic social disadvantage”, good character was “based on a vague and uncertain concept”, “lacks evidence in support of its value in predicting a risk of reoffending or prospects of rehabilitation”, “engages an unjustified form of moral and social accounting”, and “is harmful to and may be re-traumatising for victims”.
Two members of the Council gave dissenting views, saying good character evidence “ensures that the punishment fits not only the crime but also the person who committed it”, and rejecting the assertion that it was “synonymous with social privilege”.
Mr Daley, who introduced the bill, was one of its most vocal supporters and declared in February: “No offender should be able to rely on the fact they are of ‘good character’ to mitigate the consequences of their criminal behaviour.”
He added that “some offenders try to use their reputations and social standing to commit serious crimes and then minimise their culpability.”
Victoria is also planning to scrap good character references, while Tasmania intends to introduce similar legislation applying to serious offences only.
All states except for Western Australia already have exceptions for child sex offences, and Queensland and Tasmania have removed good character references for all sexual offences.
Header image: NSW Premier Chris Minns with Mr Daley (Facebook).
The post NSW passes antiwhite law abolishing ‘good character’ in sentencing first appeared on The Noticer.
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