[adrianratnapala]

> I suspect the protections in the Constitution are equivalent,

No, Australia has nothing like the Bill of rights, even if some bits of the constitution cover the same ground very partially.

To give a flavour of this, our constitution prohibits an established church using language very similar to the US 1st Amendment. But the silence about freedom of speech is deafening.

In the '90s the High Court decided there had to be an implied right to freedom of speech inherent in the political system which is itself implied by the constitution. But since it is not explicit, they still restrict it to only political speech. And (since it really did require a strong judicial activism) many in our legal community are against even this much enforcement of fundamental rights.

[sanderjd]

When I said "equivalent", I didn't mean in the sense of having the same protections in the Constitution, but rather that in the sense that its protections are equivalently difficult to amend as those in the Bill of Rights.

[chiaro]

Common law rests heavily on stare decisis. The precedent set in Australian Communist Party v Commonwealth is not likely to be overturned, as far as free political speech and organisation goes.