XR QLD rebel wins challenge against Brisbane City Council
Extinction Rebellion Australia, 24 Aug 2025
Brisbane City Council's six year long ban on XR's use of council's library meeting rooms has been overturned, and found to be discrimination on the basis of political belief and activity. Brisbane XR member Miree Le Roy (fourth from left) self-represented against a pool of senior counsels and lawyers from the Council. (photo by Lucy Stone)
Queensland’s Human Rights Commissioner Scott McDougall warned Lord Mayor Adrian Schrinner in 2019 that the ban on Extinction Rebellion protesters using Council meeting places could amount to unlawful discrimination.
But by February 2022, the council had already spent $25,888 on legal fees in the Queensland Human Rights Commission and the Queensland Civil and Administrative Tribunal on the case.
"We make no apologies for preventing this group's members from using public facilities, like our libraries, to plan their illegal activities," the Lord Mayor's spokesperson said.
Miree Le Roy told ABC Radio Brisbane in 2022 that all she and Extinction Rebellion members wanted was access to public library facilities again, and for council to stop "censorship and … infringement on people's rights.
"At a time when people from the Northern Rivers are experiencing their second major flood event in the space of one month it is obscene that public officials are trying to stop public education and discussion on this existential crisis."
"The people affected by this ridiculous ban by the Brisbane City Council, are parents and ratepayers and should be given the same access as all other ratepayers to use these facilities."
Last week Tribunal member Peter Roney, KC, rejected the argument that Extinction Rebellion had an “overall propensity” to engage in illegal behaviour or that “a substantial part of its activity was a commitment to unlawful behaviour”
“That some people break traffic or public order laws while protesting does not reasonably lead to the conclusion that this was the raison d’être,” he said.
Mr Roney said “critically” council’s ban was not on XR using the library rooms to do or plan unlawful things, “it disallowed use to the group for any purpose at all”.
See the 21 August 2025 Courier Mail article Extinction Rebellion wins discrimination complaint against Brisbane City Council
Miree Le Roy was one of 14 XR activists to plead guilty to disturbing the legislature over a protest from State Parliament’s public gallery on November 30, 2022.
The rebels unfurled banners with anti-fossil fuel slogans from the public gallery of parliament, interrupting question time with chants of “end fossil fuels now” and “stop coal, stop gas” for about three minutes.
Proceedings were immediately suspended by the Speaker. Two additional protesters, seated in the Speaker’s Gallery opposite the Public Gallery, livestreamed the footage to the XR Facebook page. The Speaker ordered those filming to cease immediately and ordered the Sergeant-at-Arms to clear the Public Gallery.
In 2024 Greens MP Michael Berkman was referred to the parliamentary ethics committee over his comments in support of XR rebels facing charges over the protest.
Queensland’s parliamentary ethics committee cleared Michael of inciting or encouraging the Extinction Rebellion protest in November 2022, but described his conduct as “disgraceful”.
Michael said, in a social media post "The Ethics Committee says my post, about a group of people unfurling "stop coal, stop gas" banners and chanting in Parliament, is "little better" than incitement of the deadly storming of the US Capitol storming Jan 6 2021. This comparison is outrageous and, frankly, disgusting."
“Supporting climate action and peaceful protest is none of those things. It is a moral obligation that the major parties have chosen to disregard.”
The 14 rebels appeared briefly in the Brisbane Magistrates Court in February 2023 charged with disrupting the legislature. Two were also charged with failing to comply with the direction of the speaker.
Outside court, the group said they would be fighting the charges. ABC News reported XR rebel, Lee Coaldrake's comment that there was a "general overreach" across all levels of government in Australia, in relation to attempting to "silence protesters".
"It's not about the court or us being punished, we are here because we are not acting appropriately or urgently enough on climate change," she said.
"What we have in common is a belief in the science and also we're terrified about what the future holds for our children and grandchildren."