Entire NSW Labor left calls for controversial anti-protest laws to be scrapped ahead of party conference

Fifty-six Labor branches have passed motions to the New South Wales state conference calling for controversial anti-protest laws to be repealed or reviewed, with the entire left faction backing a motion for two of the laws to be repealed.

Gambling reform, Aukus and Palestine were also among the top issues in motions submitted by branches to the conference, the last before the March election and which is key in informing policy.

But some Labor members are concerned that the rank and file will not be afforded the opportunity to debate the protest laws after the matter was scheduled second last on the agenda.

In a press conference on Friday held by civil liberties groups, Labor party member Asrah Sobh labelled it an attempt to “shut down branch members’ voices”.

“The single most submitted issue to state conference was in the social justice and affairs chapter, and that is the right to protest, that is the right to express ourselves in this democratic society,” Sobh said.

“Chris Minns is essentially not listening to his rank and file, which is not OK … because [the party] is the rank of file at the end of the day. The party is not one single man up at the top, and like all happy families, debate is an important part of how things work.”

The premier was approached for comment.

Minns will address the party faithful in a speech on Saturday. In a move to appease unions, he is expected to announce a plan to bring train manufacturing back to the Hunter region.

“For over 100 years, the best trains in the world were proudly made by union workers in NSW,” he will tell delegates.

The government has not specified a start date for the commitment to $12bn in funding over 15 years, nor was it accounted for in last week’s state budget. It has identified two potential sites for a state-owned, privately operated facility in Teralba and Broadmeadow. It says the project will provide 780 jobs in site construction and 550 ongoing jobs in manufacturing.

But the announcement will likely be overshadowed by the Labor left motion to repeal the 2022 anti-protest laws, which were passed by the then Coalition government and supported by Labor. The law includes penalties of up to two years in jail for blocking major facilities.

It is also calling for a repeal of a law which restricts protests outside places of worship and which was passed last year after an earlier iteration of the Minns government law was found unconstitutional.

“Although purported to promote safety,” the motion states in its preamble about the laws, “they have not delivered that outcome and have instead created conditions where tension and violence at protests are more likely to occur.”

It says “NSW witnessed disturbing scenes” at the 9 February rally against the Israeli president, Isaac Herzog.

Legal Observers NSW, an independent group which observes protests, released a report about the protest on Friday, finding after reviewing 150 videos from the protest and collecting numerous witness statements that there was a “collective and systemic police escalation”.

There is also set to be no debate over the state’s position on the “Australia and the World” committee report after it was referred to the party’s national conference.

Labor Friends of Palestine and Labor Against War have written a letter to the party’s NSW general secretary, Dominic Ofner, seen by Guardian Australia, that called for a debate to go ahead. The group said a debate was a “clear priority for the party rank and file” and also sections of the report were at odds with motions passed by branches.

This included on Aukus, which the report includes a lengthy endorsement of, despite “not a single” branch motion supporting that view, the groups wrote in their letter.

They also wrote that “the preamble suggests that there are ‘a range of perspectives’ in motions addressing the issue of Palestine”, but this was “simply untrue” given the 14 party units which submitted motions were “unanimous” in their condemnation of the ongoing violence.

Darcy Byrne, the mayor of Sydney’s Inner West council, and the delegate representing the electorate of Grayndler at the state Labor conference, has said the conference is a critical moment to act on harm from poker machines.

“For too long, the private interests of the poker machine lobby have trumped the public interest of preventing addiction and harm,” he said. “But at this conference, for our party, this is a crisis that can no longer be ignored.”