A plan by the Australian Vaccination-risks Network to park its bus in a public park in the Blue Mountains tomorrow [September 3] has been thwarted after council voted to refuse permission.
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At its meeting this week, councillors were unanimous in their opposition to the AVN "tour" which they said spread misinformation.
Cr Roza Sage, a dentist, said during the last two years she had been a practising health professional monitoring the COVID pandemic and had dealt with the AVN which, she said, was "rabidly anti-vaccination".
"I support freedom of speech ... however I do draw the line when there's potential harm with the spread of inaccurate, cherry-picked information to the public."
Cr Brendan Christie also said freedom of speech was "very important to me" but added "this isn't a freedom of speech issue... I don't believe they should be coming up and spreading their misinformation."
The AVN had made a request of council which said: "I wish to seek permission to use parking at a public park within your council on the 3rd September, 2022. Our organisation is the Australian Vaccination risks Network Inc and we are planning to tour through your area. The Vaxxed Bus has been touring Australia for two years now."
The mayor, Mark Greenhill, who introduced the urgency motion to bar the group, reminded the meeting of the number of people who have died of COVID-19 - nearly six-and-a-half million worldwide, and 13,700 in Australia.
"This information [promoted by AVN] is harmful. They are not using our council facilities to spread that rubbish."
He said the AVN views were not based in scientific fact.
"When it comes to vaccines, as with climate change, we defer to science."
Tuesday night's decision reflected previous resolutions of council in July and October 2020 relating to anti-vaccination groups.
