Judge upholds 20-year Vegemite prison ban

Vegemite has been excluded from Victorian prisons for two decades. On Monday, a state court rejected a legal challenge that sought to restore the spread to inmate menus.

Andre McKechnie, a 55-year-old man serving a life sentence for murder, argued that the ban violated his human rights. He claimed the restriction prevented him from enjoying his culture as an Australian. Justice Claire Harris of the Supreme Court of Victoria ruled against him. She found that the ban was a justified measure to secure the prison system.

Harris wrote in a 47-page judgment that the primary limitation on McKechnie’s cultural rights stems from his status as a prisoner. The court accepted the prison authorities' position that the ban serves specific operational goals. Those goals include removing illicit drugs and alcohol from facilities across the state.

Prison officials testified in July that the spread poses security risks. They stated that Vegemite can impair the ability of sniffer dogs to detect narcotics. The yeast content in the product also allows it to be used for brewing alcohol. The ban has applied to all 12 prisons in the state for 20 years.

McKechnie represented himself during the trial. He appeared by video link from Barwon Prison, a maximum-security facility west of Melbourne. He argued that the neighboring state of New South Wales did not ban the product. He contended that this difference showed less restrictive methods were available to achieve similar security outcomes.

The prisoner also cited a 2003 article in the food studies journal Gastronomica. The piece claimed Vegemite is the best predictor of national identity. McKechnie argued that lacking the spread left him feeling deprived and disconnected from his community. The judge noted that his imprisonment, rather than the lack of food, was the material cause of his feelings.

McKechnie initially linked the ban to a thiamine deficiency. He explained that as a Jew observing kosher law, he could not eat pork, another source of vitamin B1. He dropped this argument after prison lawyers objected to his evidence. He also referenced a 1980s hit song and a 2017 incident where a man tried to use the smell of the spread to hide drugs at a music festival.

The judge rejected McKechnie’s claim that Vegemite contains no live yeast. A state prison department manager cited research showing the spread helps home-brewed beer ferment. Bega Group, the owner of the product, did not respond to a request for comment on Monday.