News

Disability Rights

The DDA and its impact in the area of Education

Perhaps it's just because I'm getting older, but I increasingly have the feeling that Australia is becoming a more sentimental and nostalgic nation. We have a Prime Minister whose vision for us is to be relaxed and comfortable. And many of us spent last night - after watching the final stages of the Australian cricket juggernaut's comprehensive winning of the ashes for the eighth time in a row - watch a bunch of old blokes who used to be rock and roll singers showing us that it was a long way to the top. Haven't we got anything more exciting to do than that?

Commission – General

President speech: Human Rights, Refugees and Asylum Seekers

I would like to begin this morning by acknowledging the traditional owners of the land on which we meet, the Gadigal People of the Eora Nation. I pay my respects to their elders past and present.

Sex Discrimination

Work Life Balance: AIM Breakfast

I hope you’re all enjoying your hot breakfasts and are extremely grateful for them. For a couple of reasons: First- you didn’t have to cook them yourself, or, to be more precise, wash up all the dirty frying pans yourself. This is because you are working and you don’t have time to cook hot breakfasts for a particularly fussy group of consumers, your family.

Rights and Freedoms

Australian Lawyers Alliance Conference (2009)

As lawyers who work every day with ordinary people, you will all have first hand experience of the value that we, in Australia, place on human rights. You will also be acutely aware of the significant gaps in human rights protection in Australia.

Rights and Freedoms

USING THE LAW TO MAKE A DIFFERENCE Graeme Innes AM (2007)

Scarlett Finney was only six when she saw the brochures for the Hills Grammar School, set in park-like grounds in Sydney's outer suburbs. She indicated her keenness to attend "the school in the bush". Her parents were prepared to pay the fees, and saw the setting and curriculum as providing her with a great education. But the school refused her enrolment due to the fact that she had spina bifida, and sometimes used a wheelchair [1].

Rights and Freedoms

Human Rights in the Asia Pacific Region

It is my pleasure to report to you today on the outcome of deliberations of the Working Group on Human Rights Education. This working group was relatively small in size but very diverse and robust in its deliberations. It consisted of representatives of Arabic countries, including the host country Qatar as well as Japan, the Philippines and Australia.

Rights and Freedoms

"Asylum Seekers": Dr Sev Ozdowski OAM (2002)

Firstly, I would like to acknowledge the Worimi people who are the traditional owners of this land and a timely reminder that we are all immigrants to this vast continent.

Rights and Freedoms

Rural youth suicide: convention, context and cure: Chris Sidoti (1999)

Every suicide of a young person is not an isolated, individualised event. Certainly it robs the young person of his or her promised future. But it also traumatises the family, the friends, the school or workmates and, especially in a rural or remote community, the entire community. Every suicide of a young person speaks volumes of weeks, months, even years of confusion, alienation, hopelessness and despair leading up to the final and fatal event.

Commission – General

President Speech: ‘Women as Agents of Change’: Balancing the scales

I would like to begin by also acknowledging the traditional owners of the land on which we meet, the Gadigal people of the Eora nation. I pay my respects to their elders past and present. In particular, I would like to acknowledge the inspirational work of so many Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander women who have been agents of change, be they barristers, lawyers, judges, litigants or community advocates.

Commission – General

President speeches: Speech at Annual UNAA Day Dinner

I would like to begin by acknowledging the traditional owners of the land on which we meet, the Kaurna people, and pay my respects to their elders past and present.

Commission – General

Creating Fairness and Equality in the Workplace

It is now 12 months since the introduction of WorkChoices radically restructured Australia’s industrial relations system. Today, I propose to reflect on the implications of WorkChoices for the Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission (HREOC) and to outline reforms HREOC believes are necessary to safeguard fairness and equality in the workplace.

Commission – General

Society of University Lawyers

When I was invited to give this address, my first thought was to talk about unlawful discrimination in the context of higher education and, in particular, disability discrimination.

Commission – General

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Set against the wreckage and the unthinkable horror of the Second World War, the Declaration was something of a phoenix rising from the ashes, a document which sought to rekindle a human dignity which had been gravely debased in the preceding ten years.

Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Social Justice

Let the healing begin

Prime Minister, the Hon Kevin Rudd; Opposition Leader, Brendan Nelson; the Minister for Indigenous Affairs, the Hon Jenny Macklin; former Prime Ministers, Professor Bruce Wilson representing the late Sir Ronald Wilson, Stolen Generations patrons Dr Lowitja O’Donoghue and Bobby Randall, NSDC Chair Helen Moran and SGA Chair Christine King, Ministers; Members of Parliament; Senators, members of the stolen generations and your families; my Indigenous brothers and sisters; and distinguished guests from around Australia and overseas.

Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Social Justice

NSW Teachers Federation Council Meeting (2010)

With respect and gratitude I acknowledge that we sit on the lands of the Gadigal peoples of the Eora Nation, and I thank the Traditional Owners for allowing us to do so.