Rights and Freedoms
Keynote presentation delivered at the 8th National Conference of the Association for the Welfare of Child Health (AWCH) - "Children on the margin: addressing the health care needs of marginalised children and young people", 11 October 2001, Dr Sev Ozdowski
Commission – General
I am honoured to have been invited to address you this evening on this beautiful campus of the Flinders University of South Australia. Let me begin my address by recalling that, long before the establishment of this prestigious place of learning in the European tradition, there was learning of another tradition here; the learning of the Kaurna people of the Adelaide Plains.I would like to acknowledge the Kaurna people, the traditional owners of the land on which we meet, and pay my respect to their elders, past and present.
Commission – General
HREOC is a statutory body independent of government. While our main function is to promote an understanding and acceptance of human rights in Australia, we are also charged with the responsibilities of investigating, and attempting to conciliate complaints of unlawful discrimination under the federal Racial Discrimination Act 1975, the Sex Discrimination Act 1984, the Disability Discrimination Act 1992 and the Age Discrimination Act 2004.1 HREOC also has specific responsibilities to report annually to Parliament on the enjoyment of human rights of Indigenous Australians.
Commission – General
I would like to begin by acknowledging the Elders and Traditional Owners of Darwin, the Larrakia People, and to thank them for the opportunity to visit this beautiful part of the country. After that very heartfelt welcome to country, I feel very privileged to be here this morning.
Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Social Justice
I begin by paying my respects to the Ngunnawal peoples, the traditional owners of this land. I pay my respects to your elders, past, present and future.
Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Social Justice
Good evening distinguished guest, ladies and gentleman. Friends, I would like to begin by acknowledging the traditional owners of the land on which we meet today, the Wurundjeri people of the Kulin Nations.
Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Social Justice
We are on Aboriginal land – and as a mark of respect to the traditional owners of this country – I want to recognise their culture and their law because they are integral to what we now call Coogee.
Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Social Justice
I would like to welcome you all to Parliament House this morning and thank you for coming along. I would like to acknowledge that we are meeting on Ngunnawal land, and I pay my respects to the Ngunnawal People as represented here by Matilda House.
Disability Rights
I wrote the title for this presentation almost a year ago when I was first asked to give it. I came back to it two weeks ago to write the actual paper and thought "what does this mean?"
Disability Rights
Probably most of us here are parents, and we all have dreams for our children. One of my dreams for my 18-year-old son and his girl friend is that they will be able to participate in society in the same way as everyone else.
Disability Rights
In the United States, 54 years ago today, Rosa Parks was arrested. Rosa Parks was a black woman, arrested for refusing to sit at the back of a bus. It's appalling to think this occurred. It's even more appalling that 54 years later in Australia, many people with disability can't even get on the bus.
Disability Rights
I always enjoy receiving an invitation from Victoria to talk about Action Plans because I know that Victoria is a leader in the country in terms of organisational commitment to developing Action Plans.
Disability Rights
Thanks for the opportunity to speak to this conference today. You are embarking on this topic, in my view, at just the right time. Unemployment is the lowest it has been for over a decade. Our economy is strong and needing more employees, and our population is ageing, reducing the relative size of the workforce. In coming years, there will be fewer of us to support more of us, so as many people as possible need to be working and paying taxes rather than receiving welfare benefits. What better time to introduce employees with disabilities in larger numbers.
Disability Rights
Thank you for the opportunity to meet today. I want to take a few minutes to run through some current areas of work which may be of particular interest to you.
Disability Rights
I am sure I am not the first person to say it, but it seems to me that there are particularly important reasons for a telecommunications company such as Telstra to be interested in diversity.
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