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Rural Australians For Refugees Wangaratta Branch is not directly involved with children or adults in detention centres. Therefore our submission is very brief and comes from the desire to add to the growing voice of Australian citizens. We do not support the current mandatory detention of refugees and asylum seekers that is the present policy of government. We are not legally trained and write…

DR OZDOWSKI: I would like to formally open this public hearing which is one of a series of hearings conducted around Australia. My name is Sev Ozdowski and I'm the Human Rights Commissioner. I have two colleagues sitting with me, Mrs Robin Sullivan who is Queensland Children's Commissioner, who is assisting with the Inquiry and Dr Trang Thomas who is Professor of Psychology at the Royal Melbourne…

'In supporting the reunification of ATSIC and ATSIS, I support the retention of the conflict of interest directions within ATSIC by which ATSIC's elected representatives would continue to set policy priorities and to decide the broad program allocation of funding but not have any involvement in making individual funding decisions.

In accordance with the functions set out in section 46C(1)(a) of the Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission Act 1986 (Cth), this report includes 12 recommendations. The recommendations appear in the text of the report and are also reproduced here.

Recommendation 2: The need to detain should be assessed on a case-by-case basis taking into consideration individual circumstances. That assessment should be conducted when a person is taken into immigration detention or as soon as possible thereafter. A person should only be held in a closed immigration detention facility if they are individually assessed as posing an unacceptable risk to the…

1. In Beijing in 1995 the Australian government was one of 73 governments that made commitments for national action during their plenary speeches at the Beijing Conference.

We have also played an important leadership role internationally by sharing our experience with other national human rights institutions and by contributing technical assistance to advance partnerships for human rights in other countries.

The resolution of the debate as to whether the extinguishment of native title by the common law and the Native Title Act 1993 (Cwlth) (‘NTA’) is racially discriminatory, depends upon the interpretation given to its two essential components: extinguishment and discrimination. The interpretation that the High Court has given to the extinguishment provisions of the NTA and its relationship…

Every year on December 10, we commemorate the anniversary of the adoption of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. During 2009, the Australian Government conducted a series of human rights consultations on human rights in Australia.

Sexual harassment is unwelcome sexual conduct which makes a person feel offended, humiliated and/or intimidated where that reaction is reasonable in the circumstances. Sexual harassment in employment is unlawful under the Sex Discrimination Act 1984 (Cth).

The Optional Protocol to CEDAW was accepted by the UN General Assembly on 6 October 1999 and opened for signing and ratification by national governments that were parties to CEDAW. Its provisions became operational on 22 December 2000.

Australia is responsible for ensuring that all children in its jurisdiction can enjoy all applicable human rights, including those in the Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC), International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR) and Refugee Convention. That responsibility may be executed through legislation, executive action and the judicial system. Subject to the Australian…