Sunday, October 11, 2009
Human Rights Charter Debate
Debate: Should Australia have a Charter of Rights?
Today prominent Human Rights activist Julian Burnside AO QC and Jeremy Moore (Woomera Lawyers Group) locked horns in Elder Hall, generally to agree with each other on basic premises, and disagree fairly amicably on the details. An expansive National Human Rights Consultation Committee enquiry, handed down on the 30th of September has made recommendations to the Attorney General to take immediate action in Australia, taking steps to create a “human rights culture.”
Education is emphasised, along with a list of fairly self explanatory and uncontroversial set of human rights and freedoms to be acknowledged. As Burnside states, these human rights are so fundamental and self-evident as to be platitudinous. These are really not the issue. The issue is that Burnside takes the position of the recommendations made by the committee.
The implementation of these rights is proposed via a “dialogue model,” that emphasises, but does not enforce, concern for human rights across the tiers of government. Under this system, the power will still rest with the parliament (allaying ever-present fears of a swing of power to the unelected judiciary) to make legislation, although qualified by a human rights “compliance committee,” whose role it would be to review the legislation and ensure it suitably took into account care for the human rights enshrined in the proposed Bill/Charter.
Here is where the problem begins. If the legislation fails to gain a compliance certificate from the committee, the government may be coerced to amend it. Or, it can just pass the legislation anyway. At least this institutes a “political cost” to human rights abuses by the government, says Burnside. You could be forgiven for not having much faith in the Australian electorate to enact the “political cost” of human rights abuses, given that John Howard was re-elected in 2004 in spite of his record for locking up children, and one case to the effect of potentially imprisoning a desperate and innocent man for the rest of his life for the crime of being stateless. The “dialogue model” is a non-binding agreement between the tiers of government to ensure they “alert” each other when one or other is violating the code. But no action is sanctioned. The recommendations are non-binding. In fact, the government of the day could conceivably legislate away the Charter. Rhetoric in the spirit of the Coalition governments in the early 2000’s could potentially be just as effective as it was then, dehumanising and thus legitimising human rights abuses of “others” while still maintain a firm electoral footing. Burnside speaks of the Charter providing us with a “tool box” with which to tackle human rights issues in this country. Does liberal internationalism really need yet another empty toolbox? (In the spirit of an institution that brought us such inert and utterly useless pleasantries as the “non-binding resolution.”) If anyone is serious about human rights, we must aim to pass measures that do more than just create another level of bureaucracy to pay lip service to them.
Tweet This
Today prominent Human Rights activist Julian Burnside AO QC and Jeremy Moore (Woomera Lawyers Group) locked horns in Elder Hall, generally to agree with each other on basic premises, and disagree fairly amicably on the details. An expansive National Human Rights Consultation Committee enquiry, handed down on the 30th of September has made recommendations to the Attorney General to take immediate action in Australia, taking steps to create a “human rights culture.”
Education is emphasised, along with a list of fairly self explanatory and uncontroversial set of human rights and freedoms to be acknowledged. As Burnside states, these human rights are so fundamental and self-evident as to be platitudinous. These are really not the issue. The issue is that Burnside takes the position of the recommendations made by the committee.
The implementation of these rights is proposed via a “dialogue model,” that emphasises, but does not enforce, concern for human rights across the tiers of government. Under this system, the power will still rest with the parliament (allaying ever-present fears of a swing of power to the unelected judiciary) to make legislation, although qualified by a human rights “compliance committee,” whose role it would be to review the legislation and ensure it suitably took into account care for the human rights enshrined in the proposed Bill/Charter.
Here is where the problem begins. If the legislation fails to gain a compliance certificate from the committee, the government may be coerced to amend it. Or, it can just pass the legislation anyway. At least this institutes a “political cost” to human rights abuses by the government, says Burnside. You could be forgiven for not having much faith in the Australian electorate to enact the “political cost” of human rights abuses, given that John Howard was re-elected in 2004 in spite of his record for locking up children, and one case to the effect of potentially imprisoning a desperate and innocent man for the rest of his life for the crime of being stateless. The “dialogue model” is a non-binding agreement between the tiers of government to ensure they “alert” each other when one or other is violating the code. But no action is sanctioned. The recommendations are non-binding. In fact, the government of the day could conceivably legislate away the Charter. Rhetoric in the spirit of the Coalition governments in the early 2000’s could potentially be just as effective as it was then, dehumanising and thus legitimising human rights abuses of “others” while still maintain a firm electoral footing. Burnside speaks of the Charter providing us with a “tool box” with which to tackle human rights issues in this country. Does liberal internationalism really need yet another empty toolbox? (In the spirit of an institution that brought us such inert and utterly useless pleasantries as the “non-binding resolution.”) If anyone is serious about human rights, we must aim to pass measures that do more than just create another level of bureaucracy to pay lip service to them.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)