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- 29 October 2003
Australian Bill of Rights Day
International Day for Tolerance
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The Hon. PETER BREEN [10.45 p.m.]: I bring to the attention of the House two important human rights days to be celebrated next month. The first is the Australian Bill of Rights Day on 15 November and the other is the International Day for Tolerance on 16 November. Those two human rights days are linked in several ways. I would like to take this opportunity to canvass their significance from the point view of my party—Reform the Legal System—which party was originally formed as the Australian Bill of Rights Group and contested a Federal election before changing its name in the March 1999 State election to Reform the Legal System. Although the party has a new name, its primary focus remains the enactment of a statutory bill of rights, which explains my interest in the Australian Bill of Rights Day on 15 November.
Of course, Australia does not have a bill of rights—it is the only country in the common law world not to have one—and the Australian Bill of Rights Day is not celebrated by the international community. But it is an important day on the Australian human rights calendar because on that day in 1985 the Australian Bill of Rights Bill passed the House of Representatives. It was a cognate bill with the Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission [HREOC] Bill and it contained the enforcement provisions of the HREOC legislation. A cognate debate commenced in the Senate on 2 December 1985. Unfortunately, the Australian Bill of Rights Bill became bogged down in the Senate and the legislation effectively lapsed.
The HREOC legislation eventually went through both Houses of the Federal Parliament but, without the bill of rights to enforce the noble objectives of the commission, the full potential of the legislation has never been achieved. Honourable members may be interested to know that Gough Whitlam told me, following publication of my book on the bill of rights issue, that the reason the Australian Bill of Rights Bill failed in the Senate was that the then Western Australian Labor Premier, Brian Burke, was worried about his gerrymander. Gough said that Brian Burke pressured the then Labor Prime Minister, Bob Hawke, to drop the bill and Hawke agreed because he was, in Gough's words, "excessively dependent on Burke for campaign funds". The Burke Labor Government was re-elected on 8 February 1986 and, two weeks later, Gareth Evans successfully piloted the Australian Bill of Rights Bill through its second reading in the Senate. But that was the last anybody saw of the bill. Gough said:
Without informing the Cabinet or the caucus or the Parliament or the party, Hawke agreed to Burke's proposition.
As we approach Australian Bill of Rights Day on 15 November, honourable members might spend a moment thinking about a very different kind of legal system that might have evolved in Australia in the last 20 years if Bob Hawke had remained true to his working-class origins. I am reminded of the biblical instruction that God and money are incompatible masters. Just last week I speculated about a society in which basic human rights principles underpin its legal system. Immediately I realised that former Premier Neville Wran could have stayed home instead of attending the New South Wales Law Society annual dinner if our legal system recognised basic citizens right and freedoms. Mr Wran said that the biggest danger to basic human rights and long-established freedoms is silence. I quote from Alex Mitchell's report of the speech in last Sunday's Sun-Herald. Mr Wran also said:
There is something wrong when we are willing to go to war on Iraq to defend and promote fundamental democratic principles such as natural justice, human rights and fairness, while we are prepared to abandon those same democratic principles when it comes to David Hicks and Mamdouh Habib.
In the same week a horror story appeared in Brisbane's Courier-Mail that would never have been published if we had a bill of rights or other human rights legislation that protected fundamental principles of justice and fairness. The Courier-Mail story, which was headed "Redneck line moves south of the Tweed" quoted Queensland Attorney General Rod Welford as describing New South Wales as the new "deep south" on account of its draconian crime and justice initiatives, including police powers to deal with terrorism that are totally inappropriate under Australian law. Mr Welford also referred to the New South Wales Parliament's intrusion into the power of judges to determine custodial sentences.
Honourable members will be aware that the High Court will be asked to overturn a sentencing law passed by this Parliament in the case of Baker v The Queen. I expect the case to be listed in January or February next year, and my advice suggests that the challenge to the sentencing legislation will be successful. Unlike Australian Bill of Rights Day, the International Day for Tolerance on 16 November is recognised by the international community. At the initiative of the United Nations Education, Scientific and Cultural Organisation, 1995 was declared the United Nations Year for Tolerance, which saw the launching of a worldwide campaign for tolerance and non-violence. I will explain that day further at the next opportunity.
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