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Disability Rights

Australian Association of the Deaf National Conference

I think it's always good manners to make this acknowledgment. But at a Deaf community event it's also an important reminder that the rate of deafness and hearing impairment in some indigenous communities - over 30% - is even higher than it is throughout the community as a whole.

Category, Speech
Disability Rights

Disability Enterprises Annual meeting

It is my custom to make this acknowledgement at public events because I think recognising Australia's indigenous history is an important element in recognising the truth of our diversity as a people.

Category, Speech
Disability Rights

Address to Blind Citizens Australia Convention 1999

Graeme Innes AM Deputy Disability Discrimination Commissioner Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission 15 October 1999 Note: This is the full version of Deputy Commissioner Innes' paper, which was presented in summary form at the convention for reasons of time.

Category, Speech
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].

Category, Speech
Rights and Freedoms

The human rights of older Australians in the bush: Chris Sidoti

I am very pleased to be here tonight at the Rural Ageing Seminar dinner. Thank you, to Dame Roma and the Rural Ageing Seminar Reference Group, for inviting me to attend an event that (for once) takes place where it counts - in rural South Australia.

Category, Speech
Commission – General

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The topic for discussion is the role of human rights in good governance. Along the way I will touch on HREOC’s perceptions of cultural change at DIMA, legal roadblocks to cultural change, and the importance of human rights principles in the law and policy making process.

Category, Speech
Commission – General

H R Law Masterclass: Federal Anti-discrimination Law in an Employment Context: recent developments, likely future directions and the lessons from the past

To some of you the role of The Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission (HREOC) in the industrial relations scene in Australia will be well known, others of you may be wondering why a representative of a human rights body would be speaking on this occasion. I propose therefore to briefly summarise HREOC's role in the administration of federal anti-discrimination law, including its complaint handling function, and to give some recent statistics.

Category, Speech
Age Discrimination

Building a better cultural inheritance for an ageing Australia

Hon Dr Kay Patterson AO Age Discrimination Commissioner Keynote Address to National Press Club of Australia, Canberra Wednesday, 28 June, 2023 CHECK AGAINST DELIVERY Welcome Thank you Andrew Tillett (National Press Club Vice President) for your kind introduction. I am sometimes introduced...

Category, Speech
Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Social Justice

Who’s driving the agenda?

I begin by paying my respects to the Wurundjeri people of the Kulin Nation, the traditional owners of the land where we meet today, and I pay my respects to your elders, to your ancestors and to those who have come before us.

Category, Speech
Disability Rights

Risky Business?

I make this acknowledgment in all my public presentations, because recognising the indigenous history of this land is an important element in recognising the truth of our diversity as a people.

Category, Speech
Disability Rights

Making rights relevant

Thank you for the opportunity to speak to you today. Whilst planning this speech, I was thinking that it was a long time since the first time that I addressed an NDS (then Acrod) conference. I was asked to give the Kenneth Jenkins memorial oration at the Acrod conference in the early 80s, as the first President of DPI Australia. The speech then was just the type that you would expect from the head of an advocacy organisation finding its feet, to the conference of the service provision organisation. It was brash, assertive and demanding.

Category, Speech
Disability Rights

National Deafness Sector Summit

I'd also like to acknowledge Brian Rope's many years of contribution to the disability sector, and wish him well in retirement, and wish Nicole Lawder success as she moves into the CEO's role.

Category, Speech

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