Victorian launch of the Companion Card
As Federal Acting Disability Discrimination Commissioner, I'd like to take this opportunity to congratulate the Victorian Government and venues that have supported the Companion Card concept.
As Federal Acting Disability Discrimination Commissioner, I'd like to take this opportunity to congratulate the Victorian Government and venues that have supported the Companion Card concept.
I would like to thank ACROD for inviting me to deliver the Kenneth Jenkins Oration; both because I regard it as a privilege and because it gives me the opportunity to address a gathering of the key people in the disability field at an important time in the work of the Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission.
Of course, women too can be violent. However for the most part, the purpose and effects differ radically - male violence is used to regulate women's behaviour, and men's. Men commit most of the violence that is considered in the criminal system, against women and against other men.
I'm very pleased to be speaking to you today. I'm especially encouraged that so many young people have put aside a weekend to think about, and talk about, human rights.
Firstly I would like to acknowledge the traditional custodians of the land on which we stand and by so doing remind ourselves that Australia's cultural traditions stretch back many thousands of years and express our aspirations for Australians of the future to be socially just and inclusive.
Although the first Human Rights Commission was established by federal legislation in 1981, ICESCR was not added to its mandate (unlike the ICCPR). The omission was repeated when the new (current) Commission was established in 1986.
I wish to start today by acknowledging the traditional owners of the land on which we are meeting. On behalf of the Australian Human Rights Commission, I pay my respects to their elders past and present.
I would like to begin by acknowledging the traditional owners of the land on which we meet, the Wurundjeri People of the Kulin Nation, and pay my respects to their elders past and present.
I would like to acknowledge the Gadigal people of the Eora nation, the traditional owners of the land on which we meet today, and pay respect to their elders.
I was invited to pick my own topic for discussion. As an ex-judge being invited to speak to students of the law, I assumed that I was expected to speak on something related to the administration of the law from a judge's perspective. And as President of Australia's Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission (HREOC), I assumed I was expected to mention the role of human rights promotion in our legal system.
Between December 2007 and April 2008 the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Social Justice Commissioner, Tom Calma, will deliver a series of key speeches setting out an agenda for change in Indigenous affairs.
In September 2001, after a gap of 18 years the United Nations finally held the third World Conference against Racism, Racial Discrimination, Xenophobia and Related Intolerance in Durban, South Africa.
Good evening distinguished guests, my Indigenous brothers and sisters and non Indigenous friends. May I begin by acknowledging the Wurrundjeri People of the Kulin Nation on whose land we are meeting on tonight, and thank the dancers for cultural expression and your welcome to country. Thank you also to the Vice Chancellor, Professor Paul Johnson for your introduction, and to La Trobe University for inviting me to present this year’s Hyllus Maris Memorial Lecture. May I also acknowledge Ms Lois Peeler and the other family members of Hyllus Maris who are with us tonight.
Today's launch here in Sydney is part of a national program of launches that I have been undertaking in recent weeks in order to bring issues of human rights significance raised by my latest social justice and native title reports to the attention of Indigenous and other interested communities and organisations. So far, launches have been held in Melbourne, Perth and Broome, with launches in the next week in Alice Springs and Adelaide; to be followed by Brisbane and Darwin after that.
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?"
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