Australia has taken the final step necessary to ratify and implement a major international treaty that combats torture and other forms of mistreatment. This is an opportunity to protect the rights of people who are detained in Australia for generations to come.
The Australian Human Rights Commission welcomed the Australian Government’s ratification of the Optional Protocol to the Convention against Torture (OPCAT) on December 21, 2017.
Today Australia has taken the final step necessary to ratify and implement a major international treaty that combats torture and other forms of mistreatment. This is an opportunity to protect the rights of people who are detained in Australia for generations to come.
The Australian Human Rights Commission today welcomes the Australian Government’s ratification of the Optional Protocol to the Convention against Torture (OPCAT).
Mandatory sentencing laws strip courts of their power to interpret laws and compromises the separation of power between government and the judiciary, Commissioner Wilson said today.
“I understand that governments take this approach to mandatory sentencing because they want to be seen by their constituents as being ‘tough on crime’.
“But mandatory sentencing laws do not provide a solution. Instead they stifle the role of courts to review and interpret the laws.
Acknowledgements
Thank you for your kind introduction.
I would like to begin by acknowledging the Turrbal People, the traditional owners of the lands on which we are meeting today.
I would also like to acknowledge:
The Australian Human Rights Commission provides this response to the questionnaire from the Working Group on Arbitrary Detention in relation to judicial review of the lawfulness of detention.
The Australian Human Rights Commission will today report on its inquiry into the treatment of people with disabilities in the criminal justice system. It finds that such people are not equally treated.
The report Equal before the law: Towards disability justice strategies is the culmination of extensive consultations held last year with victims, perpetrators, witnesses, disability advocates, policy makers and criminal justice workers.
Mandatory detention laws were enacted in Western Australia and the Northern Territory in 1996 and 1997 respectively. Essentially these laws require courts to impose minimum sentences of detention or imprisonment for people convicted of certain offences. They effectively remove judicial discretion in relation to those offences.
Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Social Justice Commissioner Mick Gooda has welcomed moves by the WA government towards a Justice Reinvestment approach to the criminal justice system.
Commissioner Gooda said he was heartened by reports in the West Australian media over the last few days that WA Corrective Services Minister Joe Francis was prepared to act on recently released data identifying the local government areas from where the highest rates of prison admissions originated in the 2011-2012 period.
