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Law Week Breakfast Law Society of Western Australia Perth, 13 May 2019 Emeritus Professor Rosalind Croucher AM, President, Australian Human Rights Commission Acknowledgements Thanks to Greg McIntyre SC, President of the Law Society of Western Australia, for the wonderful invitation to speak at the opening of Law Week in Perth. I would like to begin my contribution by acknowledging the traditional ...

Some of you might recall media coverage regarding a young man undergoing cancer treatment who was required to attend a job capacity assessment the day he got out of hospital, to establish his entitlement to disability support payments.

I would like to begin by acknowledging the traditional owners of the land on which we meet, the Ngunnawal peoples, and pay my respect to their elders past and present.

This page provides access to over 200 speeches and papers on disability issues from members (current and past) and senior staff of the Australian Human Rights Commission. All major speeches since 2000 are included, as well as a selection of earlier speeches and papers as far back as 1989.

Mr. Neil Brown QC, Mr. Michael Shand QC, members of the Victoria Bar and of Chartered Institute of Arbitrators, distinguished guests, ladies and gentlemen, all.

I am here today partly because Michelle Castagna was quick off the mark in organising me to come before I had accepted any of the numerous other possibilities for events for the international day.

Thank you for the opportunity to speak here today, World Mental Health Day. I am very pleased that World Mental Health Day this year is dedicated to the theme Human Rights and Mental Health. This theme recognises that mental health issues are human rights issues - a view argued strongly and consistently by our Human Rights Commission for many years.

I will not speak in detail about human rights conventions and disability because this topic is addressed by my co-speaker in this session, Karl Lachwitz. I will say though that international human rights law and human rights debate has not yet acknowledged adequately or sufficiently clearly that people with a disability are part of what the "human" in human rights means. Equally, there has not always been enough attention to human rights dimensions in disability discourse.

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].

Firstly, I would like to pass on apologies from the President of the Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission, The Hon. John von Doussa QC, who is presently interstate and unable to be here today. It goes without saying that he entirely endorses the purpose of this project and believes there should be more of it.