QUT Law Graduation Ceremony Occasional Address
The Hon Catherine Branson QC, President, Australian Human Rights Commission
17 December 2009
Acting Chancellor Mr Stephen Keim SC, Vice Chancellor Professor Peter Coaldrake, Professor the Hon. Michael Lavarch, Executive Dean of Law, other members of the official party, Faculty staff, graduates and your families and friends.
First, may I first acknowledge the traditional owners upon whose ancestral lands this ceremony is being held, and pay my respect to their elders past, present and future.
Next let me congratulate each of you graduating today. The successful completion of your course of study is something of which you, and those family members and others who supported you while you were studying, may feel justifiably proud. During your years of study you will have called upon your capacities for hard work, self-discipline and independent thinking – all qualities that you will find of importance in the years ahead.
The tertiary education that you have been fortunate to receive at this highly regarded Law School will mark you out as a privileged member of your community – where ever that community is. I hope that you will forgive me for reminding you that with privilege comes responsibility. You will not be surprised to learn that the responsibility that I would like to take this opportunity to remind you of is the responsibility to respect the human rights of every individual; to be ever mindful of the inherent dignity of every person.
Australia is not a country with a well-developed culture of human rights. It is probably not a coincidence that Australia is the only western democracy without either a constitutional Bill of Rights or a Human Rights Act. As you may be aware, the Committee that conducted the recently concluded National Human Rights Consultation recommended that the Federal Parliament enact a Human Rights Act for Australia. This recommendation is surprisingly controversial. A very large proportion of submissions to the National Consultation support a federal Human Rights Act. There remains, however, significant opposition to this reform. We have not yet learnt what the Government’s response will be.
I believe that a Human Rights Act would make an important contribution to Australian society. It would greatly facilitate the development of a human rights culture in our country. It would do this principally by ensuring that all who exercise federal governmental power, the executive, the legislature and the judiciary, are conscious of the human rights of those who could be affected by their decisions.
Is it important that Australia have a better developed culture of human rights? I think that it is. I would like to mention this evening two reasons why I think so.
First, I think that our poorly developed culture of human rights means that we tend to overlook that everyone in our country has a legitimate claim to economic, social and cultural rights as well as to civil and political rights. The economic, social and cultural rights to which I refer include the right to a decent standard of living, proper education and the highest attainable standard of health care. These three rights are the human rights that the National Consultation on Human Rights found mattered most to people in Australia. And they are the human rights of greatest importance to the most disadvantaged in any society – including to name just a few categories of disadvantaged people in our Australian society – many Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Peoples, especially those who live in remote communities; many who are suffering from psychiatric illness and their families; many people with disability and their families or other carers; and many who have arrived recently in this country especially where their language, religion or culture is not that of the majority of Australians. It is important for us always to remember that the way in which we treat the most disadvantaged in our society is probably the most important measure of our worth as a society.
I also think that our poorly developed culture of human rights means that as a nation we too readily acquiesce when governments interfere with our civil and political rights. These rights include the right not to be arbitrarily detained, and the rights to freedom of speech and freedom of association – and the right to enjoy these rights without distinction of any kind based on characteristics such as race, national origin, colour, sex or religion. Because we do not have a well-developed culture of human rights I fear that governments are too easily tempted to infringe on these fundamental rights and freedoms more than on careful reflection is truly necessary to ensure the security of the nation.
It is not just that authorities can make mistakes. Our civil and political rights are worth protecting because they are at the heart of the values that characterise us as a liberal democracy and should hold us together as a nation. Moreover, it is increasingly recognised that respect for human rights and the rule of law can help hold diverse communities together and that it is not necessary to abrogate either of these things to maintain safe communities – indeed, doing so may in the longer term prove counterproductive. I was particularly pleased to read recently that an international conference of leading figures concerned with combating terrorism concluded that ‘[c]ounter terrorism efforts must be compliant with the values that democracies uphold more broadly, including the rule of law and human rights’.
So what has all this to do with you as you graduate from the Faculty of Law? A number of things I think. First, I am sure that most of you care about these things or you wouldn’t have chosen to study law. I urge you to keep on caring about them what ever it is that you go on to do as you leave your student days behind you. Although you will go on to use your qualifications in many diverse ways, quite a few of you, I suspect, will wish at some time (perhaps always) to work within agencies or organisations explicitly concerned with social justice and civil liberties. I commend you on this choice. But many of you will not seek, or perhaps not find, the opportunity to do this. This does not mean that you cannot be a human rights practitioner. Within every organisation, indeed in every life, there are countless opportunities to be a human rights practitioner – particularly if you carry with you the authority of being a lawyer.
As we like to say at the Australian Human Rights Commission human rights are for everyone, everywhere, everyday. Where ever you are you can be concerned about discrimination and other ways in which individuals are not treated with respect. You can question judgments based on stereotypes and look yourself to the qualities and capacities of the individual; you can model leadership that doesn’t involve bullying; you can speak out against sexual or other harassment; you can show respect for cultural, religious or other legitimate difference – and you may well be able to create an expectation that those around you will do the same. You can examine carefully arguments in favour of abrogating fundamental rights and freedoms – particularly when those most affected by the proposed measures are likely to be unpopular minorities or others whose voices will carry little political weight. You can question conventional wisdom and do all that you can to keep your mind open to new ideas – remembering, for example, that it is not so very long ago that almost no-one questioned the conventional wisdom that it was appropriate for a woman’s property to pass to her husband on marriage and that women should not be allowed to vote. It is likely that there are things that are now taken for granted by the majority of Australians that in the future will look equally ridiculous.
In short, Iet me express the hope that you will take with you as you leave this university the idealism and values that have played such an important part in your lives as students.
