The Human Rights Commission’s Complaint Process
for complaints about discrimination in employment based on religion, criminal record, trade union activity, sexual preference, political opinion and social origin
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WORDThe Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission is an independent third party which investigates complaints about discrimination and human rights breaches. It does not act as an advocate or legal representative for a party to a complaint. The complaint process is simple, free and flexible and is outlined below.
Make an enquiry
- Telephone HREOC’s Complaints Information Line to discuss issues you think might be discrimination.
- We can send you a complaint form to start the process.
- If we can’t help, we can refer you to someone who may be able to assist you.
Lodging a complaint
- Making a complaint is free and you do not need a lawyer.
- The complaint must be in writing – this includes email, and can be in your preferred language.
- Our officers can help you to write down the complaint.
- You can lodge a complaint on our website using our electronic complaint form.
- We will let you know whether we can deal with your issues as a complaint or not.
Investigation
- A HREOC officer will contact you to discuss your complaint.
- The officer will contact the person/organisation you are complaining about, provide them with a copy of your complaint and ask for their comments and other relevant information.
- We will review all of the information and discuss it with you.
- We may try to resolve the complaint through conciliation.
- If we decide we cannot deal with your complaint we will talk to you about this and explain why.
Conciliation
- Conciliation means we try to help you and the person you are complaining about to resolve the matter.
- This might be through a face-to-face meeting or over the telephone.
- The outcome of conciliation may include an apology, policy changes, compensation and/or staff training.
What next?
- If the complaint cannot be conciliated and is not declined for some other reason, the complaint will be determined by the President.
- This might involve a public hearing to determine if discrimination has occurred.
- If the President is satisfied discrimination has occurred, he will prepare a report about the complaint which is submitted to the Attorney-General and then tabled in Parliament.
- The report would detail the complaint, the findings about discrimination and would make recommendations to the respondent about action it should take regarding the complaint.
- Recommendations might include an apology, compensation, a policy change and/or staff training.
- Examples of reports the President has made about discrimination in employment are on the HREOC website at www.humanrights.gov.au/legal/HREOCA_reports/
The Human Rights Commission’s Complaint Process
