Equality Act on agenda
A federal equality act, first raised by a Senate committee in December last year, could end up being a reality much sooner than the 2011 timeframe originally proposed.
The Rudd Government’s Human Rights Consultation will examine the need for an equality act in addition to the more widely assumed bill of rights.
The Consultation, which began holding public forums in NSW on 18 February, is likely to finalise its recommendations well before the Human Rights Commission is given the go-ahead for its own inquiry.
A Senate committee had recommended the Commission conduct an inquiry and report by 2011, but the Government has not yet responded.
The Government welcomes the comprehensive recommendations made by the Committee and will respond in due course, a spokesman for the Attorney-General said.
The Government is likely to wait to hear the findings of the Human Rights Consultation, negating the need for a second inquiry.
The Equality Act, as proposed by the Senate committee, could combine the sex, race, age and disability anti-discrimination laws and include new protections against sexuality and gender identity discrimination.
The deadline for submissions to the Human Rights Consultation has been extended to 15 June 2009. Share you views by attending one of the public forums or in writing. More information at www.humanrightsconsultation.gov.au.
Australia is the only western democracy which does not have a Bill of Rights or a Human Rights Act (HRA) which is pretty shameful. Many of the basic rights and freedoms we too often take for granted are not actually protected by either State or Federal law and a HRA will be a great step in the right direction to ensure equality for all Australians, not just the GLBT community.
Whilst there is a lot of support for a HRA, there are also some very prominent figures coming out against it. These include Cardinal George Pell (no surprises there though), former NSW Premier Bob Carr and the current NSW Attorney-General John Hatzistergos. It is IMPERATIVE therefore that individuals, community groups, organisations and corporations make submissions to the Consultation Committee in support of a HRA.
Making a submission is as easy as sending an SMS – a number has been set up by Amnesty International and HumanRightsAct.tv for this. Simply SMS your name and post code, as well as what human rights matter most to you to 0428 415 939. Submissions will be forwarded to the Human Rights Act Consultation Committee and will not be distributed or published elsewhere by Amnesty or HumanRightsAct.tv (however the Consultation Committee has not yet determined whether they will be compiling all submissions and making them available to the public).
We are “behind” because most people don’t want deverse peoples to be treated equally. The fact is that hate still exists. Learn to duk-n-weave!
Bring it on. Why has it taken so long and why are we behind a lot of the Western world. We are a “new” country we should be amongst the first to adopt change. In my opinion there is too much influence from the church on Gay issues, especially the Catholic church. They are very powerfull in this country, most of our leaders are of this religion. We should stop supporting them and their charities ie St. Vincent shops.
This Bill of Rights is CRITICAL, in forcing private superanuation funds to honour post-retirement reversionary pensions. (ie after you retire, when most vulnerable)
At the moment the greedy super funds are free to discriminate & pocket OUR own hard earned gay money as extra “profit” for themselves- ie. when one gay partner dies they STOP the pension & pocket it for themselves(a pension made up of our own gay money)… yet with heteros they continue to pay the pension to the surviving partner for life.