Australian Lawyers for Human Rights (ALHR) congratulates the Palaszczuk Government and Queensland parliament on yesterday’s passage of legislation to decriminalise abortion, and establish safe access zones around termination clinics. NSW is now the only jurisdiction in Australia where abortion remains a crime and, ALHR says, it must now act to address this anomaly. ALHR President … Read More >>
Lawyers have expressed concerns that changes to the Government’s proposed Electoral Legislation Amendment (Electoral Funding and Disclosure Reform) Bill 2017 (‘the Bill’) do not go far enough and that the Bill continues to exceed its stated aims of supporting both real and perceived integrity and fairness of elections by preventing undue influence in the democratic … Read More >>
Australian Lawyers for Human Rights (ALHR) has joined the “Make Renting Fair” campaign in NSW with 90 other organisations urging the NSW Parliament to vote in favour of the Residential Tenancies Act (Review) Bill 2018, but with crucial amendments to make renting fair by removing unfair evictions. ALHR NSW Convenor Sarah Schwartz said, “We strongly … Read More >>
Leading human rights lawyers have expressed alarm at recent reports about leaked content of the Ruddock review into religious protections commissioned after last year’s postal vote on marriage equality. Instead of singling out the right to religious freedom, they are calling on the Morrison Government to introduce a national Human Rights Act to protect human … Read More >>
Australia’s leading association of human rights lawyers has welcomed the Government’s recent announcement of a Royal Commission into Aged Care Quality and Safety, but is calling on the Government to go one step further and launch the long overdue Royal Commission into abuse, violence and neglect in the disability care sector. ALHR President Kerry Weste … Read More >>
Australian Lawyers for Human Rights (ALHR) has expressed support for a call by members of the Wangan and Jagalingou (‘W&J’) People for the Government to rule out any action which would extinguish native title, following the dismissal of a challenge by the Federal Court last month. On 17 August 2018, the Federal Court dismissed a … Read More >>
Leading human rights lawyers are dismayed by the manner in which our new Prime Minister, Scott Morrison, has chosen to approach the rights of LGBTI children in Australian schools. Australian Lawyers for Human Rights (ALHR) has written to the Prime Minister condemning his recent negative public statements about programs designed to ensure that children who … Read More >>
(Photo: © UNICEF Yemen) Australian Lawyers for Human Rights (ALHR) has written to Australia’s Minister for Foreign Affairs, the Hon Marise Payne, raising serious concerns about Saudi Arabia’s use of force in Yemen. It has been widely reported that at least 54 civilians were killed on Thursday 9 August in an airstrike in the northern … Read More >>
Australia’s leading human rights lawyers welcome the early closure of Real Bodies – The Exhibition (Exhibition). The Exhibition was initially due to close end of October 2018, however, is now closing on 16 September 2018. There has been mounting pressure placed on the NSW Government by human rights lawyers, medical professionals, academics and civil society … Read More >>
Guardian Australia’s ‘Deaths Inside’ project has reported that at least 407 Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people have died in custody since the conclusion of the 1991 Royal Commission into Aboriginal Deaths in Custody (RCIADIC). 147 of those deaths occurred in the past decade, and 43 of that number were young Indigenous people born after … Read More >>
State, Territory and Federal governments must make urgent changes to end homelessness. Australian Lawyers for Human Rights (ALHR) has described current levels of homelessness as a significant human rights failure which should be at the forefront of the minds of all parliamentarians during Homelessness Week. In keeping with this year’s theme of “Ending Homelessness … Read More >>
Australian Lawyers for Human Rights (ALHR) is alarmed by reports on ABC News that a transgender woman was jailed and sent to Hobart’s Risdon Prison only then to be allegedly raped by other prisoners. The woman, Marjorie Harwood, has since died from kidney disease. ALHR LGBTI Subcommittee Co-Chair, Georgia Burke said: “The Tasmanian Prison Service … Read More >>
