pathways, DECEMBER 2008
Arguably the most publicly prominent Religious in Australia, Jesuit, lawyer and advocate, Fr Frank Brennan will chair a national community consultation on human rights in Australia.
Fr Brennan's appointment was announced in the national media on Wednesday, December 10, ahead of the Attorney-General, Robert McClelland, marking the 60th anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights by launching the consultation.
In effect, Fr Brennan (chair), Mick Palmer, Mary Kostakidis and Tammy Williams will explore the need for a bill of rights in Australia as they consult on the protection, promotion and corresponding responsibilities of human rights in this country.
"All Australians will be given the chance to have their say," Mr McClelland (
pictured) said.
"Whatever views are presented, we want to hear from as many Australians as possible and to stimulate a national discussion about this important topic."
The committee will ask the Australian community:
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Which human rights (including corresponding responsibilities) should be protected and promoted?
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Are these human rights currently sufficiently protected and promoted?
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How could Australia better protect and promote human rights?
Mr McClelland said the consultation would not presuppose any outcome, although the Government had made it clear that any proposal must preserve the sovereignty of Parliament.
"We want to encourage broad community debate on a range of human rights issues, not only on whether a Charter or Bill of Rights is necessary."
"The time is ripe for Australians to conduct a national conversation about how best to provide the fair punt for all, making the State attentive to the still, small voice of conscience', Fr Brennan said in the December 10 edition of the Jesuits' e-journal
Province Express.
The committee will report to the Government by July 31, 2009.
The committee:
Father Frank Brennan
is a Jesuit priest, a Professor of Law at the Australian Catholic University and Visiting Professorial Fellow at the University of New South Wales. He was the founding Director of the Uniya Jesuit Social Justice Centre in Sydney. Fr Frank has written extensively on aboriginal land rights and, in 1995, he was awarded an Order of Australia for his services to Indigenous Australians. In 1998, he was named a Living National Treasure, during his involvement in the Wik Debate.
Fr Frank is - by his own admission - a long-term 'fence sitter' on the question of how best to protect and promote human rights.
Mick Palmer
was for six years, from 1988, a Commissioner of the Northern Territory Police, Fire and Emergency Services. From 1994 he served for seven years as Commissioner of the Australian Federal Police. In 1997 he became the first Australian to be appointed to the Executive Committee of Interpol, a position he held for three years. He presently holds the statutory office of Inspector of Transport Security.
A lawyer, Mr Palmer is an Honours graduate of the Queensland Barristers Admission Board and in 1982 was admitted to practise as a Barrister at Law in Queensland. He practised at the private bar during 1982 and 1983 before returning to policing. In 1998, he was appointed Deputy Chair of the Australian National Council on Drugs. He was also appointed by the former Prime Minister to oversee an inquiry into the Government's handling of Cornelia Rau in 2005.
Mary Kostakidis
is a well-known journalist and former television news presenter from Sydney. She has a long history of community service, working with organisations such as the Drug and Alcohol Council of Australia, the Order of Australia Honours committee, and the Advertising Standards Board. Ms Kostakidis is on the Board of the Fred Hollows Foundation. Previously she was a member of the Breast Cancer Council Advisory Committee, the Constitutional Centenary Foundation and the Republic Advisory Committee.
Tammy Williams
is from the Aboriginal community of Cherbourg in Queensland. Well before her 20's, she was a vocal spokeswoman for issues affecting young people in Australia. In 1996, she was identified as a future leader and selected to attend the State of the World Forum in San Francisco. Ms Williams went on to address other international forums, including the UN Commissioner of Human Rights. For her efforts, she was awarded the 1997 Youth Award by the Australian Human Rights & Equal Opportunity Commission.
Ms Williams obtained her law degree from the Queensland University of Technology in 2001 and is now a practicing barrister in Queensland. She has worked as a prosecutor for the Commonwealth Director of Public Prosecutions and in 2003 was named the 'Emergent Young Lawyer of the Year' by the Queensland Women Law
Association. She's also one of the Indigenous directors on the Board of Indigenous Enterprise Partnerships.
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