Human Rights Law Centre | 28 Feb 2012
Australia has moved a step closer to ensuring independent monitoring, inspection and oversight of places of detention.
The Commonwealth Attorney-General, Nicola Roxon, and the Acting Minister for Foreign Affairs, Craig Emerson, today tabled a National Interest Analysis on Australia’s ratification of the Optional Protocol to the Convention against Torture.
The Optional Protocol is an international treaty which aims to prevent ill treatment and promote humane conditions by establishing systems for independent monitoring and inspection of all places of detention.
“It is not only in the interests of persons deprived of liberty, but also the broader community, that all places of detention – whether prisons, psychiatric hospitals, police cells or disability facilities – promote rehabilitation and reintegration. It is fundamental that all detainees are treated with basic dignity and respect. Independent inspections and oversight are critical in this regard,” said Human Rights Law Centre Executive Director, Phil Lynch.
At the national level, the Optional Protocol requires that countries establish what is known as a “national preventative mechanism”, or NPM. An NPM is an independent body with a mandate to conduct both announced and unannounced visits to places of detention, to make recommendations to prevent ill treatment and improve conditions, and to report publicly on its findings and views.
At the international level, the Optional Protocol establishes an independent committee of experts, the UN Sub-Committee on the Prevention of Torture, with a mandate to carry out country missions to monitor deprivations of liberty.
According to Mr Lynch, “The whole system is premised on the evidence and experience that external scrutiny of places of detention can prevent and redress torture and other forms of ill treatment. By making places of detention more open, transparent and accountable, it helps to ensure that persons deprived of liberty – whether people with psychiatric illness, prisoners, people with disability or asylum seekers – are treated with basic dignity and respect.”
Australia signed the Optional Protocol in May 2009. Since that time, progress on ratification and implementation has been slow, with wrangling between the states and the Commonwealth about who is to foot the modest bill for detention monitoring and oversight. According to Mr Lynch, “This is despite international evidence as to the very high social and economic costs of failing to prevent and redress ill-treatment.”
Mr Lynch said that, “Now that the NIA has been tabled, the Commonwealth, state and territory governments should all prioritise ratification and implementation of the Optional Protocol. Any further delay in the prevention of ill-treatment has intolerable social and economic costs and is simply not an option.”
Showing posts with label OPCAT. Show all posts
Showing posts with label OPCAT. Show all posts
Wednesday, February 29, 2012
Tuesday, December 27, 2011
A Human Rights Agenda for the new Attorney-General, continued
We asked some of Australia’s leading human rights advocates, activists and academics to tell us, in less than 100 words, what the Attorney’s top human rights priority or initiative for 2012 should be. We’ll be sharing more of them with you in the coming days and weeks.
John Tobin is an Associate Professor at Melbourne Law School and a member of the HRLC Advisory Committee
The prioritisation of efforts to address human rights considerations is always fraught with danger. But the reality of limited resources means that prioritisation is a fact of political life. Given this reality, the top priority for the new Attorney General in 2012 must be ensuring the successful implementation of the Human Rights (Parliamentary Scrutiny) Act 2011. The requirement to scrutinize all new legislation in light of international human rights standards must not be reduced to a shallow process of compliance. Instead, the Attorney General must lead from the front and demonstrate that substantive engagement with international human rights standards leads to more effective and equitable legislative outcomes.
Lucy McKernan is Manager of Strategic Projects with the Public Interest Law Clearing House (Vic)
That a five year old girl can be lawfully refused admission to a government funded kindergarten on the basis of her parents’ same-sex relationship, is a disgrace. Even the Acting Bishop for the relevant Catholic diocese was ‘appalled’ by the discriminatory decision, yet Australian laws allow this form of discrimination by religious organisations.
Attorney-General Roxon should remove the blanket exceptions for religious organisations permitting them to discriminate on the grounds of sex and age. At the very least, the Attorney should prohibit discrimination by religious organisations in respect of their government funded functions and require greater transparency from organisations seeking to rely on the exceptions. Importantly, the Attorney should also show leadership by encouraging her State counterparts to follow suit.
Les Malezer is Co-Chair of the National Congress of Australia’s First Peoples
The priority for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Peoples is to gain recognition and respect as first peoples, and acknowledgement and protection of Indigenous rights.
In 2012, the Attorney General must make the Human Rights Framework effective, leading cultural change across government. For Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples this includes giving the recommendations and reports of the Australian Human Rights Commission, including the ATSI Social Justice Commissioner, real authority, not just political lip service. The Government must implement and be accountable to reports on human rights by national and international authorities. There should also be a focus on judicial and legal education, to ensure legal professionals understand Indigenous rights and can properly and impartially resolve cases regarding those rights.
Lucy Adams is a Senior Lawyer with the PILCH Homeless Persons’ Legal Clinic
On census night in 2006, approximately 105,000 Australians were homeless, including approximately 7,480 families. Australia needs a human rights-based framework for addressing homelessness.
InVictoria, we have seen how legislative protection of human rights can work in practice through the Victorian Charter of Human Rights. The HPLC has relied on the Charter’s binding obligations on public bodies – to give proper consideration to human rights in decision-making and to act compatibly with human rights – to avoid the eviction of 42 people, including 21 children, from social housing into homelessness.
Enforceable human rights obligations, including national homelessness legislation that enshrines the right to adequate housing, are critical to Australia’s ability to effectively prevent and address homelessness.
Friday, December 16, 2011
A Human Rights Agenda for the new Attorney-General
Human Rights Law Centre | 15 December 2011
Australia’s new Attorney-General, Nicola Roxon, was sworn in on 14 December 2011.
We asked some of Australia’s leading human rights advocates, activists and academics to tell us, in less than 100 words, what the Attorney’s top human rights priority or initiative for 2012 should be. We’ll be sharing more of them with you in the coming days and weeks.
Catherine Branson QC is President of the Australian Human Rights Commission
My hope is that the new Attorney-General’s priorities will include bringing along her fellow ministers and parliamentarians in making the new human rights scrutiny processes effective and seeing through the consolidation of federal discrimination laws process to create an effective national equality law. She should also ensure the ratification of the Optional Protocol to the Convention against Torture and establish a national system of monitoring places of detention. Finally, the Attorney must ensure that human rights considerations inform policy in all areas of her portfolio, for example in security policy where there is an urgent need for a system enabling review of adverse security assessments.
Nicolas Patrick is a Partner and Head of Pro Bono with DLA Piper
I would prioritise the human rights of people in places of detention. A significant proportion of Australia’s prison population suffer from mental illness. There is a causal and consequential link between imprisonment and mental illness. Australia is warehousing people with mental health problems in prisons, where mental health care is entirely inadequate.
The number of juveniles in detention is also a major concern, along with the over-representation of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples. These issues raise significant concerns with respect to Australia’s obligations under the Convention against Torture, the Convention on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination and the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights and require the urgent attention of the Australian Government.
Professor David Kinley is Chair in Human Rights Law at Sydney Law School
Dear Attorney,
Pay very close attention to the newly established parliamentary human rights scrutiny committee. This is a sleeping giant, whose potential power and range is underappreciated; indeed largely unnoticed. Having authority to scrutinise all bills for compliance with all Australia’s international human rights obligations goes far beyond the scope of any equivalent mechanism overseas, and it will embarrass and expose. So, heads up for the enhanced human rights scrutiny of the next wave of immigration, anti-terrorism or workplace relations proposals.
PS. Don’t take up smoking this year.
Ed Santow is Chief Executive Officer of the Public Interest Advocacy Centre
Over the last few years, the Australian Government has made progress in improving the protection of our basic rights. However, Australia still lacks a comprehensive human rights law. This increases the vulnerability of already disadvantaged people — like Indigenous Australians, people experiencing homelessness and people with a disability. To rectify this, the new Attorney-General should take the lead in fully implementing the recommendations of the 2009 National Human Rights Consultation, including by enacting a comprehensive Human Rights Act.
Nicky Friedman is Head of Pro Bono & Community Programs with Allens Arthur Robinson
The new Attorney should ensure that asylum seekers can access and exercise their legal rights.
Since the High Court’s decision in M61, which confirmed that review by the courts is available to asylum seekers who are processed offshore, legal assistance providers have been hit with floods of applications for legal representation in judicial review proceedings. Despite the huge increase in demand, no extra funds have been provided and legal aid and community legal centres are turning away desperate people. The Attorney should provide funds to boost the capacity of refugee and immigration community legal centres and legal aid commissions to deal with these matters immediately.
Professor Sarah Joseph is Director of the Castan Centre for Human Rights Law
There are many human rights priorities for Australiain 2012, such as properly implementing the new Human Rights (Parliamentary Scrutiny) Act and vastly improving this country’s impoverished refugee debate. As the number one priority, however, I would say that the Australian Government must take the lead in vigorously supporting amendment of the Australian Constitution to better recognise and protect the rights of Indigenous peoples, and to educate Australian people about the need for such amendment. A campaign against Constitutional recognition has already begun (see eg, J Albrechtsen inThe Australian on 14 December). The government and the opposition must get on the front foot to counter the scaremongering.
Australia’s new Attorney-General, Nicola Roxon, was sworn in on 14 December 2011.
We asked some of Australia’s leading human rights advocates, activists and academics to tell us, in less than 100 words, what the Attorney’s top human rights priority or initiative for 2012 should be. We’ll be sharing more of them with you in the coming days and weeks.
Catherine Branson QC is President of the Australian Human Rights Commission
My hope is that the new Attorney-General’s priorities will include bringing along her fellow ministers and parliamentarians in making the new human rights scrutiny processes effective and seeing through the consolidation of federal discrimination laws process to create an effective national equality law. She should also ensure the ratification of the Optional Protocol to the Convention against Torture and establish a national system of monitoring places of detention. Finally, the Attorney must ensure that human rights considerations inform policy in all areas of her portfolio, for example in security policy where there is an urgent need for a system enabling review of adverse security assessments.
Nicolas Patrick is a Partner and Head of Pro Bono with DLA Piper
I would prioritise the human rights of people in places of detention. A significant proportion of Australia’s prison population suffer from mental illness. There is a causal and consequential link between imprisonment and mental illness. Australia is warehousing people with mental health problems in prisons, where mental health care is entirely inadequate.
The number of juveniles in detention is also a major concern, along with the over-representation of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples. These issues raise significant concerns with respect to Australia’s obligations under the Convention against Torture, the Convention on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination and the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights and require the urgent attention of the Australian Government.
Professor David Kinley is Chair in Human Rights Law at Sydney Law School
Dear Attorney,
Pay very close attention to the newly established parliamentary human rights scrutiny committee. This is a sleeping giant, whose potential power and range is underappreciated; indeed largely unnoticed. Having authority to scrutinise all bills for compliance with all Australia’s international human rights obligations goes far beyond the scope of any equivalent mechanism overseas, and it will embarrass and expose. So, heads up for the enhanced human rights scrutiny of the next wave of immigration, anti-terrorism or workplace relations proposals.
PS. Don’t take up smoking this year.
Ed Santow is Chief Executive Officer of the Public Interest Advocacy Centre
Over the last few years, the Australian Government has made progress in improving the protection of our basic rights. However, Australia still lacks a comprehensive human rights law. This increases the vulnerability of already disadvantaged people — like Indigenous Australians, people experiencing homelessness and people with a disability. To rectify this, the new Attorney-General should take the lead in fully implementing the recommendations of the 2009 National Human Rights Consultation, including by enacting a comprehensive Human Rights Act.
Nicky Friedman is Head of Pro Bono & Community Programs with Allens Arthur Robinson
The new Attorney should ensure that asylum seekers can access and exercise their legal rights.
Since the High Court’s decision in M61, which confirmed that review by the courts is available to asylum seekers who are processed offshore, legal assistance providers have been hit with floods of applications for legal representation in judicial review proceedings. Despite the huge increase in demand, no extra funds have been provided and legal aid and community legal centres are turning away desperate people. The Attorney should provide funds to boost the capacity of refugee and immigration community legal centres and legal aid commissions to deal with these matters immediately.
Professor Sarah Joseph is Director of the Castan Centre for Human Rights Law
There are many human rights priorities for Australiain 2012, such as properly implementing the new Human Rights (Parliamentary Scrutiny) Act and vastly improving this country’s impoverished refugee debate. As the number one priority, however, I would say that the Australian Government must take the lead in vigorously supporting amendment of the Australian Constitution to better recognise and protect the rights of Indigenous peoples, and to educate Australian people about the need for such amendment. A campaign against Constitutional recognition has already begun (see eg, J Albrechtsen inThe Australian on 14 December). The government and the opposition must get on the front foot to counter the scaremongering.
Friday, December 2, 2011
Detention conditions: degrading, intolerable and inhumane
Phil Lynch | The Drum | 30 November 2011
Conditions of detention in Australia have been in the news for all the wrong reasons recently.
In April, an independent report tabled in Western Australia's parliament described prison conditions in that state as "degrading, intolerable and inhumane".
Recent reports from Victoria's Ombudsman have been similarly critical, variously describing conditions in youth detention facilities, police cells and the Melbourne Custody Centre as "appalling", "disgraceful" and incompatible with basic human rights.
Inhumane conditions of detention are not confined to correctional facilities. Nor are they confined to the mandatory immigration detention facilities so infamously described by Australian of the Year Professor Patrick McGorry as "factories for mental illness" and by the Australian Medical Association as "a form of child abuse".
Inhumane conditions also persist in many mental health and disability services. Indeed, investigations reported in The Age newspaper over the last two months have revealed the deaths of at least 36 people in Victorian psychiatric wards in the last three years, together with widespread allegations of physical and sexual abuse of patients.
This is just a snapshot of the developments that make Australia's implementation of the UN's Optional Protocol to the Convention against Torture and Ill-Treatment so imperative, and the two-year delay in ratifying that treaty since Australia signed it in 2009 so galling.
The Optional Protocol is an international treaty which aims to prevent ill treatment and promote humane conditions by establishing systems for independent monitoring and inspection of all places of detention.
It is not only in the interests of persons deprived of liberty, but also the broader community, that all places of detention – whether prisons, psychiatric hospitals, police cells or disability facilities – promote rehabilitation and reintegration and that all detainees are treated with basic dignity and respect. Independent inspections and oversight are critical in this regard.
At the national level, the Optional Protocol requires that countries establish what is known as a "national preventative mechanism", or NPM. An NPM is an independent body with a mandate to conduct both announced and unannounced visits to places of detention, to make recommendations to prevent ill treatment and improve conditions, and to report publicly on its findings and views.
At the international level, the Optional Protocol establishes an independent committee of experts – comprising doctors, lawyers, social workers and academics – with a mandate to carry out country missions to monitor deprivations of liberty. The UN Sub-Committee on the Prevention of Torture, as it is called, is also tasked to work cooperatively with states and NPMs to provide advice and training on the prevention of ill-treatment in places of detention.
The whole system is premised on the evidence and experience that external scrutiny of places of detention can deter and, where necessary, help to redress torture and other forms of ill treatment. By making places of detention more open, transparent and accountable, it helps to ensure that persons deprived of liberty – whether people with psychiatric illness, prisoners, people with disability or asylum seekers – are treated with basic dignity and respect.
Existing systems for transparency and accountability of places of detention are manifestly inadequate in Australia. In Victoria, for example, the Office of Correctional Services Review is an internal business unit within the Department of Justice. It reports to the Secretary of the Department – the very secretary with responsibility for correctional management – and does not make its reports public. The problem of lack of independence is not confined to corrections. The 36 deaths in psychiatric facilities are being investigated by the Office of the Chief Psychiatrist, an office which, according to its own website "has responsibility under the Mental Health Act for the medical care and welfare of persons receiving treatment or care for a mental illness".
Australia signed the Optional Protocol in May 2009. Since that time, progress on ratification and implementation has been slow, with wrangling between the states and the Commonwealth about who is to foot the modest bill for detention monitoring and oversight. This is despite international evidence as to the very high social and economic costs of failing to prevent and redress ill-treatment. On any estimate, the costs of independent monitoring and oversight are absolutely dwarfed by the $23 million paid by the Commonwealth for the unlawful detention and ill-treatment of immigration detainees over the last decade, costs which could have been largely avoided with a functioning and effective NPM.
Despite its name, there should be nothing optional about Australia's ratification and implementation of the Optional Protocol. The prevention of torture and ill treatment is certainly not regarded as optional or negotiable by like-minded countries. The United Kingdom, for example, ratified the treaty almost eight years ago, while New Zealand has no less than five independent, publicly accountable bodies mandated to visit and report on places of detention.
The Commonwealth, state and territory governments should all prioritise and expedite ratification and implementation of the Optional Protocol to the Convention against Torture. Any further delay in the prevention of ill-treatment has intolerable social and economic costs and is simply not an option.
Phil Lynch is Executive Director of the Human Rights Law Centre. You can follow the HRLC on Twitter @rightsagenda.
Conditions of detention in Australia have been in the news for all the wrong reasons recently.
In April, an independent report tabled in Western Australia's parliament described prison conditions in that state as "degrading, intolerable and inhumane".
Recent reports from Victoria's Ombudsman have been similarly critical, variously describing conditions in youth detention facilities, police cells and the Melbourne Custody Centre as "appalling", "disgraceful" and incompatible with basic human rights.
Inhumane conditions of detention are not confined to correctional facilities. Nor are they confined to the mandatory immigration detention facilities so infamously described by Australian of the Year Professor Patrick McGorry as "factories for mental illness" and by the Australian Medical Association as "a form of child abuse".
Inhumane conditions also persist in many mental health and disability services. Indeed, investigations reported in The Age newspaper over the last two months have revealed the deaths of at least 36 people in Victorian psychiatric wards in the last three years, together with widespread allegations of physical and sexual abuse of patients.
This is just a snapshot of the developments that make Australia's implementation of the UN's Optional Protocol to the Convention against Torture and Ill-Treatment so imperative, and the two-year delay in ratifying that treaty since Australia signed it in 2009 so galling.
The Optional Protocol is an international treaty which aims to prevent ill treatment and promote humane conditions by establishing systems for independent monitoring and inspection of all places of detention.
It is not only in the interests of persons deprived of liberty, but also the broader community, that all places of detention – whether prisons, psychiatric hospitals, police cells or disability facilities – promote rehabilitation and reintegration and that all detainees are treated with basic dignity and respect. Independent inspections and oversight are critical in this regard.
At the national level, the Optional Protocol requires that countries establish what is known as a "national preventative mechanism", or NPM. An NPM is an independent body with a mandate to conduct both announced and unannounced visits to places of detention, to make recommendations to prevent ill treatment and improve conditions, and to report publicly on its findings and views.
At the international level, the Optional Protocol establishes an independent committee of experts – comprising doctors, lawyers, social workers and academics – with a mandate to carry out country missions to monitor deprivations of liberty. The UN Sub-Committee on the Prevention of Torture, as it is called, is also tasked to work cooperatively with states and NPMs to provide advice and training on the prevention of ill-treatment in places of detention.
The whole system is premised on the evidence and experience that external scrutiny of places of detention can deter and, where necessary, help to redress torture and other forms of ill treatment. By making places of detention more open, transparent and accountable, it helps to ensure that persons deprived of liberty – whether people with psychiatric illness, prisoners, people with disability or asylum seekers – are treated with basic dignity and respect.
Existing systems for transparency and accountability of places of detention are manifestly inadequate in Australia. In Victoria, for example, the Office of Correctional Services Review is an internal business unit within the Department of Justice. It reports to the Secretary of the Department – the very secretary with responsibility for correctional management – and does not make its reports public. The problem of lack of independence is not confined to corrections. The 36 deaths in psychiatric facilities are being investigated by the Office of the Chief Psychiatrist, an office which, according to its own website "has responsibility under the Mental Health Act for the medical care and welfare of persons receiving treatment or care for a mental illness".
Australia signed the Optional Protocol in May 2009. Since that time, progress on ratification and implementation has been slow, with wrangling between the states and the Commonwealth about who is to foot the modest bill for detention monitoring and oversight. This is despite international evidence as to the very high social and economic costs of failing to prevent and redress ill-treatment. On any estimate, the costs of independent monitoring and oversight are absolutely dwarfed by the $23 million paid by the Commonwealth for the unlawful detention and ill-treatment of immigration detainees over the last decade, costs which could have been largely avoided with a functioning and effective NPM.
Despite its name, there should be nothing optional about Australia's ratification and implementation of the Optional Protocol. The prevention of torture and ill treatment is certainly not regarded as optional or negotiable by like-minded countries. The United Kingdom, for example, ratified the treaty almost eight years ago, while New Zealand has no less than five independent, publicly accountable bodies mandated to visit and report on places of detention.
The Commonwealth, state and territory governments should all prioritise and expedite ratification and implementation of the Optional Protocol to the Convention against Torture. Any further delay in the prevention of ill-treatment has intolerable social and economic costs and is simply not an option.
Phil Lynch is Executive Director of the Human Rights Law Centre. You can follow the HRLC on Twitter @rightsagenda.
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