The federal government wants to know what kind of human rights protection Australians would like to see enshrined in law.

The federal Attorney General, Robert McClelland, launched a public consultation process on Human Rights Day, December 10 last year, to get a response to the following questions: Which human rights should be protected and promoted? Are these human rights currently sufficiently protected and promoted? How could Australia better protect and promote human rights?

Locally, Karin Ness from the Northern Rivers Community Legal Centre is holding a forum for service providers today (Thursday, April 23) at the Goonellabah Community Centre and plans to hold another for the general public later in May to encourage people to make submissions.

“I believe that numbers will count in terms of whether we get better protection or not,” she said. “I suspect that if there are enough submissions we could get a federal human rights act.”

Karin recently set up a stall at Youth Week events around the region and got about 60 young people to make submissions. She has another project planned to go into four different nursing homes around Lismore to consult with elderly residents and also plans to consult with the refugee community.

Anybody with an interest in human rights (and surely that’s all of us) can find out more about the process at www.humanright
sconsultation.gov.au and can make a submission until June 15. After listening to the views of the Australian people, the consultation committee will report to the government by August 31.