Category: Australia
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Jonathan Collinson: Disqualifying Dual-National Parliamentarians in Australia: A Problem of Legal Status or of Their True ‘Belonging’ to Australia?
It has been reported that the Deputy Prime Minister of Australia, Barnaby Joyce, has referred himself to the Australian High Court over his eligibility to sit in Australia’s Parliament. It was discovered that Mr Joyce was a dual national of Australia and New Zealand, a fact of which Mr Joyce claims he was entirely ignorant.…
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Narelle Bedford: Public Law, No Disgrace in Australia but Room for Improvements
Writing recently Tom Hickman raised the vital issue that fear of an adverse cost order can prevent potential applicants from seeking judicial review in UK courts with serious consequences for diminishing access to justice. He labelled it “public law’s disgrace” which it undoubtedly is. His calls for reform are necessary and should be supported by…
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Ron Levy and Graeme Orr: To Save Democracy, Reform the Law
The US election just passed has made many people wonder about the merits of democracy. If an election can still be won using the dark rhetorics of earlier, troubled times in Western history, then they may have a point. In fact, ever since there have been democracies, there have been critics of democracy concerned about…
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Luke Beck: The Constitutionality of Australia’s Offshore Detention Regime for Asylum Seekers: Two Very Recent Cases
On a far smaller scale that currently being experienced in Europe, Australia has had an issue with asylum seekers arriving on its shores by boat. The issue is politically contentious and has featured prominently in a number of federal election campaigns. It is Australian policy that asylum seekers who arrive by boat will never be…
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George Williams and Daniel Reynolds: The First Four Years of Australia’s Parliamentary Scrutiny Regime for Human Rights
Australia is an exception when it comes to the legal protection of human rights. It remains the only democracy without a national human rights act or Bill of Rights. This remains the case despite a national consultation recommending in 2009 that Australia enact a law based upon the Human Rights Act 1998 (UK), Human Rights…
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George Williams: An Australian Perspective on the UK Human Rights Act Debate
Editors’ note: This post is based on a presentation titled ‘This Way, That Way, The Other Way? Directions for Human Rights in the UK’ delivered by Prof Williams at the Bingham Centre for the Rule of Law in London on 19 October 2015. The long-running debate over the future of the UK Human Rights Act…
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Paul Kildea: Same-sex marriage – Don’t let the people decide
Australian politics is gradually settling back down again after a tumultuous few weeks in which we saw another first-term Prime Minister deposed in a party room ‘spill’. New Prime Minister, Malcolm Turnbull, has pledged to run a different kind of government to that of his predecessor, Tony Abbott, but it is unclear what this will…
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HRA Watch: Reform, Repeal, Replace? Janet McLean: Giving Effect to International Human Rights Obligations: Possible Alternatives?
Editors’ note: The blog is inviting constitutional lawyers to comment on the UK Government’s proposal to repeal and replace the Human Rights Act. We continue with a post by Janet McLean, Professor of Law and Associate Dean (Research) at the Faculty of Law, University of Auckland. You can read the other contributions in this series here. Posts…
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Judith Bannister: The Last Word on the Public Interest in FOI: Australia and the United Kingdom Compared
Freedom of information (FOI) reform has often been slow in Australia. There was a decade (and a change of government) between Gough Whitlam’s 1972 election promise of freedom of information and the passing of the Commonwealth’s Freedom of Information Act in 1982. There were 15 years between the recommendation of the Australian Law Reform Commission and Administrative Review Council to create…
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Janina Boughey and Greg Weeks: Comment from Australia: Australian Government Scraps Peak Administrative Law Advisory Body
After the problems the Australian Government encountered in passing many of its 2014-15 budget measures through the Senate, Australia’s Prime Minister, Tony Abbott, promised that the 2015-16 budget would be ‘dull and routine’. It is unlikely that most Australian administrative lawyers would consider the abolition of the Administrative Review Council (‘ARC’) — a body of…