The Sydney Morning Herald

Your editorial (“Standing up for liberties”, Herald, April 13) correctly identifies the balancing act that policy makers must engage in. You are right to say that both the Government and Opposition, in Canberra and in NSW, seem uninterested in undertaking this complex but necessary task in relation to terrorism measures and personal liberties. But it is not only a plural liberal democracy that demands that the balance is maintained.

International human rights standards recognise that the rights to liberty and to freedom of movement are subject to restrictions necessary for national security. Those same standards establish safeguards that keep national security measures within reasonable limits.

It is 24 years since Australia ratified the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights and accepted its obligations to protect and to balance human rights. Yet Australia remains the only democratic country in the world not to have passed laws that give effect to these obligations. In any other democracy the proposed anti-terrorism laws would be assessed according to internationally accepted standards, in a process where the trade off between collective safety and individual freedom would have to be addressed, and would be the subject of open and informed debate.

One of the virtues of international human rights standards is that, to a large extent, they transcend political positions. They identify issues that are core to a society that is both safe and free. Until and unless Australia joins the rest of the world in adopting human rights standards as a benchmark for public policy, the values implicit in a plural liberal democracy will remain vulnerable to the politics of the day.

Simon Rice
President
Australian Lawyers for Human Rights

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This page last updated 4th May 2004