Mealy-mouthed Rights

Just before the Opinion pages, about 20 deep in today's Herald Sun, is the story that today Victoria's Charter of Rights goes into effect. The Age didn't even bother to print a story.
(The Herald Sun story isn't even on the Victoria - Breaking News webpage that I can find.)

Why is the story buried so deep in the paper? Because the charter is meaningless. It is an obsequious bit of legislation that does nothing.

Is Change needed in Victoria to better protect human

rights?

Short Answer to Question 1: YES, Victoria needs change to better protect human rights. There is no institutional way now to stop legislation impairing the enjoyment of human rights, nor to require government to repair gaps in the law.

In Victoria, our human rights are not protected well enough.

Even rights that many Victorians take for granted are not protected and available to all. For example the right to freedom of speech is given only limited protection under the common law, and can easily be limited by statute.

The purpose of making a law is to make the protections of the law available to everyone because the government must enforce the law. This is a law that is written to never be enforced.

This is not a Bill of Rights which protects the citizen against malicious or foolish legislation. This law protects no one but the present administration. They can say their administration was the first to pass a charter of rights.

A Charter of Rights is a law or part of the Constitution which protects certain minimum standards common to all humans, called human rights. Human rights can be summarised by the Australian concept of a “fair go” for everyone. A Charter of Rights would protect rights such as the right to: affordable health care, freedom of religion, freedom of speech, a fair trial etc. A Charter of Rights would also have a corresponding responsibility for the government to protect individual rights.

How does it work? (or not work, more correctly..)
From this day forward, every bill set forward in the Victorian Parliament must contain a section where it shows the proposed law is in compliance with the Charter. -- That sounds good, until you find out that this compliance is not required. Parliament can ignore the need for compliance.
The courts would normally enforce a law. This law is not enforced by the courts. That means the average citizen will never enjoy its protection -- There is no element of government to provide such protections.
The citizens cannot go to the courts and demand they enforce the law. The Charter precludes the intervention of the courts.

If a law is shown not to be in compliance with the Charter, what happens?
A report can be sent to Parliament indicating how the law is not in compliance with the Charter. -- That's it. The buck stops ... in thin air.
Parliament is not required to do anything about the report.

But this is a law, can't a citizen sue to be protected under the law? That's how half of Common Law developed, after all. Citizens sue to establish protections.
Of course a citizen can sue for protection under the Charter. All they have to do is go to the Supreme Court. That's a minimum of $100,000 just to appear before the Supreme Court.
The only people who will be able to seek protections under the Charter will be that 1% of Australians who have $100,000 or more to throw around.

Australians still have no guarantees of any rights: speech, association, property, or even life.
Oh, did I mention three other states are thinking of their own Charters? -- Why waste the time and money?

And just when I thought I had found something to like about Rob Hulls, I went and found out the facts behind his support of the Victorian Charter of Rights.
This is a perfect law .. for lawyers. It does nothing for anyone else, unless you count the make-work requirement for more paperwork.