from civil liberties australia …..

Confected ‘Rights Action Plan’ spins fairy floss …..

The Gillard/Roxon axis has released a National Human Rights Action Plan (NHRAP).

CLA calls it the Confected – or pretend – Rights Action Plan (CRAP).

This is the plan you have when you’ve “built” a human rights “framework” first...which is precisely the wrong way to fashion any robust structure that you want to last. Most strong buildings start with a plan and foundations, then a framework is built.

“This delivers on another of the commitments made in Australia’s Human Rights Framework,” the Attorney-General, Nicola Roxon, trumpets. Her statement furthers the spin of creating airy nothingness and calling it concrete.

Here are the claims:  “The NHRAP outlines what the government will do to improve human rights.  It reaffirms our commitment to existing social policy initiatives and also highlights new priority areas for human rights across Australian governments.  It also articulates, in detail, how the government will implement the commitments we made in 2011 during Australia’s Universal Periodic Review at the United Nations.”

Rubbish. It is a collection of weasel words cobbled together to make it seem that a PR Spin approach to human rights is meaningful.

Whenever this government and its Coalition predecessor has faced a human rights issue of principle, it has sprinted away at the double in the wrong direction. Haneef? Habib? Hicks? Assange? A vote on peace in the Middle East? American interests in Afghanistan and the Asia-Pacific? US troops (including CIA and Joint Special Operations Command hit squads) in Australia? Drone assassinations?

Human rights has been the furthest thing from our governments’ considerations. Australia’s “stance” is to bend over, backwards.

You can bet your bottom dollar that this government will stand clearly and decisively against human rights principles most of the time. It will oppose individual, national and international liberties, in favour of the USA for example, at every opportunity. It will use weasel words to try to convince us, and itself, that it actually believes in liberties and rights, which it doesn’t.

When forced to choose between the rights of an Australian citizen – say Julian Assange – and the wants of other nations, this government will elect to put the rights of non-Australians first.

Did anyone mention a Human Rights Act for Australia? Certainly the media release didn’t. If Roxon, Gillard and Labor (or Shadow AG George Brandis, Tony Abbott and the Coalition) want to demonstrate a real “national human rights action plan”, they would enact a Bill of Rights for Australia. Everything else, including this CRAP, is public relations spin.

The National Human Rights Action Plan is available for download at http://www.ag.gov.au/nhrap. Further information at 02 6141 3086 or [email protected]