Category: CLArion

CLArion April 2025: Candidates – Tell us where you stand on US chaos

Never have Australians voted amid such international uncertainty and chaos. Because of that, the political parties and all local candidates must clearly state the approach they will take to US President Donald Trump’s current and future assaults on stable and sensible global affairs. It’s time to recalibrate our own fundamental values in dealings with the world: to be able do that properly, first we must confirm our basic internal standards, rights and liberties that comprise Australia’s ethical infrastructure.

Other highlights in this issue include:

  • Parliamentary Education Office needs contractor to educate students?
  • Election 2025: Beware the Law ’n’ Order campaigning, based on fearmongering
  • SPECIAL REPORT: Human Righrs and the Australian Parliament
  • 87% support Human Rights Act; only 4% oppose one
  • Judges and inquiries lead to…more judges and inquries
  • Rights ignored, major consultation dismissed, by Qld government
  • NT descends into farce amid secret appointments and contracting
  • Australia should cash in on Scandinavian experience

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CLArion March 2025: Election will test righteousness v justice

The coming federal election result will demonstrate clearly how Australia stands in relation to a world trend towards self righteous indignation benefiting the few contrasted with greater social justice lifting the many. Even global media barons, like Rupert Murdoch, are painting themselves as much-put-upon underdogs, as we report in this issue. 

CLArion FEB 2025: CLA calls on Labor to commit to HR Act

Civil Liberties Australia – in its customary Australia Day letter – has called on Prime Minister Anthony Albanese to commit to a social justice program, including a Human Rights Act for Australia, if he and the Labor Party are re-elected in the coming months. After four years of active campaigning, CLA believes a re-elected Labor govt would have plenty of support from the Greens, Independents, and the ‘teals/etc” to pass such legislation. Meanwhile, recent state election results, coupled with the likely return of the govt in WA, means Australia is tilting strongly towards a nationwide police state mentality.

CLArion Jan 2025: CLA calls on Labor to commit to HR Act

Civil Liberties Australia is calling on the Leader of the Government, Anthony Albanese, to commit his Labor Party to legislating a Human Rights Act for Australia before the end of 2025. “He must commit to doing so during the imminent election campaign, then follow through on the promise if his party is elected as a majority or minority government,” CLA President Dr Kristine Klugman said. “From his first speech in 1996 to now, he has said he is commitment to social justice: now is the time to deliver the fundamental underpinning of human rights legal protections for all Australians.

CLArion December 2024: New bid to ‘overturn’ Bromley in HC

The frustrations with a High Court which got it totally wrong in the Derek Bromley case may be countered by a novel way of securing a ‘different verdict’. Dr Bob Moles explains how fraud might be able to trump criminal law. Elsewhere in this issue, read about the shocking coronial situation exposed in the Senate, judges all over the place…and a federal Human Rights Act campaign about to be refreshed.

CLArion Nov 2024: Laws, kids, judges under scrutiny

Parliament regularly passes laws that infringe Australians’ human rights: here’s a rundown from just one recent report. As we debate whether the Senator or the King transgressed more, experts are saying new conservative governments in the north are ‘taking our kids back to the darker ages’. A judge blames everyone but judges for a low opinion of the legal system, but examples abound of how the quality of the law is much strained, particularly in the south, by judicial shenanigans.