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Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Social Justice

The End in the Beginning: Re(de)finding Aboriginality: Dodson (1994)

I don't care how hard it is. You build Aboriginality or you get nothing. There's no choice about it. If our Aboriginal people cannot change how it is among themselves, then the Aboriginal people will never climb back out of hell. 1

Category, Speech
Disability Rights

Keynote Address: Pacific Islands Forum Disability Ministers' Meeting (2009)

Imagine a visit to your local market? The noise of trading, the wonderful smells of fresh food, the multitude and variety of colours. It's at ground level, with wide passage ways, and John moves around easily, managing his stall. Rick throws a heavy box of fruit onto his shoulder and, after reading the stall number printed on the box, carries it to that stall. And Elizabeth enters stallholder permit details on her laptop, with an ear-piece in her ear. A society where people with disability are welcomed, and fully included.

Category, Speech
Disability Rights

Presentation to the NSW Subcommittee of the Australian Braille Authority

Have you ever stopped to think about all the things that we take for granted? When you're wandering through the breakfast cereal isle at the supermarket, for example, do you ever wonder whether Uncle Toby really was? If so, was he related to Sara Lee? Were Nana's apple pies originally made by Granny Smith? It's not so much that familiarity breeds contempt as that it lulls us into a state of mind where we no longer feel the need to question or even test our assumptions and presumptions.

Category, Speech
Legal

Climate Change and Human Rights: Issues for Indigenous Peoples

Thank you for the introduction and I thank HREOC for the opportunity to speak here today. Before I commence my discussion, I would also like to acknowledge the traditional owners of the country on which we meet, and pay my respects to their elders, both past and present.

Category, Speech
Rights and Freedoms

"The rights of the child and international human rights law"

This morning I am going to talk to you about unaccompanied child migrants in the wider context of current world trends. In so doing, I have taken full account of the lessons to be learned from the experiences of the victims of British child migration schemes.

Category, Speech
Commission – General

Launch of the Supreme Court Equal Treatment Benchbook

When I first entered the law 'benchbooks' were closely guarded, leather bound books into which judges carefully entered notes as a case progressed - usually I thought adverse comments and exclamation marks about one's arguments or less than flattering remarks about one's principal witness. These books seemed to be some kind of secret code to the outcome of cases and never saw the light of day.

Category, Speech
Commission – General

Address to Tri-State Country Conference, Broken Hill

I also want to make mention of the fact that we are 130kn south west of an area of great significance to the Aboriginal communities of western NSW, which is now called Mutawintji National Park - the first park to be handed back to its Traditional Owners under the NSW National Parks and Wildlife Act in 1998. [1] The caves and overhangs in the park have been transformed into expansive galleries of Aboriginal rock art, and it comes as no surprise that they have formed the backdrop for ceremonies for at least 8,000 years.

Category, Speech
Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Social Justice

Start Stronger, Live Longer, National Aboriginal Health Symposium

I would like to begin by acknowledging the Nyoongar people, the traditional owners of the land we are meeting on today. I pay my respects to their elders past and present. I thank you Kim Collard for your warm welcome.

Category, Speech
Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Social Justice

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Thank you for the opportunity to speak here this morning. I would like to begin by acknowledging the traditional owners, the Turrbal people on whose land we are on today.

Category, Speech
Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Social Justice

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Opening address to the 'Indigenous peoples and racism' Conference A Regional Meeting for the United Nations World Conference Against Racism, Racial Discrimination, Xenophobia and Related Intolerance by Dr William Jonas AM , Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Social Justice Commissioner , Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission, 20 February 2001

Category, Speech
Disability Rights

World Mental Health Day Address

Thank you for the opportunity to speak here today, World Mental Health Day. I am very pleased that World Mental Health Day this year is dedicated to the theme Human Rights and Mental Health. This theme recognises that mental health issues are human rights issues - a view argued strongly and consistently by our Human Rights Commission for many years.

Category, Speech

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