Commission – General
In the second century AD, Marcus Aurelius, a Roman emperor and Stoic philosopher, thanked one of his brothers for teaching him to value "the conception of the state with one law for all, based upon individual equality and freedom of speech, and of a sovereignty which prizes above all things the liberty of the subject."1
Disability Rights
Disability Discrimination Commissioner Dr Ben Gauntlett's keynote speech at the ACCC International Consumer Protection and Enforcement Network (ICPEN) Conference Dinner in 2023.
Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Social Justice
I would like to begin by acknowledging the traditional owners of the land on which we meet - the Waradjuri nation and the elders present. I also acknowledge our hosts - the Dijrruwang Program at Charles Sturt University , and thank you for inviting me here to address this Gathering.
Disability Rights
I congratulate EOPHEA for organising this discussion. Although, of course, your focus is primarily on employment in the university environment, the conference program is clearly designed to address equal opportunity issues of much more general significance. I have approached my own paper in the same spirit: I hope it will be particularly relevant in your own context as equity practitioners in higher education, but I have taken the opportunity to raise issues of wider relevance.
Disability Rights
Probably most of us here are parents, and we all have dreams for our children. One of my dreams for my 18-year-old son and his girl friend is that they will be able to participate in society in the same way as everyone else.
Disability Rights
I also acknowledge Minister Macklin, Parliamentary Secretary Shorten, and other representatives from Australia's governments, and from disability community organisations.
Disability Rights
Thank you for the opportunity to speak to you today. Whilst planning this speech, I was thinking that it was a long time since the first time that I addressed an NDS (then Acrod) conference. I was asked to give the Kenneth Jenkins memorial oration at the Acrod conference in the early 80s, as the first President of DPI Australia. The speech then was just the type that you would expect from the head of an advocacy organisation finding its feet, to the conference of the service provision organisation. It was brash, assertive and demanding.
Disability Rights
I think it's always good manners to make this acknowledgment. But at a Deaf community event it's also an important reminder that the rate of deafness and hearing impairment in some indigenous communities - over 30% - is even higher than it is throughout the community as a whole.
Disability Rights
In such company my role as Human Rights Commissioner is not to speak as an expert on mental health, but to emphasise the human rights dimensions of the way that we as a nation respond to mental health issues.
Disability Rights
Allow me to begin by acknowledging the traditional owners of the land on which we stand [the Nyoongar people] and pay my respects to their elders both past and present.
Disability Rights
Good morning everyone. I'm actually thinking of developing a theory of corporate management based on reactions to that introduction. For example, when I say good morning to first year university students, they echo "good morning" back to me; when I say good morning to politicians, they remain silent, lest they be misquoted; when I say good morning to management consultants, they write it down; and when I say good morning to web content strategists, they hurry off to turn it into a inaccessible bitmap image.
Disability Rights
I am here today partly because Michelle Castagna was quick off the mark in organising me to come before I had accepted any of the numerous other possibilities for events for the international day.
Disability Rights
I have to admit that two months ago when I took the title " The Disability Discrimination Act and the continuing battle for equal rights for people with a disability" for my paper today I was not attaching great importance to the precise words of that title.
Rights and Freedoms
Many communities use sport as a way to build peer friendships, and enjoy favourite activities in an atmosphere which is safe and supportive. Some years ago- too many sadly- I enjoyed a bi-annual Australian cricket carnival played between teams of people who were blind or had low vision. This is exactly what is happening at these games, and I trust that the links and friendships built through the activities will be positive and long-standing ones, as they were for me.
Rights and Freedoms
The Australian HR protection system is a direct result of the history and development of white settlement in this country. If you compare us with the United States, we Australians had no free settlement, no War of Independence and little or no nation building by private entrepreneurship; rather it was done by way of British government fiat.
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