Arjay,
It was libertarians who fought and gave you the freedoms you enjoy today. But as usual, you have no use for history and its deeper investigations into the origins of ideas and their correlating events. The off the cuff parroting of a conservative ideological perspective you are trying to now emulate and craft as something you've had for years -- is pathetic -- and so blatantly obvious - its simply embarrassing.
Do yourself a favour and start thinking for yourself mate. We libertarians admire people who understand education to be something that comes from the University of Life, not from a life in a university.

I believe with what the Govt/s are doing nowdays we should cement some BASIC RIGHTS in Legislation, but more importantly seeing how we are having big problems with our health system/hospitals, water supply/dams, electriciaty supply etc etc, we should be looking at a more accountable system of Government which actually does what it is suppossed to be doing and actually listens to the majority of people and most of all does not hide the truth from us taxpayers (or IE: the politicians Bosses). Rather than the current not our/my fault buck passing that Politicians and Governments seem to engage in so frequently nowdays and then tell the taxpayers they will have to pay more for the Politicians/Governments neglect/mistakes.

After all what is so bad about having basic human rights enshrined in Legislation, and most of all open and accountable government!

Mirko’s argument that there is no empirical need for a rights charter is based on survey material which is likely to precisely exclude people who are disadvantaged and marginalised rather than “flourishing”. The enjoyment of rights is easy with privilege, and the establishment of rights standards and mechanisms to give them effect is not directed towards their benefit. It is for the people who need to claim them, often when the right is being denied by an instrument of the state – hence the large number of matters that go to appeal, and with success in both administrative matters such as centrelink payment decisions, child support determinations, or the denial of a service to a veteran.

Conceptually more misleading about Mirko’s argument is that rights in charter/bill have no foundations and will introduce silly so-called rights. The source of local rights charter content typically draws on the standards of principle contained in human rights treaties such as the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR) http://www1.umn.edu/humanrts/instree/b3ccpr.htm . They have a rather significant foundation as they are the product of a global consensus (which in other ways is problematic because they are the products of integovernmental and diplomatic compromise, and as such not as sharply or precisely worded as they should/could be).

By signing up and ratifying the treaties and those standards, governments state their support for them, promise to implement them in their own country and report on how they are going, and be subject to critical evaluation. Australia has done so and thus local legislation that reflects that convention and local context (e.g. Indigenous inequality issues) would be a consistent step. Victoria’s proposed charter will be one State example of doing so – the A.C.T already has a comparable law in place.

A country can also withdraw from endorsing the ICCPR and a call for Australia to do so would be logical consequence of Mirko’s stance if the rights for the proposed charter/bill are so unpalatable for him.

Mirko, I’d be interested to know whether you would support such a step.

Well put Danny 2 cents worth,

The state's fidicuary duty to citizens cannot simply rely on the political interpretations and their adhoc interpretations of social justice.

Fiduciary is a legal term used to describe a relationship between a person who occupies a particular position of trust, power or responsibility with respect to the rights, property or interests of another". But it can also refer to government and governance.

A right to an education, a right to a good health system are without doubt relative to the degree of access individuals may enjoy in the market place but we need to clearly state what the threshold of these rights are for the most vulnerable in our society. A bill of rights would succeed in giving some clarity to this. Having no clarity at all is simply unworkable.

David Hicks and others are prime examples of how unclear their rights as domestic Australians citizens are both here and afar.

A bill of rights would go some way toward amending a loose hanging thread in our contemporary understandings and answers to a question that should continually be asked and that is this *'how can we claim to be a civil society'?*

No Irfan ,we don't need the empower the lawyers more.Just strengthen the independance and authority fo the various Ombudsman and we will have a more cost effective solution.

People in Zimbabwe,China or Iran could do with some rights,but we in Australia have many avenues of recourse including a free media that often takes up a perceived injustice and in turn, puts pressure on an elected Govt.

A Bill of Rights will see more criminals on the street because of some legal technicality and make arrests even more complex for police who have now been already turned into a wet lettuce of a police service by leftist legal system.

The rights of the individual should not surpass the rights of the majority since the situation we have in NSW will only get worse,whereby a total breakdown of law and order will prevail and not even Irfan will be safe in our streets.

a bill of rights would be a disaster for australia and would create a lawyer's picnic and would subject us to an unaccountable dictatorial rule by elitist judges.

we would just be inviting those parasitic vultures to take over australia and once that regeime is in place we can never get rid of it.

the problem with formulating a bill of rights is that you then encourage 'interpretation' from the legal fraternity because that's what lawyers do with legal documents.

you would end up with an all powerful high court that can make policy from the bench......as happens in the usa. it would become actively involved with politics instead of being an impartial observer from the sidelines.

any system that gives increased power to those obnoxious lawyers cant be good.