Some people are still insisting that the government had no power to order people to stay at home, or to stop them travelling around the country. It is believed that the government does have the power to restrict public gatherings - which they DID NOT DO in the case of recent racially motivated street demonstrations - but the lockdown and travel restrictions contravene the Constitution.

While all efforts should now be directed at repairing the economy and the wrecked lives of of all those people who lost their jobs due to actions of the politicians and elites who lied about their own 'in it togetherness', there must be an investigation and a price to pay for anyone who has violated our Constitution - and well before the next emergency occurs.

Ttbn,

Which section of the Constitution do you mean ? 52 ? Restrictions. on trade ?

Joe

According to civil liberties advocates the broad
new powers given to the federal and state
governments to limit the movement of Australians
during the coronavirus pandemic are appropriate
but should remain limited for the duration of the
crisis only.

The appears to be such a thing as the Bio-Security Act.
This empowers the health minister Greg Hunt to issue
"any direction to any person"and "determine any
requirement "necessary to prevent the spread of
coronavirus in Australia, to another country, or to
implement a World Health Organisation recommendation.

The two biggest changes to Australian's rights are -
the states'declarations of emergency and the
declaration of a human bio-security emergency under
the Bio-Security Act.

Apparently the limit on this power is that any direction
to a state or territory official must be in agreement with
the state or territory and the declaration is limited to
3 months, although we're told it can be extended.

Those who fail to comply with the direction can face up to
$63,000 in fines or 5 years in jail.

The power that now resides in the Federal Health Minister
shows the gravity of the situation. Which we're told is akin
to times of war - where extraordinary powers are vested
but with a clear eye to the fact that they should last as
is necessary to deal with the emergency.

This information was obtained from the web for anyone who
wants to Google it.

Dear loudmouth2,

Some of the nutters are flagging Section 117.

"A subject of the Queen, resident in any State, shall not be subject in any other State to any disability or discrimination which would not be equally applicable to him if he were a subject of the Queen resident in such other State."

However our courts have been quite clear "that there can be valid exceptions to these prohibitions, where it is necessary to protect the people of a state from the risk of injury from inbound goods, animals, and people."

People from another state are not prevented from crossing borders because they live in a another state, but because they are crossing from one state to another.

Eg: I'm a resident of Queensland. If I was to go to Victoria then back to Queensland, I would be prevented from crossing back into Queensland. So the border control laws apply exactly the same whether I'm a resident of Queensland or Victoria. That is, they don't discriminate on whether I'm a Queenslander or not.

Anyway, even if this was a problem the solution is trivial. All they have to do is move the exclusion crossing point a meter down the road. Because now you are crossing from one part of a state over a demarcation line within the same state. In other words, you would be allowed to freely cross the state border but not cross internal state zones.

Also, regarding the question of the abuse of civil liberties. We don't have an enacted bill of rights in Australia. There are very few actual rights specifically granted in the federal constitution. Most of our "constitutional rights" have been effectively created by the judicial system. Besides the judicial systems' creation by interpretation of rights, State Governments (in respect of the federal constitution) have vast amounts of power to enact laws as long as it doesn't contravene an international agreement that the federal government has signed.

Dear Ttbn,

«Some people are still insisting that the government had no power to order people to stay at home, or to stop them travelling around the country.»

But they DID order, that's a well-known fact, so how can they say otherwise?

«It is believed that the government does have the power to restrict public gatherings»

Well indeed, in most cases they successfully restricted public gatherings, so obviously they had that power almost completely.

«but the lockdown and travel restrictions contravene the Constitution.»

OK, but why would that be of any concern to the ordinary person in the street?