Mr GARRETT (Kingsford Smith) (7.30 p.m.)—I rise in the House to reflect on the attitude and the track record of the Howard government in relation to the issue of human rights and democratic freedoms—rights and freedoms which Australians enjoy and, at the least, ought to expect to be present and protected in a liberal democracy. This is a call to members opposite as well as those on this side who think and care about these issues to consider their involvement in the many contemporary debates concerning human rights that occur in this place and, most critically, the involvement of the first law officer, the Attorney-General.

If we begin at habeas corpus and proceed through the known history of the evolution of democracy and the rule of law, the development of the common law and international law to the enlarged notion of a suite of rights we now take for granted, a citizen might assume that freedom is just another word for the Australian way of life. They would be wrong—whether the matter concerns the unlawful treatment of Australian citizens by DIMIA so comprehensively recorded in the recent Comrie report; the dismantling of an independent tribunal which recognised the collective rights of Australians to join together to seek fair conditions in employment, now under way in the proposed changes to the industrial relations system; or the fate of the Australian David Hicks, who has been stripped of any genuine legal clothing and left without proper legal recourse, effectively in limbo, overseas. It seems that we are the only democratic country to cast a citizen adrift in this way.

If we consider these things, but particularly the fate of those who find themselves at the mercy of a government department whose culture for administering immigration has been described by the words ‘failure’, ‘inexcusable’, ‘catastrophic’, ‘dereliction of duty’, ‘shameful episode’, ‘defying commonsense and decency’ and ‘dehumanised’, we are left with the indelible impression that, for the government, which has responsibility for the protection of political and legal rights, such rights are no longer considered the universal assets of the citizen in this democracy. For this government, they are merely pieces of institutional and historical furniture that can be moved around at will provided you have the power to do so. And the notion of ministerial responsibility for the actions of those who serve under you means absolutely nothing.

At this point it is always necessary to provide a strong caveat to the effect that, notwithstanding the presumed guilt or innocence of any person, no matter how repugnant the activities of a person or group might be, these fundamental principles of our democratic system—principles of equality before the law, the presumption of innocence, the right to a fair trial and so on—need to be vigorously defended. Well, yes, Mr Speaker, and that is the task of members of parliament. Some members here and in the Senate have performed that task. It is the task of lawyers, judges, commentators and others, but it is primarily the task of the first law officer of the Crown, in this case the Attorney-General. It is time to call him to account.

The Attorney-General has played a central role in all the critical matters affecting rights—children in detention, the incarceration of Hicks, the role of DIMIA in relation to the deportation of Vivian Alvarez and the treatment of Cornelia Rau and the framing of antiterrorism legislation. In each of these instances, and in many others, his has not been a voice defending rights. No, his actions have been those of a man willing to see rights prescribed and reduced, the currency devalued, and ultimately the citizen denied.

When the previous Director-General of ASIO was asked whether he was satisfied that he had sufficient rights to do the job, he replied in the affirmative. The Attorney-General did not celebrate this fact. When a former Liberal Prime Minister, Mr Fraser, remarked that proposed antiterrorism legislation is ‘contrary to the rule of law ... to due process ... to the basic rights we have come to understand are central to a free and open society’, there was nothing from the Attorney-General. When the Dean of the Monash University Law Faculty described control orders as eroding the presumption of innocence, we did not hear from the Attorney-General on the need to consider those comments—to consider very carefully the implications of whether we ought or ought not to have legislation that amplified existing restrictions on civil liberties.

It may be that there are compelling reasons to overthrow a number of longstanding legal principles which have stood the test of time and safeguarded our freedoms, but their elected champion in this House has chosen not to fulfil his duties as first law officer and open the issue up for debate and consideration on the grounds of the primary functions these freedoms have in our society. It is clearly time for us to now consider a bill of rights. Even more importantly, it is time for the Attorney-General to stand up for the legal rights and principles that underpin democracy in Australia.