U2 AOS3 Legal Revision Flashcards
What are human rights?
Human rights are the basic standards and entitlements that exist for all human beings regardless of personal characteristics.
What is an example of a human right?
The right to education
What is the Universal Declaration of Human Rights?
It is a document created by the United Nations in 1948 that outlines the common entitlements that should be afforded to all people across the nation.
Why was the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR) significant?
It was considered the basis of international human rights declaration and is an aspirational document that influenced the actions of other governments.
How does Australia protect human rights?
Through the Australian Constitution.
What is the Australian Constitution?
The Australian Constitution establishes the way Australia operates regarding the composition of the parliament and the powers possessed by each branch.
How does the constitution protect rights?
The constitution protects the 5 express rights, implied rights and the structural protection of rights.
What are express rights and give examples.
Express rights are explicitly stated in the wording of the constitution and can only be changed or removed by changing the wording of the constitution through a referendum. The 5 express rights are:
1. The right to receive ‘just terms’ when property is acquired by Commonwealth.
2. The right to trial by jury for Commonwealth indictable offences
3. The right to interstate trade and commerce.
4. The right to freedom of religion
5. The right to not be discriminated against based on your state of residence.
Describe one express right in the constitution and explain how this protects human rights in Australia.
One express right is the right to freedom of religion which means that all human beings are allowed to practice and believe their own religion without discrimination.
This express right protects human rights as the government can not impose any restrictions based on religious or other belief, allowing everyone the freedom to their religion.
What is one strength and limitation of the constitution protecting express rights?
One strength would be that these rights impose limits on law making as they cannot breach these rights.
One limitation is that it is difficult to add to these rights as a referendum is time consuming and rare to achieve.
What are implied rights?
Implied rights are not explicitly stated in the constitution, however has been interpreted by the High Court to exist.
What is an example of an implied right?
The right to vote
What is the structural protection of rights?
It involves the systems and mechanisms established by the constitution that ensures the governments actions achieve human rights protection.
What are the 2 structures?
Representative Government and Seperation of Powers.
What is the representative government and how does it protect human rights?
The representative government is a system which the members of parliament are elected by the people of a community to represent the needs and views of the people. This protects human rights by ensuring laws adapt to societal changes and stay relevant.
What is the seperation of powers and how does it protect human rights?
The separation of powers is a principle that ensures no abuse of power in the bodies involved with the creation of laws and the administration of justice, by separating the government into 3 branches; legislative, judicial, and executive.
Seperation of powers protects human rights by keeping all the branches seperate therefore members of the legislative branch cannot exercise judicial power and members of the judicial branch cannot exercise legislative powers, while preventing one branch from having too much power and abusing it.
Justify whether the government is able to pass laws which constitutionally invalid.
There are no mechanism that prevents parliament from passing laws that are constitutionally invalid however, if someone with standing took it to court, the law would be found invalid and removed by the judges.
What is the Victorian Charter of Human Rights and Responsibilities (VCHRR)?
It is a piece of Victorian legislation that requires the Victorian Parliament to review bills and determine their compatibility with the rights set out in the charter.
What are the strengths and limitations of VCHRR?
Strengths are that it ensures human rights are openly discussed when new laws are proposed and the mandatory statement of compatibility that ensures all laws need to pass the statement of compatibility, and there is an extensive protection of rights (the 20 rights in the charter).
Limitations are that Victorians cannot sure the Parliament for breaching the charters rights, pre-2006 legislation may not align with the human rights standards and VCHRR only applies to laws within Victoria.
Describe the difference between statute law and common law.
Statute law is law made by the Parliament, while common law is law made by the courts when resolving a dispute with no law that can be applied.
The key difference is that statute law is made by the Parliament, whereas common law is made by the courts.
How are human rights protected by statute law?
Racial discrimination ACT 1975 - states that it in unlawful to refuse a person residential accomodation on the basis of their race, colour, national or ethnic origin.
Equal opportunity ACT - states that an employer must not discriminate against a person based on their gender.
How are human rights protected by common law?
Common law establishes principle regarding how legislation should be interpretated to uphold human rights, judges interpret statutes to clarify legislation and protect human rights, judges establish precedents to guide future human right cases and common law rights can become codified into legislation.
How has Australia protected the rights of young people?
Australia has signed and ratified the United Nations Conventions on the Rights of the Child.
What are the conflicting issues with the rights of young people.
The age of criminal responsibility being 10 and the age which Australians are allowed to vote is 18.
