ALHR Newsletters

ALHR's national committee met in Brisbane on 13-14 April to review and plan the organisation's work. A key element informing this was the 2012 members' survey in which people said they wanted more ALHR events they could join and easier ways to interact and get involved in ALHR work. More details from the planning weekend will follow, but here are some key things which 2013 will hold.

ALHR will have a new website. This will be easier to navigate and will have public and 'members only' areas. This will enable us to better target some materials and benefits to ALHR's membership.

There will be more events, at State and Territory levels, for ALHR members. Some of these will focus on particular human rights topics and have guest speakers, as ALHR has always done. However we'll also host some practical and training workshops about using human rights and submission writing. These are aimed at assisting members to have a better understanding and use of human rights in their work, and also if they want to get more involved in ALHR's submission writing and analysis.

At the national level ALHR will work on five key areas in 2013 - many of these in collaboration with other NGOs:

1. Asylum seeker issues (including the relocation of asylum seekers to other countries for 'assessment', the refoulement of asylum seekers, and the treatment within Australia);
   
2. Standards against torture (including the next periodic report to the Committee against Torture due in 2012; and pushing for Australia's ratification of the Optional Protocol to the Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment);
   
3. Optional Protocol to the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights - pushing for Australia's ratification of this;
   
4. Australia's report against the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, which is being progressed in 2013'; and
   
5. Monitoring progress in relation the UN's 2011 Universal Periodic Review of Australia, and also the Commonwealth's National Human Rights Action Plan (this will be mostly done through our ongoing submission and law reform work - referencing back to these recent commitments or requirements wherever relevant)
   

Thanks to everyone who helped out with the planning weekend in Brisbane: the prior preparations in Brisbane and elsewhere, QUT for providing us with a meeting room for the weekend, everyone's eager participation and involvement, and the many members travelling from around the country at substantial personal cost.