Australian Capital Territory Economic, Social and Cultural Rights Research Project Report
This Report presents the findings and recommendations of a research project established to examine whether the ACT Human Rights Act 2004 (HRA) should be amended to include explicit guarantees of economic, social and cultural rights (ESCR) and, if so, what impact this was likely to have on governance in the ACT. The project was funded under the Australian Research Council Linkage Project Scheme; the academic project partners were the Regulatory Institutions Network (RegNet) in the College of Asia and the Pacific of The Australian National University and the Australian Human Rights Centre, Faculty of Law, The University of New South Wales, while the Partner Organisation was the ACT Department of Justice and Community Safety.
Equal access to social and economic rights in Australia – the troubling case of ParentsNext
ABSTRACT This reflection considers the slow progress towards domestic recognition of social and economic rights in Australian law and the notable gaps that remain. It focuses on the lack of actionable rights to social security and non-discrimination in relation to a government program called ParentsNext. This legal gap leaves some of the most vulnerable members of our community without protection against policies that impinge on their rights to equality of access to income support.
Analysis: The Agenda 2007 Proposals: Evolution or Revolution?
On 10 February 2004 the Commission published its proposal for the financial perspective 2007-2013. A week later it adopted the third report on economic and social cohesion. These two documents form the basis of the so-called ‘Agenda 2007 reforms’. They will be the greatest challenge for the enlarged EU after the intergovernmental conference, since they will determine the financial basis for EU policy-making until the middle of the next decade. The Agenda 2007 proposals certainly hint at courageous reforms, because they place a previously unheard-of emphasis on performance and quality. Under the proposals, structural operations should generate value for money, and the funds should focus on projects which generate added value at a European level. Overall the Commission’s proposals point in the right direction, because they balance, on the one hand, solidarity for the new Member States and weak regions in the old Member States with, on the other hand, investments in future tasks. Moreover, they constitute a paradigm shift. For the first time, the Common Agricultural Policy will not be the dominant expenditure category. Now it is up to the Member States to examine the proposals politically and find a compromise between sometimes very divergent interests. It is to be hoped that, during the debate over expenditure limits and division of funds, national interests do not outweigh European interests.