Human rights in Australia

rdf:langString Human rights in Australia

rdf:langString Human rights in Australia have largely been developed by the democratically-elected Australian Parliament through laws in specific contexts (rather than a stand-alone, abstract bill of rights) and safeguarded by such institutions as the independent judiciary and the High Court, which implement common law, the Australian Constitution, and various other laws of Australia and its states and territories. Australia also has an independent statutory human rights body, the Australian Human Rights Commission, which investigates and conciliates complaints, and more generally promotes human rights through education, discussion and reporting. Universal voting rights and rights to freedom of association, freedom of, and from, religion and freedom from discrimination are protected in Australia. The Australian colonies were among the first political entities in the world to grant universal manhood suffrage (1850s) and female suffrage (1890s). Contemporary Australia is a liberal democracy and heir to a large post-World War II multicultural program of immigration in which forms of racial discrimination have been prohibited. As a founding member of the United Nations, Australia assisted in the drafting of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and it is signatory to various other international treaties on the subject of human rights. Australia is the only democratic country in the world without a national bill of rights of some kind. Racism in Australia traces both historical and contemporary racist community attitudes, as well as political non-compliance and alleged governmental negligence on United Nations human rights standard and incidents in Australia. An ongoing human rights issue in Australia is the legacy of mistreatment of Indigenous Australians, who are disproportionately of disadvantaged socioeconomic standing, have shorter life spans, and make up a disproportionately high number of imprisoned persons, thus receiving disproportionately high levels of social welfare payment as well as preferential employment and tertiary educational placement in state sectors. In 2016–17, the estimated direct expenditure per person was $44,886 for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Australians, which was around twice the rate for non-Indigenous Australians ($22 356).