The rule against double jeopardy is not a rule designed to protect the guilty but to protect the innocent.
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It is our position that in order to ensure that Local Councils in the State properly comply with their obligations in this regard, section 5 (4) of the Peaceful Assembly Act ought to be repealed. That way, local authorities in this State would become subject to the same notification and Court review process as the police are.
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QCCL President Michael Cope said today, “The rule against double jeopardy is not a rule designed to protect the guilty but to protect the innocent.”
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The presumption of innocence dictates that the State has no greater obligation to protect its citizens from a person who has been released from custody than it has to protect its citizens from any other member of the public.
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The issue is how do we meet the legitimate aims of this legislation whilst protecting the fundamental liberty rights at stake in the criminal justice process.
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Mr O’Gorman said that the ever present and growing influence of the Queensland Police Union on Queensland politics should be made more accountable by requiring both the Palaszczuk Government and the Crisafulli Opposition to publicise on a publicly available register all dealings with the Police Union in the next 12 months leading up to the next State election.
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The implementation of a digital identity scheme in Australia is a significant step and it is imperative that this is approached in a way that is measured, transparent, comprehensively safeguarded and that the Australian community is fully informed as to all potential consequences of this path;
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The Parliament should also take the opportunity to remedy a big hole in the law in Queensland by providing a right to those who are wrongfully convicted of a criminal offence to claim compensation.
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in our view the Federal Act should contain a provision similar to Commonwealth anti-discrimination legislation which provide that the Act is not intended to exclude or limit the operation of a law of a state (or territory) that furthers the objects of the Act and is capable of operating concurrently with the Human Rights Ac
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The QCCL urges the Queensland Government to implement the recommendations of the Honourable Alan Wilson KC’s Review urgently to ensure that whistleblower protection in Queensland is robust and fit for purpose.
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Why is the government indulging in this reprehensible behaviour? Because it is trying to arrest its way out of the youth crime problem. The Council accepts that there is a youth crime problem. However, this problem cannot be solved by arresting and detainig more children”
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The important connection between a dog and their owner renders the destruction order a decision that should be a last resort and made with careful consideration. Destruction orders infringe upon the rights of the dog and the dog owner. However, the threat the dog poses to the community and the careful consideration that occurs for destruction orders renders such a decision appropriate and necessary to uphold community safety in the relevant circumstances.
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“The inability of government to act as arbiter in its own cause means that freedom of speech includes the right to make false claims about social and political matters. In order to sustain uninhibited political discourse, the state cannot prevent resort to exaggeration or offence or even to false statements”, says Mr Cope
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The government's role as an intellectual arbiter of the truth in social and political debate must be constricted, if not completely denied. This is based on a deep skepticism about the good faith of those controlling the government. That skepticism flows from the fact that decisions about what is true or false, when made by those in power, are bound up with political perspectives of those in power. In that regard the government is not impartial when it comes to contested disputes about the facts underlying political life. This is not meant to be some conspiracy theory. It derives from the fact that in the words of Lord Acton “All power tends to corrupt.”
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In our view, Australia should require any development or application of artificial intelligence to an authorisation and licensing process that primarily focuses on the human rights implication(s) and we submit that this approach ought to be consistently applied to State use of these computational processes as well as any private development or application
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Mr O’Gorman said there is clearly a problem with a cohort of juveniles committing car thefts and violent crime but attacking Judges and Magistrates who cannot defend themselves publicly is a cheap and easy political stunt.
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Currently, Australia is the last western democratic country to refrain from explicitly protecting their human rights in legislation, which has subsequent implications for the protection of human rights for Australian citizens
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This legislation was introduced in 2004 at the peak of concerns about terrorism. Since then, we have learned that the law inappropriately prioritizes the secrecy of national security information over the administration of justice
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The Folbigg Pardon highlights the necessity to establish a national Criminal Cases Review Commission in Australia.
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