Radio Democracy Playlist 10/12/08

Human Rights Day

It is 60 years today since the Universal Declaration of Human Rights was signed by Eleanor Roosevelt in the immediate aftermath of World War II.

And while the principles contained in the declaration are certainly noble, it seems sadly, after 60 years, many of these principles are yet to become reality.

The Federal Government has announced a consultation on a possible bill of rights for Australia, to be headed by Father Frank Brennan, who The Australian newspaper describes as a human rights skeptic.

We spoke to Phoebe Knowles, Campaign Coordinator for the Australian Human Rights Group, a coalition of over 60 organisations who would like to see better protection of human rights in this country.

She told us about what form the consultation will take, how people can make submissions and what a bill of rights would mean for Australia. A popular argument is that a bill of rights would prevent policies such as mandatory detention from coming into existence, so we asked Phoebe if this could even be applied to such idiocies as the mandatory internet filter. She thinks a constitutional protection of the right to free speech, association and expression could preempt the existence of the filter (as an example).

My two cents: seeing as 60 years of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights hasn't exactly changed a whole lot, maybe an Australian bill of rights – as much as the UDHR itself – could do with a revision. A lot has changed in the last 60 years, and while the concept of universal human rights should be strived for, perhaps the way we frame the concept needs to be redefined a little, or a lot.

Ahem. Glad I got that off my chest.

Check out the Australian Human Rights Group and the government consultation sites for more information.

Dave was in again with an report on the activities of the 'clean coal' lobby, which are ramping up in anticipation of the government's announcement of its emissions reduction targets next week.

The greenwash is going into overdrive as the dinosaurs refuse to die.

Climate Change minister Penny Wong is currently in Poznan, Poland for a United Nations Climate Change summit and the elephant in the room is Australia’s expected emissions cuts.

Senator Wong is remaining tight-lipped about Australia’s target, but it is anticipated that the Government will announce a figure of 5-15% on Monday.

That’s a 5-15% cut on 2000 levels by 2020.

Like many other environmental groups, the Australian Youth Climate Coalition says this isn’t enough. We spoke to Jess Willis from the AYCC to discuss their ‘Your targets = our future’ campaign.



Music
Door Peep – Burning Spear
Alternative Energy – Combat Wombat
Time to Evolve – Bill Hicks
Paranoid Android – Easy Dub All Stars
Revolution Get Down – The Bellrays
A Public Dis-service Announcement from Shell/... And we thought Nation States Were a Bad Idea – Propagandhi
Eureka – Unkle Ho
Nights in Venice – The Saints

sad face

Well it has been quite some time, so perhaps it's about time...

I just read that Australian refugee policy is being described as 'inhumane' at a UN meeting in Darwin, and that we are going to have to cop environmental refugees fair on the chin.

I would have thought that both of these things were bleedingly obvious, but it is good to see someone vocalise this, given that it has been a non-issue for about 5 years now. Remember the Woomera and Baxter protests? I never went personally, but it made for good indymedia (another dead cause).

So now we have this wonderful new government, which does seem to have a genuine reform agenda, do you think we'll see profound change on these issues? Given that we can't get enough immigrants in on 457s to scrub our West Australian toilets, maybe we'll see another bout of populate or perish. We need Mexicans.

I know it has been said before but it would be fitting that the pacific island nations that are being submerged as a result of our disproportionate carbon stink and belch should have some right to asylum on our big, empty and at the time of writing, still-dry island.

I just went back to the ABC News Online page to link to the article and it's gone. How strange.

Maybe Rudd et al will be able to spin this as a humanitarian move, when really they're adding more human grist to the labour market mill that is our minerals and resources economy. Smart.

we all win in the end