Page 213 - Week 01 - Wednesday, 10 December 2008
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I might now, for the record—no doubt, to your absolute delight—recognise that this move forward had the support of Kerrie Tucker and Deb Foskey in my time in this chamber. It is noteworthy that those opposite opposed it. Yet here they are, speaking on a motion about the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. I could stand here for another 15 minutes and tell you all the things they have done to oppose the movement towards recognising human rights that this government has introduced. I think their record is appalling. Their record for fairness is appalling. Their record of supporting even themselves is appalling. Had it not been for that sort of stuff, Trevor Kaine would not have left and Helen Cross would not have left. Alistair Coe would not have left—yet.
I wait to see what happens. This stuff that you guys have just done yesterday was played out with Helen Cross. Let us see if it repeats itself. In fact, I will put five bucks down now. I know we are not allowed to gamble, Mr Speaker, but I will put five bucks down now and I will take it up. We had better get another chair. I have been in three Assemblies and, in each one, one green bottle has fallen off the wall—I am sorry, Mr Speaker—one brown bottle has fallen off the wall. I reckon I will go out of political life watching the brown bottles fall, one at a time, each Assembly. They have no right to talk about it.
MRS DUNNE (Ginninderra) (3.05): I will not reflect on the unprofessional approach of the Minister for Corrections. It is with a great deal of pleasure that I rise to congratulate Ms Bresnan on this motion today, 10 December, which is Human Rights Day. Today marks its 60th anniversary. There was an event in the reception room at lunchtime which I had hoped to attend, but the constraining hour and a half over the luncheon period and other commitments kept me from it. I hope that it was a success. I understand that the attorney was speaking about some of the developments that he touched on here this morning in relation to the new amendments to the act which will come into effect on 1 January.
The Universal Declaration of Human Rights is an important document. I was listening to a program on the radio on the weekend in which Eleanor Roosevelt referred to it. I am sure I am misquoting her here, but she used words to the effect that she hoped it would become the international Magna Carta for all men. That is a high-flown aspiration, and in many ways this is an aspirational document. You touched upon this yourself this morning, Mr Speaker. It is an aspirational document. It is something that we need to aspire to. It was useful to note, for instance, that when the declaration was passed by the UN, there were a number of abstaining voices, and they were mainly from the communist bloc countries.
I will come back to the communist bloc countries when I come to some of the comments that Mr Corbell made. But, for the most part, this was a declaration of people who had obtained maturity in their democracy, who did not want to go back and repeat the problems that they had lived through in the preceding decades. It was a time when emotions and blatant abuses of human rights were raw in people’s minds.
I think from time to time we actually have to go back and reflect on what motivated these people and to congratulate them on their farsightedness because, even though they were responding to very immediate actions, they created a document that has
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