Throughout December 2012 and January 2013 Right Now will publish a number of articles around the theme of asylum seekers. This time around we’re taking a more creative turn – with the majority in December being short stories and poems. To get you ready, here’s a bit of a retrospective … Over the past year-and-a-half, Right […]
By Jess Kapuscinski Evans. I’ve been involved in the arts since I was a child, performing in teenage choirs and theatre groups just like many other kids my age. Unlike everyone else, I use a wheelchair full-time and need assistance with most tasks of so-called daily living. I have since gone on to have a […]
By James Petty. The question of human rights in relation to coercive treatment for substance use is, unsurprisingly, complicated. The concept of “addiction” exists within a complex web of legal categories, medical science, social values and cultural practices, all of which work to colour the way we view these issues. In 2010 the Victorian parliament […]
By Holly Kendall. Australia has just spent at least 24 million dollars to win a seat on the United Nations Security Council. Right Now investigates how Australia can use its seat to advance human rights in Australia. The Security Council was formed in 1945 under the United Nations Charter with the “primary responsibility for the […]
By Hsin-Yi Lo “Children everywhere have: the right to survival; to develop to the fullest; to protection from harmful influences, abuse and exploitation; and to participate fully in family, cultural and social life. The four core principles of the Convention are non-discrimination; devotion to the best interests of the child; the right to life, survival […]
Right Now’s John Alizzi spoke with Monique Hardinge and Simone King, students at Melbourne Law School who have recently taken part in the credit bearing ‘Street Law’ initiative. Right Now: It would be great if you could start by explaining a little bit about ‘Street Law’. [Monique Hardinge]: Street Law is a subject that involves students […]
Reviews by Sonia Nair and Jessica Szwarcbord. Multiculturalism and euthanasia are two hotly debated topics, and the subjects of our two reviews this week – Tim Soutphommasane’s book Don’t Go Back To Where You Came From, and the recent, fiery Intelligence Squared Debate on the question of euthanasia. Book: Do’t Go Back To Where You Came […]
By Shae Courtney. Whilst it is true that More Economically Developed Countries (MEDCs), such as Australia, enjoy on balance a standard of living that is the envy of Less Economically Developed Countries (LEDCs), this standard can often mask the internal problems in developed nations. A recent study, conducted by The University of New South Wales […]
By Ellena Savage. A version of this article previously appeared on the Tharunka website, and was the winner of Tharunka Non-Fiction Writing Competition. It is May, 2009. A cold, clear night; frost will set over the tips of lawns before dawn. I wait at a bar for my new boyfriend, Ishmail, an attractive Eritrean-Australian I met though […]
By Karen Akehurst. PART II The basis of criminal law is intent and this is where the law often betrays people with intellectual disability. It was our common experience to find that a person had either been deliberately set up to commit an offence by someone else, or to find that they were indeed guilty […]
By Karen Akehurst PART I Very few people develop greater insight into the machinations of the Australian criminal justice system than the invisible support worker. My experience as Co-ordinator for a specialist legal support service for people with intellectual disabilities in the NSW criminal justice system was like watching a real life game of snakes […]
By Dr Peter Wigg. I have recently returned to Melbourne after fifteen months on a reconstructive surgery program for victims of armed conflict in the Middle East. Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF), for whom I worked, has hired hospital and accommodation space in Amman in Jordan, and brings patients there on short-term visas from Iraq, Yemen, […]
