Human Rights in Australian Law: Principles, Practice, and Potential

This book details the impact, and potential impact, of human rights law in the major areas of Australian legal practice, criminal law, administrative law, constitutional law, immigration law, family law, labour law, environmental law, etc. It also includes chapters on researching human rights laws and using them in litigation.

This book chronicles nothing less than a legal revolution. Every chapter records the growing impact of international human rights law on Australian law. ... It demonstrates, in a way that even sceptics cannot ignore, that human rights law is now permeating the nooks and crannies of Australian substantive and procedural law. ...The special value of this book is that it demonstrates this fact in a multitude of practical instances where courts and tribunals, faced with difficult decisions, have looked beyond the hitherto orthodox sources of legal reasoning ... Scarcely a week goes by in a sittings of the High Court of Australia that a case does not involve, in some way or other, an international treaty to which Australia is a party or values that find reflection in the principles of international law. ...The most striking feature of these essays is that they demonstrate beyond argument what a practical subject the study of human rights jurisprudence is now becoming for the judge and lawyer in Australia. The Hon Justice Michael Kirby AC CMG, High Court of Australia, from the Foreword