Solitary confinement must not be used as a response to COVID-19
The Human Rights Law Centre has made a submission to the Royal Commission into Violence, Abuse, Neglect and Exploitation of People with Disability raising concerns about the use of harmful practices like solitary confinement on people living with disability in prisons. Solitary confinement is a fundamentally cruel practice that is known to inflict long term and irreversible harm, with international human rights law prohibiting the use of solitary confinement on people with disability when their condition would be exacerbated by such measures.
The submission calls for the practice of solitary confinement of people in prisons to be prohibited. It also highlights that the use of solitary confinement as a primary means to prevent the spread of COVID-19 in prisons is inappropriate especially when safer alternatives, like reducing the number of people detained in prisons, exist.
Read the Human Rights Law Centre’s submission to the to the Royal Commission here.
Submission to 2025-26 Federal Budget consultation
The Human Rights Law Centre has put forward recommendations to the 2025-26 federal budget submissions across a range of issues, including campaigning for an Australian Human Rights Act, migration justice, prisoners’ rights, whistleblower protection and modern slavery.
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Submission to Surveillance Legislation Amendment (Identify and Disrupt) Act 2021 review
The Human Rights Law Centre is calling for stronger safeguards for the right to privacy and warned that these powers enable the AFP and ACIC to undertake significant invasions of privacy, encroach on the right to privacy, and threaten to have a chilling effect on the work of journalists and their sources.
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Submission to Inquiry into antisemitism at Australian universities
In a submission to the Parliamentary Joint Committee on Human Rights’ inquiry into antisemitism on Australian university campuses, the Human Rights Law Centre has called for reforms that uphold Australia's commitment to international human rights standards, fostering a society that respects equality, freedom, and justice for all.
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Acknowledgement of Country
The Human Rights Law Centre acknowledges the Traditional Owners of the lands across Australia, including the lands of the Wurundjeri, Boon Wurrung, Gadigal, Ngunnawal, Cammeraygal, Darug, Wadawurrung, Turrbal and Jagera people where we work from.
We pay our respect to Elders past and present. This land always was, and always will be Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander land. Sovereignty has never been ceded.
WARNING: This site contains images or names of people who have passed away.