Tuesday, 20 September 2022

Monitoring of Places of Detention by the United Nations Subcommittee on Prevention of Torture (OPCAT) Bill 2022

Second reading

Debate resumed on motion of Ms SHING:

That the bill be now read a second time.

Dr BACH (Eastern Metropolitan) (14:31): It is good to rise to make a contribution on the Monitoring of Places of Detention by the United Nations Subcommittee on Prevention of Torture (OPCAT) Bill 2022, which is a strange little bill and one that on this side of the house we do not oppose. Back in 2017 the Australian government, the then coalition government, signed an optional protocol, the United Nations Optional Protocol to the Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment—this is known as OPCAT for short. That protocol has now been signed by a range of nations, but not others. I checked the website of the United Nations a little earlier on, and sure enough the membership is quite broad. The website says it is:

… composed of 25 independent and impartial members drawn from countries which are parties to the Protocol. Members serve in their personal capacity and are drawn from a variety of different backgrounds relevant to its work, including lawyers, medical professionals and detention and inspection experts. Members do not work for any Government and do not receive any instructions from state authorities.

I had a look at the nations that some of these representatives come from, and again it is a diverse and eclectic mix. They include Lebanon, Tunisia, Senegal, France—and to be fair to him, the French President has in fact been saying a whole series of quite sensible things recently, including about the Queen—Morocco, the Maldives, Germany, Panama, Norway, Peru, Uruguay, Costa Rica, Poland, Spain, Argentina and Denmark. So it is an interesting mix for an interesting committee. It is worth noting, as it was noted in the other place, that some of the members on this committee represent countries that do not themselves have the best human rights record—and that is putting things mildly. But nonetheless here is my perspective: any port in a storm.

In the other place Mr O’Brien in particular in his contribution spoke about some of the egregious abuses of human rights that we have seen in Victoria over recent months and years, and in particular he referred to the hard lockdown of 300 public housing commission residents who were detained in their homes and then some of the commentary of the Ombudsman and other independent umpires here in Victoria about that. This bill is crafted in such a way as to not allow any examination of those issues, but there are other issues here in Victoria that this interesting committee could look into if it so chooses to do. In particular I am referring to some of the appalling and ongoing human rights abuses in Victoria’s youth justice facilities. These are well known and, predicting some of the commentary from others opposite, have nothing to do with COVID, Scott Morrison or Jeff Kennett.

In 2017 and then in 2019 the independent children’s commissioner and the Ombudsman wrote scathing reports highlighting the systemic use of solitary confinement in Victoria’s youth prisons, at both Parkville and Malmsbury, and they highlighted the fact that the government’s use of solitary confinement is against the law. It is against our international obligations as well and causes so much harm to the vulnerable young people who find themselves in our youth prisons. The children’s commissioner more recently did a fantastic report called Our Youth, Our Way—fantastic because of the spotlight it shone on a really serious issue. It was troubling, nonetheless. What she said is that so often we see the most vulnerable and traumatised young people in our state move from our child protection system, and in particular residential units, institutions in the community, into the youth justice system, where they are further traumatised and brutalised and then, when they are released—because every single young person in our youth justice facilities is coming out—because of the mistreatment they received at the hands of the state, well, surprise, surprise, huge numbers reoffend.

The government’s own statistics say that over 60 per cent of young people, upon release from Malmsbury and Parkville youth justice centres, reoffend. But then there is the dark figure. Scholars of these things talk about the dark figure because of course so much crime occurs in the community that is never detected, and so based on a conservative estimate it is more like 80 per cent of the young people who are detained by this government, systemically subjected to solitary confinement in breach of their human rights, then reoffend. We should care deeply for the young people that this government fails in child protection and youth justice. Even if you do not, even if your sole lens is one of community safety, you should want a spotlight to be shone upon the appalling practices of the Andrews Labor government in youth justice because they lead to more crime in the community.

Historically I have been no great fan of the United Nations. In particular the ongoing anti-Israel sentiment that so often emanates from the United Nations is something that is deeply distasteful to me, but, as I say, any port in a storm. It has not been enough for this government that the children’s commissioner has condemned them for their humans right abuses of vulnerable young people in youth justice. It has not been enough for the Andrews Labor government that the Ombudsman has condemned them for their human rights abuses of vulnerable young people in youth justice. Both pre COVID. COVID has nothing to do with the systemic use of arbitrary solitary confinement in youth justice, which many legal experts call torture. So I have written to this committee. I have written to the chair of this committee urging the committee to inspect Victoria’s two youth justice facilities and once again shine a spotlight on the human rights abuses of the Andrews Labor government.

This is an odd bill. It is an odd thing we are doing today. I would have thought that the minister could deal with any administrative matters regarding this committee themselves. However, here we are. Fine. On this side of the house we will not oppose the bill. Then again, I hope that when this committee come here in some weeks, between 16 and 27 October, I am advised that they look carefully at what is happening in our youth justice facilities.

Mr FINN (Western Metropolitan) (14:39): Running the risk of getting into a demarcation dispute with Mr Quilty, I will be brief. I wish to make a very clear point on this bill, the Monitoring of Places of Detention by the United Nations Subcommittee on Prevention of Torture (OPCAT) Bill 2022. I think the United Nations is the most corrupt organisation on the face of the earth. I wish Australia was not involved with the United Nations. I wish Australia was leading the way, in fact, in leading free nations out of the UN. The United Nations is an organisation that is run by tinpot despots and extremist lunatics, and for the life of me I do not know why we would be bending over—or bending over backwards, should I say; or maybe I was right the first time—to facilitate this sort of activity by the UN.

It is interesting to note that in the overview of this bill it states that to enable the subcommittee to perform its inspections independently and in full this bill requires that the responsible minister and a detaining authority must permit the subcommittee access to and unrestricted access within a place of detention. Just giving the UN carte blanche to walk in and do whatever it likes is not something that I am at all comfortable with, given its record on a whole range of issues. I am not happy with that at all.

It also says that we need to give access to all relevant information, including personal and health information. Now, I ask you: is anybody, after what has happened in this state over the last 2½ or three years, going to trust this government with anybody’s health records or indeed personal or health information? Is anybody going to trust the Andrews government to do that? I certainly would not, and I certainly would not trust the UN if indeed they got that sort of information. In fact I would regard this legislation as a startling condemnation of the Andrews government. What this is saying is that the Andrews government has totally failed to protect the human rights of a good number of people. What this legislation is saying is that the Andrews government has failed to prevent people from being tortured and to prevent people from being wrongfully in detention. We know that is true; we have seen that for the last 2½ years, when Daniel Andrews on a daily basis would get up, wearing his North Face jacket or whatever it might be, to tell us that we were locked up for another day. First of all it would be a week. Then it would be two weeks, then it would be a month and then it would be six months. We did not quite know when we were coming out of it.

If the UN was going to come in and make a declaration that Daniel Andrews had violated the rights of Victorians by locking us in our homes, by refusing to allow us into the streets after a certain hour, then I might think about it. But we know damn well that is not going to happen. We know damn well that the UN and the Premier are on a similar wavelength, and that is not something that I am happy about. That is not something that I can or will support. As I say, I regard the UN as an abomination. I think it is an organisation that is well past its time. I was quite excited when AUKUS came into being—was it earlier this year or last year? We had the United States, Australia and the UK forming a defence pact. I thought that might be the start of an international organisation which would promote freedom throughout the world. I still hope that that might be the case, because the UN certainly will not do that. The UN does not do that, and I would not trust the UN to do anything in Australia. I certainly do not want them roaming the streets telling us what we should and should not do.

If we cannot do that ourselves, if this government is not capable of doing that, they should get the hell out of the place. If the Premier and the ministers cannot do what this legislation is suggesting somebody else can do, then the government should resign. The government should just get out because I think it is just disgraceful that the government would abrogate its responsibilities in this way. Indeed it is in effect telling Victorians that they have failed. That is what they are saying. They are saying to Victorians that, ‘We have failed and we are going to hand over our responsibilities to a foreign body’. That is what they are saying to Victorians. I reckon Victorians are saying to Dan Andrews, ‘If you want to hand your responsibilities to another body—to a foreign body, to the United Nations—Premier, you can go to hell’. Premier, we do not accept that. We are Victorians. This is a sovereign state. We do not need people from a foreign organisation coming in here telling us how we should run things. That is intolerable. That is something I will not accept, and I will be voting very, very strongly against this legislation.

Dr KIEU (South Eastern Metropolitan) (14:46): I rise to speak to the Monitoring of Places of Detention by the United Nations Subcommittee on Prevention of Torture (OPCAT) Bill 2022. At the outset, the United Nations is not a perfect organisation, and there is a lot of criticism about that.

Mr Finn interjected.

Dr KIEU: Let me finish, Mr Finn. But I want to put on record that without the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees I would not be where I am today. That is my gratitude as a former refugee.

This bill is a technical bill but very important and necessary because human rights are universal for everyone, even for those who are deprived of liberty because of law enforcement, because of certain restrictions in emergencies and other incidents. Mr Finn and also the opposition have spoken about the many criticisms of and sentiments about the United Nations, but I would like to remind the house that it was the former federal government of the same party as the opposition who in 2017 ratified the Optional Protocol to the Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment, also known as OPCAT. OPCAT seeks to assist nations to meet their obligations under the convention and protect people in detention against torture and mistreatment through a regime of regular, independent, prevention-focused inspections.

Under the ratification formalised by the former federal government, the obligations on Australian governments are to a two-part inspection system: one, enabling periodic visits by the UN subcommittee on prevention of torture, and two, establishing, designating or maintaining a domestic national preventative mechanism, also known as the NPM, to coordinate and conduct visits to places of detention and monitor the treatment of persons in detention. This was ratified. The preamble of OPCAT explicitly recognises the link between proactive inspection of places of detention and improving the situation of those detained. Our state government supports the ratification, and the UN has recently announced that the subcommittee will visit Australia sometime between 16 and 27 October, but the final dates have not been confirmed yet.

This bill defines the places of detention in Victoria which the committee can inspect. Also the bill enables access to places of detention and people detained there, and the bill also authorises detaining authorities to provide the subcommittee with access to relevant information to inform their inspections. So far the places of detention that are defined include prisons, youth justice facilities, secure care facilities, police and court cells, designated mental health service areas, parts of residential facilities, residential service accommodation, specialist disability accommodation, quarantine facilities and also the vehicles that transport detainees. Even the private contractors who engage and operate in places of detention, such as privately operated prisons, are also required to provide access and information to UN visitors because the bill also covers, by definition, the detaining authorities.

The bill ensures that the UN can speak to detainees and access relevant information to evaluate measures to strengthen protection for detainees. This includes unrestricted access to all information on the treatment of detainees and detention conditions and places of detention, but we do have safeguards to protect detainees’ right to privacy. The bill also stipulates that access may be denied to the committee due to major emergencies as well as that visits may be temporarily paused if it is required to maintain function of the detention facility. Our government supports the principles of OPCAT, but we note that we already have a robust oversight regime that has the legislative, administrative and judicial measures necessary for protecting persons deprived of liberty.

Increased accountability in places of detention will help to safeguard the integrity and transparency of our system. There are programs in Victoria that currently have legislative mandates to conduct regular monitoring visits to places of detention, namely the independent prison visitor program and also the Office of the Public Advocate’s community visitors program. The Victorian Ombudsman and the Commission for Children and Young People also conduct semiregular monitoring visits to prisons and youth justice centres. Victoria runs three voluntary independent visitor programs that conduct regular monitoring visits to places of detention as well.

The findings from those independent visitor programs inform monitoring and investigation by oversight agencies. We are confident that these mechanisms provide sufficient oversight to identify issues relating to places of detention. However, we do welcome opportunities for improvement and further transparency. The implementation of OPCAT in Victoria will provide a specific, formalised, transparent monitoring program of places of detention.

To summarise, Australia’s obligations under OPCAT conflict with and could create uncertainty about Victoria’s existing laws, which detaining authorities must comply with. This bill hence addresses this issue by establishing a clear legislative framework for inspection visits and provides clarity for the UN subcommittee and the operators of places of detention. Currently Victoria’s facilities are governed by a series of legislation that would otherwise be complex to navigate. This legislation is necessary because without it, it would be difficult for the UN subcommittee to access places of detention in a consistent way as well as speak to detainees. There would also be uncertainty for administrators of places of detention about their applications regarding providing information and access. I therefore commend the bill to the house.

Ms PATTEN (Northern Metropolitan) (14:55): I rise to speak on this bill. Despite Mr Finn’s assertions that this is some giant conspiracy for some amorphous, foreign force to take us over and take the information out of our brains and do some other conspiratorial things, this is actually a very sensible piece of legislation. It is a very sensible treaty that we signed five years ago as a country, and it has been progressively rolled out around the world and certainly around Australia. The monitoring of places of detention, Mr Finn—places of detention, the places where Mr Finn would like to see everyone locked up forever. I have never heard Mr Finn defend the rights of people in prison before. But new things happen in here all the time.

This is the monitoring of places of detention by the United Nations subcommittee on the prevention of torture—the prevention of torture. This is important. This is legislation that, as I say, has been in the process of being implemented for a number of years. I do not think we are going to get it perfect, because this is looking at how we introduce the monitoring of places of detention, how we work out how we do that monitoring and how we enable the United Nations subcommittee on the prevention of torture to access our places of detention. This is it—it is places of detention. It is our prisons, it is our mental health secure care, it is our youth detention. By way of hoping that we do not go into too much committee on this, I do have a question around whether this legislation would also enable that subcommittee to access prison cells, which would also be places of detention under the definition of this act. But I am not certain, from reading the bill or the second reading, whether police cells would come under this domestic national preventative mechanism.

This is a treaty and a piece of legislation that was much talked about during the inquiry into the criminal justice system. That inquiry, which many of you took part in, received submissions from hundreds of organisations around our state and around our country. It has presented over 100 recommendations. It runs to two volumes. It is a substantive piece of work. Sadly the government is due to respond to it by 24 September at the latest, and I am afraid today is the 19th and tomorrow the 20th, so I would hope that the government may have actually started work on that and might be able to provide this house with a response to that report tomorrow. Unfortunately I do not hold my breath because even substantive reports like the inquiry into homelessness and the inquiry into the use of cannabis have remained unanswered by the government.

Again I refer back to Mr Finn’s concerns about people getting our secret information. This is actually also about protecting the privacy of those in detention, and this legislation sets out some very good protective parameters to protect the privacy of detained people. As it says in the second-reading speech, it will ‘ensure detained or other persons who provide information to the Subcommittee are protected’. Not only is their privacy protected, but they are protected from reprisal. Certainly in the inquiries that I have been involved in, when we have had the opportunity to visit juvenile justice detention centres and when we have had the opportunity to visit prisons both in Melbourne and regionally, there is that fear of reprisal. People are fearful of making complaints and speaking up for fear that that will come back and bite them. Anecdotal experience would say that that actually does happen, so this is very welcomed.

We heard from numerous organisations in Victoria that gave evidence to the criminal justice inquiry that the Optional Protocol to the Convention against Torture and other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment was going to provide some of the answers to questions around the unnecessary use of restraints and the use of solitary confinement in unnecessary circumstances. In part of what we were hearing and in some of the issues that were raised—even in the inquiry into the impact of parental incarceration on children—we were hearing about circumstances where mothers were being shackled during childbirth if they were operating out of a prison. This is just something that a modern society like Victoria would not countenance. It needs to be exposed if it is occurring, and it needs to stop happening. Mothers were being shackled and handcuffed when they were taken to the doctor for neonatal care of their babies and kept in handcuffs until the doctor required that those handcuffs be removed. This is the type of activity where OPCAT and this legislation and the monitoring of these places will provide the much-needed sunlight.

There was much concern during that inquiry around the secrecy around private prisons, and we know that we have privatised many of our prisons in Victoria. They are multibillion-dollar industries. I myself have been caught when asking questions around the operation of these prisons and the organisations that run them. I have been caught by ministers telling me that that is commercial in confidence. That will not be the case under this legislation. This legislation will ensure that there is a level of transparency in prison conditions, and it will address some of the problematic practices that we heard about during our inquiry. Again, it is an inquiry that the government has not responded to, but I would encourage them, even if they do not get a chance today, to tomorrow agree to just some of the recommendations. I would look at, in line with the spirit of this legislation, recommendation 82, which calls on the Victorian government to review the use of solitary confinement, physical restraints and strip-searching in Victorian prisons with a view to introduce policy to regulate the use of these practices. Let us not leave it to the UN to tell us what to. We know that this is wrong. We know that when we are strip-searching women in the Dame Phyllis Frost prison—over 90 per cent them, in fact almost all of them, have got experiences of trauma and experiences of sexual violence and family violence—we are further traumatising them through the practices of that prison, and that must end. This legislation will go some way to shining a light on that, but I think there are things that we can do without having to wait for the UN subcommittee to look at this.

The Fitzroy Legal Service, in my region, also concurred with this, saying that ‘OPCAT alone isn’t enough’. We know the importance of organisations like our community legal centres in shining a light. We are awaiting with trepidation the coroner’s report on Ms Veronica Nelson, an Aboriginal woman who died in custody under extraordinary conditions. It was an absolute tragedy. It showed everything that is wrong with some of our bail laws, but it also showed what was wrong with the health services that are provided in our prisons. We are now—and my heart pounds as I say this—having a coronial inquest into a baby that died in a prison, and I would say that that baby would not have died if that baby had the same health services that you and I have outside of prison. This is one of the reasons why OPCAT is so important—to ensure that transparency is there and to ensure that practices where health services are denied are not allowed to happen in our prisons and in our detention centres in Victoria.

Jesuit Social Services are also calling for the urgent implementation of OPCAT. They cautioned that implementing OPCAT, as this bill will do, cannot address all the issues in the criminal justice system and advocated for change in other areas—more transformative change. Now, I am harping on this, but I would refer the government to the committee’s inquiry into the criminal justice system, where we made numerous recommendations and findings in this area.

We need to look at how we keep people out of prison and not continue to expand our prisons and build new ones. I despair when I see Cherry Creek being built right next to an adult prison. Is that the message that we are sending young people who are some of our most disadvantaged children in our community? The message we are sending them is, you know, ‘Your next stop is next door’. This is what we need to change. We heard this very loudly and clearly from the Victorian Aboriginal Legal Service, the Aboriginal Justice Caucus and many of the other Aboriginal community controlled organisations, and in particular the Victorian Aboriginal Community Controlled Health Organisation, who all gave evidence to say that what we are doing now is inadequate. What they also stressed, and I hope and would like to be optimistic and have confidence, is that in the rollout of this as we develop the framework for monitoring places of detention by the subcommittee that we will ensure that that subcommittee understands the cultural significance, understands that they need to do this in a culturally appropriate way that is safe for Aboriginal people. Because we know we are still locking up more Aboriginal people than anyone else in our community per capita. We are still seeing deaths in custody of Aboriginal people in our prisons in Victoria.

My heart goes out to the family and friends of people like Veronica Nelson. My heart goes out to the family and friends of all people who have died in custody, but in particular the families and friends of the Aboriginal people who have died in our custody. This is why, while OPCAT is one measure, and it is a significant measure and an important measure that we take, we need to wholeheartedly consider how we detain people, why we detain people and how we can improve our criminal justice system.

Now, I note that there was about half a million dollars put forward for the funding of OPCAT in the budget. We know that that will not be enough. I understand that the minister is in communication with the federal government around providing significantly more funding for this. I hope that that is forthcoming because we want this to work, but it will not work if it is not properly funded. We want to see that OPCAT operates alongside the Ombudsman and operates alongside IBAC so, I guess, that we can have faith that our prison structures are doing what they are supposed to do, and that is ensuring that while protecting the community we are also rehabilitating people in prison and that we are not unnecessarily detaining people, which I would have to say we are doing right now, when the majority of women in our prisons are there on remand—they are unsentenced.

So I welcome this legislation, but I do urge the government and implore the government to consider the report of the Legal and Social Issues Committee and the very hard work that so many organisations, non-government organisations, put into that report—the number of people with lived experience who talked about their life in detention, talked about the experiences of that period of detention and talked about what we could do better. OPCAT is certainly part of that toolbox of improving our system, but it is not the silver bullet. We can do more, and that will be around bail reform, that will be around parole reform and that will be around drug law reform. All of these areas have to walk alongside OPCAT and the oversight that this legislation will bring to our detention centres. So while I welcome this legislation, I implore the government to do more.

Ms WATT (Northern Metropolitan) (15:13): I rise to speak on the Monitoring of Places of Detention by the United Nations Subcommittee on Prevention of Torture (OPCAT) Bill 2022, and in doing so I am pleased to note that the Victorian government supports the principles of the Optional Protocol to the Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment. The OPCAT bill seeks to facilitate access by the UNSPT, or the subcommittee on the prevention of torture, to Victoria’s places of detention. This includes youth justice facilities, secure care facilities, police cells, court cells, designated mental health service areas, relevant parts of residential treatment facilities, residential service accommodation, specialist disability accommodation and quarantine facilities. I would like to clarify in these remarks that the UNSPT does not intend, nor will it be permitted, to enter private residences or places where a person is not detained by order or consent of the state. This bill will facilitate the UN visits, which have been announced for 16 to 27 October 2022, through removing legislative barriers to the UN accessing Victorian places of detention, accessing information and providing clarity to detaining authorities on their obligations and necessary protections to vulnerable detained persons.

In 2012 I helped facilitate the visit of the UN special rapporteur on the rights of indigenous peoples, Professor James Anaya, as part of his investigation into extractive industries and their impacts on indigenous peoples. Now, many of you may never know the efforts required to get a UN special rapporteur to Australia and the opening up of unique opportunities that needs to happen so that these visits offer meaningful engagement to fulfil their obligations to report to the global community on what really is happening here in our nation. But these experiences really do need to unlock the opportunity for UN experts to be in front of people with lived experience, and that is why I am so proud to have played my part in getting Professor Anaya in front of First Nations communities in WA and why within this bill we will see the same opportunities now available for people with lived experiences of staying in places in detention.

Australia’s obligations under OPCAT conflict with and create uncertainty about Victoria’s existing laws, which detaining authorities must comply with. The bill addresses these issues by establishing a clear legislative framework for inspection visits and providing clarity for the UNSPT and the operators of places of detention. Currently Victoria’s facilities are governed by a series of legislation that is difficult to navigate, and without this legislation it would be difficult for the UN subcommittee to access places of detention in a consistent way across our state as well speak directly to detainees. Also administrators of places of detention would be uncertain about their obligations regarding providing information and access. In 2017 the former coalition federal government ratified the Optional Protocol to the Convention against Torture and other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment, OPCAT, and with that OPCAT seeks to assist nations to meet their obligations under the convention and to protect people in detention against torture and mistreatment through a regime of regular independent and prevention-focused inspections. This law brings our legislation in line with other jurisdictions like Tasmania, the Australian Capital Territory and the Northern Territory, which have legislative frameworks in place to facilitate visits by the UNSPT, and the absence of proper funding to date has significantly hampered Victoria’s ability to progress the necessary preparations and consultation required to design a national preventive mechanism.

Let me just say Victoria is indeed working constructively with the new Albanese federal Labor government to facilitate the full implementation of OPCAT in Australia in a way that is effective and sustainable. The Monitoring of Places of Detention by the United Nations Subcommittee on Prevention of Torture (OPCAT) Bill 2022 provides a whole-of-government framework to facilitate inspections of places of detention by the UN subcommittee. It also removes the barriers while clarifying obligations for authorities. I have indeed outlined what those places are earlier in my remarks.

The government supports the principles of OPCAT, noting that we already have a robust oversight regime that has legislative, administrative and judicial measures necessary for protecting persons deprived of liberty. Increased accountability in places of detention will help to safeguard the integrity and transparency of our system. The bill ensures that the UN can speak to detainees and access relevant information to evaluate the measures to strengthen protection for detainees. This includes unrestricted access to all information on the treatment of detainees, detention conditions and the information on places of detention.

During the upcoming UN visit their officers have an obligation not to jeopardise the life, physical and psychological safety and wellbeing of detainees. As I said, this is in the context of Victoria’s current legislation being complex to navigate, and this legislation before us today, this bill, simplifies the process for the UN subcommittee to access places in a consistent way and to speak to detainees so that we do indeed hear the lived experiences of people in detention. It is something that is coming up very, very soon, and so with that in mind I commend this bill to our chamber.

Mr LIMBRICK (South Eastern Metropolitan) (15:19): I rise to speak on the Monitoring of Places of Detention by the United Nations Subcommittee on Prevention of Torture (OPCAT) Bill 2022. Torture in all its forms is a stain on human history. As libertarians we believe it is unethical to harm another human being, which is why we stand fiercely against aggression and torture. To us the most odious act of aggression is when such an act is carried out by the state against its own citizens. Indeed former Senator David Leyonhjelm made this clear when he forced the Abbott government to explicitly outlaw any kind of torture from its national security law.

Whilst torture is illegal in Australia, our history is littered with torturous and degrading practices against vulnerable people in state care or detention. This is plain in a number of reports, including the Royal Commission into Aboriginal Deaths in Custody, the Don Dale royal commission—the Royal Commission and Board of Inquiry into the Protection and Detention of Children in the Northern Territory—and the Royal Commission into Aged Care Quality and Safety and of course in onshore and offshore detention. However, it disgusts me to point out that these egregious acts are not limited to our past.

Torture is still alive and thriving in some of our most important state and territory institutions. As I have mentioned many times in this place, the pandemic exposed the willingness of Victorian bureaucrats and the police to expose citizens to torturous and degrading practices, things like locking people in towers without notice; detaining elderly people in rooms without visits, basic care or end-of-life compassion; locking people in hotels and apartments for months on end with restrictions on fresh air and exercise; restricting visits and rotations in prisons; unjustifiable strip searches; and cruelty against people being detained and arrested.

In Tasmania the commission into Ashley Youth Detention Centre is also coming to terms with recent allegations of torture while in state detention, including from one detainee who claimed that he was held down and raped on multiple occasions, had his arms pinned behind his back and head rammed into walls by guards who were aware he had suffered a head injury earlier in life, was forced to perform sexual acts on a group of three guards who withheld his medication until after the abuse and was also held in isolation at freezing temperatures for days on end. This is odious behaviour and a truly reprehensible breach of the United Nations torture conventions and human decency. But the picture that is laid out before me suggests that instances of torture and degradation in detention in Australia are not isolated incidents by a few sadistic individuals. They are representative of a system that lacks accountability and actual independence from the executive government, the part of government with primary responsibility for the treatment of people in detention. To that end I find myself in furious agreement with the objective of the Optional Protocol to the Convention against Torture and other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment, also known as OPCAT—that is, to create international oversight mechanisms that prevent the mistreatment of people in detention. To my mind Australia and her states and territories would benefit from or at least be less brazen about abuses with some form of external oversight. In this way OPCAT would make Victoria accountable to international human rights standards rather than state-appointed individuals and institutions that provide ad hoc and inconsistent scrutiny.

However, what is unfortunate about this bill is that it confers oversight on a United Nations subcommittee. As libertarians we resist centralisation of power in supranational bodies like the UN and the World Bank. To us, conferring power on vast, unaccountable international bureaucracies favours the interests of the unelected elites that govern them and undermines democracy and national sovereignty. Indeed one only has to look so far as the United Nations charter to see how it can be regarded as a world government charged with policing the world. According to article 1.1, member states must maintain:

… international peace and security, and … take effective collective measures for … removal of threats to the peace …

Article 43 gives the United Nations Security Council what amounts to a standing army. These sweeping powers enable a united Security Council to initiate conflict, impose blockades, unseat governments and levy sanctions, all in the name of the international community. Perhaps the clearest example of this was via UN Security Council resolution 1483, which legitimised the invasion of Iraq on false allegations that Saddam Hussein was in possession of weapons of mass destruction. This invasion saw some of the most torturous abuses of human rights in the modern era and left Iraq with civil and economic instability and vulnerable to terrorism by Daesh for decades—somewhat ironic seeing as the UN holds itself out as the purveyor of human rights standards.

While I maintain a high level of mistrust of supranational governments and would prefer an organisation such as Amnesty International to assume this function rather than the UN, it would be a dereliction of duty or commitment to human rights if I rejected every cause championed by the UN simply because it did not completely coincide with my political ideal. After careful consideration and examination of the bill I understand that the UN subcommittee’s rights are very limited in scope, their powers are soft in nature and the whole regime can essentially be overridden by the minister in the government of the day. Accordingly I believe that this is a case where we can make a significant leap forward towards protecting liberty and human rights in Victoria without directly limiting or constraining any other rights or freedoms, and if this can help unmask the people in institutions who continue to permit or perpetrate these inhuman practices, we should absolutely make that leap. The Liberal Democrats will support this bill.

House divided on motion:

Motion agreed to.

Read second time.

Third reading

Ms STITT (Western Metropolitan—Minister for Workplace Safety, Minister for Early Childhood and Pre-Prep) (15:32): I move, by leave:

That the bill be now read a third time.

Motion agreed to.

Read third time.

The PRESIDENT: Pursuant to standing order 14.27, the bill will be returned to the Assembly with a message informing them that the Council have agreed to the same without amendment.