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Behind human rights is the still revolutionary idea that every human being is free and equal, that individuals own their own bodies and should be free to pursue their lives, opportunities and enterprise. Human rights provide the foundation for our liberal democracy, our market economy and our civil society. It was the signing 800 years ago of the Magna Carta, or Great Charter of 1215, by…

Charlie Hebdo would have risked being censored by the courts, but self-censorship is the reality of Section 18C of the Racial Discrimination Act.

The Abbott government should correct the festering sores of 35P of National Security Legislation and 18C of the Racial Discrimination Act together. Since the passage of Section 35P of the National Security Legislation Amendment Bill a number of journalists have decried the threat to free speech of jailing someone for revealing the details of an ASIO special intelligence operation. Their…

To advance human rights we need to promote a culture of respect for everyone exercising their choice and freedoms. On a day-to-day basis, human rights probably appear abstract for most Australians. The term often gets raised in discussion about how we are treating asylum seekers, or when we discuss disadvantage in the community. It is common for people to say "I have a right to" one thing,…

In pursuit of legitimately tackling isolated criminal behaviour, Parliaments are reversing the basic principle of liberal democracy by criminalising the exercise of human rights and prescribing lawful activity.

A uniting, not dividing, approach is needed to reform restrictions on free speech, writes Human Rights Commissioner Tim Wilson, in an opinion piece first published in The Australian on 9 August 2014. View the news story from the Commission's website.

In an opinion piece for the Sydney Morning Herald, Human Rights Commissioner Tim Wilson says this week's Free Speech Symposium, together with the Prime Minister's decision not to proceed with changes to the Racial Discrimination Act, marks the beginning of a national conversation about free speech. View the news story from the Commission's website.

Storms on social media demonstrate we don't need laws to regulate free speech – social norms are enough Internet outrage tells us more about how we ensure civil conduct face-to-face, than how we behave online. People behave in strange ways online. But social media provides the clearest evidence of people behaving on their first instinct. All that the internet has demonstrated is there were…

Opinion by Human Rights Commissioner, Tim Wilson. First published in The Australian on 17 May 2014. Reform is not the end of debating free speech in Australia, it is the beginning The “forgotten freedoms” provide the foundations of our liberal democracy, and we have to reconnect with them. There are competing views about how human rights and freedoms should be approached. After all, human…

Before anyone screams "free speech", they should actually know what they are talking about. Earlier this week the Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet released new social media protocols. The protocols limit the capacity of public servants to make statements that are "harsh or extreme in their criticism of the government, government policies, a member of Parliament from another political…

Arguing that old rich white men have too much power is just a backdoor attempt at censorship, writes Human Rights Commissioner Tim Wilson, in an opinion piece first published on 5 April 2014 in The Australian.

THE proposed amendments to the Racial Discrimination Act provide the basis for correcting the legal limits of free speech, ­promoting pluralism, opposing reprehensible racism and highlighting the importance of ­responsibility. Arguably the most important change is assessing an 18C violation based on “the standard of an ordinary reasonable member of the Australian community”. Inter­pretations…

As Human Rights Commissioner I want to promote a culture of rights and responsibilities so that every Australian understands their rights and confidently stands up for them against government encroachment. Because human rights are a political construct, there are numerous ways that they can be approached. Each perspective weights the relative integrity of rights when they come into conflict…

Responsibility, anti-discrimination laws, human rights and freedoms - these words have been at the center of an ideological debate about how to protect fundamental freedoms, including freedom of speech, freedom of association and freedom from detention without trial. But if we are serious about securing these fundamental freedoms in Australian law, we must legislate to protect them, just as…