The three leading candidates in the Page electorate have all indicated they would like to see a federal Bill of Rights.
The chorus of agreement came at a meet the candidates forum in Casino this morning.
Greens candidate Kudra Falla-Ricketts, who has been campaigning on the issue, told Echonetdaily a question came from the floor about the concept and both Nationals MP Kevin Hogan and Labor candidate Janelle Saffin supported it.
She added a federal Bill of Rights could be achieved simply by the passage of legislation through the parliament and does not require constitutional amendment in order to bind the states.
It would act as a watchdog over federal laws that infringe fundamental civil and personal rights.
Ms Falla-Ricketts says that although Australia is a signatory to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, neither has been fully implemented into domestic federal legislation.
‘Recent anti-protest laws in several Australian states, including NSW, are a warning sign that a Bill of Rights is urgently needed in Australia’ Ms Falla-Ricketts said
‘At many levels we are seeing our rights to democratic protests, freedom from personal surveillance and freedom from arbitrary search and seizure of property eroded by successive governments. It has been a slippery slope for many years in Australia and we need to bring Australia into line with other democratic nations by enacting a Federal Bill of Rights.
‘I have been calling for a federal Bill of Rights repeatedly during this election campaign, but I was delighted this morning to see that there is an emerging political consensus among the major candidates in Page for the need for such legislation,’ Ms Falla-Ricketts said.
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