Greg Barns
Barrister and writer
Greg Barns is an Australian barrister, political commentator and WikiLeaks Party national campaign director. He is the author of several books, including “What’s wrong with the Liberal Party”.
In addition to providing Dr Mohamed Haneef with a significant victory over the Australian government, Justice Jeffrey Spender’s judgment is a powerful rebuke to those politicians and conservative commentators who argue that our courts ought to defer to government when it comes to matters involving national security, writes Greg Barns. And we must guard against governments who believe in guilt by association. So says Justice Spender.
So Kevin Andrews has, as many lawyers expected, egg on his face today with Federal Court Judge Jeffrey Spender ruling less than an hour ago that Mr Andrews was wrong to cancel Gold Coast doctor Mohammed Haneef’s visa last month, writes Greg Barns.
When, in 1967, Harold Holt’s government put to the Australian people a proposal to amend section 51 (xxvi) of the Constitution so that the Commonwealth could make special laws with respect to Aboriginal people, the maverick Liberal MP Billy Wentworth warned that this could mean that in the future, a government could not only make laws to benefit Indigenous Australia, but also to disadvantage it. He was ignored.
Thomas v Mowbray, the High Court’s decision yesterday to uphold the Howard government’s anti-terror laws, will be remembered by historians and legal scholars for two things: that this was one of the most conservative judgments in the Court’s one hundred and four year history, and that Justice Michael Kirby’s full blooded dissent will be forever remembered as one of the great Australian cries for liberty.
The current High Court is capital C conservative, which is of course what you would expect after a decade of Howard government appointments to the Court.
Immigration Minister Kevin Andrews’ attempt late yesterday to justify his decision to cancel Dr Haneef’s visa was hamfisted. And it raises more disturbing questions about the Haneef case.
Federal Immigration Minister Kevin Andrews’ weekend media performances merely confirmed what must be becoming obvious to any disinterested observer of Mr Andrews’ conduct over the Haneef matter – he lacks the insight and wisdom to be a government minister in a sensitive portfolio where he is dealing with people’s lives.
Over the course of this past week two commentators on the Haneef case – The Australian’s Janet Albrechtsen and lawyer Peter Faris – have got it badly wrong.
Now here’s a simple question for you all. If a lawyer expressed views such as; torture is ok as a form of interrogation in some circumstances; it's OK for admissions obtained by inducements or force to be allowed as evidence to convict defendants, and that "rights have no foundation", then you probably wouldn’t describe that person as a "human rights lawyer".
It’s not every day that the DPP issues a media statement telling the world he is personally reviewing a case his office is prosecuting. But then the case of Dr Haneef is no ordinary one.
