Many are awaiting visas to join their partners who are in Australia.

Due to the pandemic, Australia closed its borders to almost everyone except Australian citizens, permanent residents, resident New Zealand citizens or immediate family members.

The Australian Prime Minister, Scott Morrison added another level of difficulty this month, announcing an English language requirement for partner visa applications.

Abul Rizvi, a former deputy secretary of the Department of Immigration, said: "Not since the White Australia policy has an Australian Government acted to interfere in the decisions of Australians about who they chose to marry."

Brian Brunton, a former Papua New Guinea judge, and an Australian citizen before PNG gained independence in 1975 goes even further.

He said Australia's migration system is badly managed and racist.

His son, Richard, is currently estranged from his partner because of Australia's migration policy. He is one of the thousands who have had a series of visa denials.

Richard grew up in Australia as the child of two Australians and he is engaged to an Australian.

He has been experiencing great difficulties in returning from his country of birth, PNG, to live with her in Australia. This is despite never forfeiting his Australian citizenship.

"All his life he's been in and out of Australia for family and business, but now basically he is banned," the former judge explained.

A spokesperson for the Department of Home Affairs said it couldn't comment on individual cases due to privacy legislation. But asserted that "people born in Papua prior to independence acquired Australian citizenship at birth".

However, he said, "Papuan-born Australian citizens did not have an automatic right of permanent residence in any of the Australian States or Internal Territories".

The spokesperson said in some cases a person may be unaware they ceased to be an Australian citizen.

Sources

• Radio New Zealand
• SBS

Subsequently, the UN Human Rights Committee criticised Australia for 'chronic non-compliance' with the committee's recommendations.

Indeed, it reported that Australia's non-compliance was 'completely off the charts'.

The dissonance of these two stories calls into question Australia's commitment to human rights, even as it proclaims its global human rights leadership.

As a field of law, human rights emerged in the post-WWII context of the UN's universal declaration.

Their foundation lies in recognising the dignity of humanity, and translates a somewhat esoteric understanding of a person's inherent value into a legal right with concomitant legal responsibilities.

As a question of law, those responsibilities lie with the state. In a domestic context, the state has the power to censure individuals (or corporations) who breach the established human rights of another.

The development of a human rights framework as law reflects some of the underlying principles of liberalism, including notions of personal freedom and the idea of rights as inherent.

To the extent that human rights go beyond these ideas, they reflect additional ideological, political and cultural foundations.

These foundations are reflected also in a broader non-legal and non-technical understanding of human rights that suggests an appreciation of our 'right' as an individual to live our lives free from the interference of others, but supported by government action.

Because of the cultural and ideological construction of human rights, in a legal sense such rights manifest unevenly across the world.

t would be misguided, however, to assume that a liberal democracy such as Australia would necessarily embrace human rights.

Despite an ostensible cultural fit with the individual freedoms supported by human rights as law, there remains considerable resistance to the uptake of human rights in Australia — both in general social discourse, and as a legal framework per se. Continue reading

• Kate Galloway is a legal academic with an interest in social justice.