keywords: Kerry O'brien

  • AUSTRALIA

    It's time Parliament had a say on 'disgraceful' PNG solution

    • Frank Brennan
    • 05 June 2014
    29 Comments

    Australia's cruel arrangement for asylum seekers arriving without a visa cannot be scrutinised by our courts and has never been approved by our Parliament. In the name of democracy, in the name of Australian self-respect, and in the name of human rights protection and the rule of law, it is time this arrangement was presented to our Parliament for its approval by our elected representatives or for immediate ditching. It's a disgrace.

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  • AUSTRALIA

    Wily Harradine delivered for Indigenous Australians

    • Frank Brennan
    • 16 April 2014
    18 Comments

    The great Tasmanian Catholic warrior Brian Harradine did wonderful work in the Senate, the chamber Paul Keating described as 'unrepresentative swill'. He successfully negotiated significant improvements to the lamentable Howard Aboriginal land rights package. Seven years after the Wik debate, Democrats deputy leader Andrew Bartlett said: 'The agreement he reached on the Wik legislation was one of the few cases I would point to where John Howard was bested in negotiations'.

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  • RELIGION

    Church-state issues and the Royal Commission

    • Frank Brennan
    • 25 October 2013
    2 Comments

    'The Church should not give any appearance of hiding behind the corporate veil. Justice demands that present church leaders agree to satisfy any judgment debt against their predecessors or their deceased predecessors' estates when there is an allegation of past failure to supervise or adequately investigate a sexual predator in the ranks. Any damages should be paid from church assets.' Frank Brennan addresses the Australian Lawyers Alliance Conference, Rydges Lakeside, Canberra, 26 October 2013.

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  • RELIGION

    Church-state issues and the Royal Commission

    • Frank Brennan
    • 04 September 2013
    2 Comments

    'The Towards Healing protocol is not a substitute for criminal prosecution of sex abusers. Nor is it a cheap alternative to civil liability for damages. It is a procedure available by choice to victims in addition to criminal prosecution of perpetrators or pursuit of civil damages for negligence by church authorities.' Full text from Frank Brennan's address to the Canon Law Society of Australia and New Zealand 47th Annual Conference, 4 September 2013 at Hotel Grand Chancellor Adelaide on Hindley.

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  • AUSTRALIA

    Canberra's life of lies

    • Walter Hamilton
    • 02 July 2013
    9 Comments

    Kevin Rudd says he wants to purify politics, and make it kinder and more honest. And yet his own standards when it comes to telling the truth are at least as rubbery as Tony Abbott's. Politicians who tell us they are acting for the higher good or that their brand of dishonesty is less egregious than that of their opponents are deluded and dangerous.

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  • RELIGION

    Incompetent dealing with priestly paedophilia

    • Frank Brennan
    • 22 January 2013
    50 Comments

    Bishop Harry Kennedy was not the only one out of his depth in the saga of paedophile priest Fr F; practitioners in law and psychology were found wanting. Other than Kennedy, most of the senior clergy involved appear to have done their job credibly according to the values and practices of the time.

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  • RELIGION

    Six challenges for Indigenous researchers

    • Frank Brennan
    • 21 August 2012

    Text is from Fr Frank Brennan SJ's opening keynote address at the Higher Degree Research Retreat, Rydges Eaglehawk, Canberra, 4 August 2012.

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  • ENVIRONMENT

    Carbon price will cause pain

    • Charles Rue
    • 21 June 2011
    12 Comments

    Our lives will change forever as we face the creative challenge posed by the carbon tax. We will pay the real cost of producing food, and cheap and frequent overseas trips will slow. But we must not let a grasping spirit hold us from imagining an economy and lifestyle that can thrive on alternative energy.

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  • AUSTRALIA

    Technophobe Tony's broadband back-step

    • Michael Mullins
    • 16 August 2010
    20 Comments

    Broadband policy is the only major point of difference between Labor and the Coalition in the lead up to this Saturday's federal election. The minimalist approach mooted by the Coalition fails to appreciate fast broadband's nation-building potential.

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  • ENVIRONMENT

    Shame under Howard and Rudd

    • Tony Kevin
    • 27 May 2010
    29 Comments

    The Howard years made me feel ashamed to be Australian, and I felt about his electoral defeat the way East Germans felt about the Berlin Wall coming down: as a kind of cleansing. Rudd disappoints for a different reason.

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  • ARTS AND CULTURE

    Is there room for 'idealists' on the ABC Board?

    • Veronica Brady
    • 04 September 2006

    It was 1983, the year the Australian Broadcasting Commission became the Australian Broadcasting Corporation. The first volume of Ken Inglis' history of the ABC had just been published, and new Board member Sister Veronica Brady read every word of it.

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