Yesterday the federal government quietly appointed Lorraine Finlay as the next human rights commissioner. She is a Murdoch University legal academic and human trafficking specialist with the Australian mission to ASEAN.
Media releases from Attorney-General Michaelia Cash and the Australian Human Rights Commission both praised Finlay’s academic expertise and work in international human rights law. But they neglected to mention hers deep ties to the Liberal Party, as a former upper house candidate in Western Australia and president of the state’s Liberal women’s council. They also overlooked her years spent vocally taking positions that might put her at odds with the AHRC.
A Liberal stack
Finlay’s links to the WA Liberals go back a decade. Until 2018 she was president of the its women’s council, a position she’d held since at least 2011 when she was hosting twilight drinks with a then-shadow minister, Scott Morrison.
As head of the council, Finlay worked hard to advance women’s representation in the party — by opposing gender-based quotas. She also helped stitch up preselection contests for older, male establishment figures over younger female candidates, even as senior figures such as Julie Bishop were crying out for better gender representation.
Spend enough time as a party apparatchik, it seems, and you start getting touted as a possible candidate.
In 2015 there were rumours about her running for the federal seat of Canning (now held by Andrew Hastie). Two years later she ran unsuccessfully for the Liberals as an upper house candidate in the state election.
More recently she’s popped up in reporting on the disastrous state of the WA party, as an enemy of “The Clan”, a group of influential Liberal powerbrokers with ties to former finance minister turned OECD supremo Mathias Cormann.
Crikey asked Cash’s office whether Finlay’s Liberal links helped her land the appointment, and whether it was appropriate to pick someone so close to the party. We did not get a response.
The IPA’s pick
In 2017, the Institute of Public Affairs, which has long called for a dramatic overhaul of the AHRC, listed Finlay as one of its favoured candidates for the commission. It cited Finlay’s co-authorship of No Offence Intended: Why 18C is Wrong, a book-length call to remove that section of the Racial Discrimination Act.
Both the Abbott and Turnbull governments campaigned unsuccessfully to have the section — which makes it unlawful to offend, insult, humiliate or intimidate a person based on their race, colour, ethnicity or nationality — repealed. It dragged the commission and its former president Gillian Triggs into a protracted culture war over freedom of speech. Finlay, meanwhile, has openly called — in her book and in articles — for 18C to be abolished.
She has plenty of other views that put her at odds with the commission’s work. The AHRC supports an Indigenous voice to Parliament. Finlay joined an IPA advertisement where she called that “political segregation”.
The commission also does critical work on sexual harassment and sexual assault. On these, Finlay’s views are in line with the Sky News set. She believes moves to adopt an affirmative consent model on sexual assault laws — under way in NSW — would undermine due process and the presumption of innocence for alleged perpetrators. In fact, she’s been making this argument since 2018, when she appeared on a YouTube video with men’s rights activist Bettina Arndt.
Finlay’s appointment is just the latest instance of the Coalition targeting and stacking the AHRC. In 2013, the Abbott government appointed former IPA policy director Tim Wilson, now a Liberal backbencher, as Human Rights Commissioner. Earlier that year, staff at the Institute had called for the Commission to be abolished. At the time, attorney-general George Brandis openly admitted ideology played a part in Wilson getting the gig.
This time it hasn’t been quite so open.
Editors note: An earlier version of this article said Tim Wilson had called for the AHRC to be abolished during his time at the IPA. Wilson did not personally call for its abolition.
No Liberal Left Behind!
No doubt there are plenty more failures and rejects from the detritus of the WA Liberals implosion to be plugged into the workings of our government institutions, there to poison the well of independent administration.
“No liberal left behind”.
That’s a good line. I’ll use it meself if you don’t mind. I can never use a capital “l” when I type that name though.
No worries. I am in no position to mind in the slightest as I was only borrowing it anyway.
It’s a misnomer anyway, designed to deceive as to it’s real character. Should be a clear warning to anyone with the slightest political nous.
I like its ambiguity.
So it’s really an upper-class work-for-the-
dole-kickback scheme?It will be interesting next year because the position is supposed to advertised and due process followed.
The UN will be reviewing the position in 2022 and if unhappy with Chuckle’s pick, may downgrade the position.
Due process in libspeak is akin to describing a bowel movement all over it.
Fun fact: she was Dyson Heydon’s associate for 2 years.
So she has paid her dues?
Possibly by silence.
Very interesting, how’s Dodgy Dice going with his assault charges?
Wonder if she knows how to swallow?
Her self respect or feelings of sorority?
From the short history above it seems that the answer is a resounding ‘yes’.
Reminds me of Howard’s appointment of his mistress to Sex Discrimination Commissioner, I guess she wasn’t very discriminating after all, Janet refused to be in the same room.
The Ghoulish Ghoward.
Liberals and libertarians really still cling to their belief in the myth of meritocracy, happy to maintain the status-quo; it’s no coincidence, most are white males who would become indignant if you were to mention the privilege which allowed them to not be handicapped at the start of the race. Now with a female appointee, pushing policies maintaining the status-quo, Libs will be able to deflect from their inaction in correcting the inequities of society, particularly gender inequality.
They do not cling to such a belief. They only say they do.
It depends how you define merit, of course.
For Liberals, it involves having a penis.
…. As a leader?
Whose is the relevant question here!
The executive director of the Human Rights Law Centre, Hugh de Kretser, says the process does not meet international standards that require a clear, transparent and participatory appointment process. He says Australia argues on the international stage for strong national human rights institutions but has undermined that here. “The Morrison government,” de Kretser says, “needs to live up to these standards at home.”…Bongiorno
Noo. Their merit is the personification of how sh*t floats to the top.
Georgina Downer was too busy?
She strained her back lifting those giant fake cheques
Probably about to be parachuted into, another, Liberal safe seat so let’s hope that she extends her unblemished record of losses.
MERIT! Mates Elevated Regardless of Intelligence or Talent.
The meritorious qualities required by the Coalition for elevated appointments etc are lying swindling greed, calous ruthless indifference 2 the rule of law and the plight of anyone who does not share their goals of self-enrichment at anyone’s expense.