University of Queensland Law Journal
|
|
Home
| Databases
| WorldLII
| Search
| Feedback
University of Queensland Law Journal |
|
ELIZABETH DICKSON[*]
The recent decision of the High Court of Australia in Purvis v New South Wales (Department of Education and Training)[1] has clarified the law in relation to the nature and scope of direct discrimination[2] as prohibited by the Disability Discrimination Act 1992 (Cth) (‘DDA’). In doing so, it has revealed that there is still some judicial misapprehension of the nature and scope of disability. The decision also suggested that some reform of the DDA was desirable in order to allow courts more effectively to assess whether unlawful discrimination has occurred. In February 2005, the Federal Parliament passed legislation to extend the availability of the unjustifiable hardship exemption from disability discrimination to education providers in respect of students already enrolled in an educational institution.[3] This amendment to the DDA, in addition to the formulation of Disability Standards for Education under the Act, will allow schools and courts more scope to exclude students, like the complainant in Purvis, whose behaviour has the potential to affect the welfare of others in their school community.
Daniel Hoggan, born in 1984, has multiple impairments resulting from an infection with encephalitis as a baby. Significantly, his brain injury caused both uninhibited and disinhibited behaviour. Daniel’s legal guardian, Mr Purvis, was the appellant. In December 1997, Daniel was excluded from South Grafton High School (SGHS), a ‘mainstream’ high school in northern New South Wales, after a series of incidents during which he kicked or punched staff members and students at the school.
The Principal of SGHS had initially refused to enrol Daniel. As a result, Mr Purvis lodged a complaint with the Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission (HREOC). After a conciliation conference convened by HREOC, the establishment of an integration committee to examine the implications of Daniel’s enrolment, and negotiation with the SGHS staff and the Teachers’ Federation, Daniel was offered a place at SGHS on 28 February 1997. On 7 March 1997, the Special Education Directorate of the New South Wales Department of Education and Training authorised funding to provide initial support for Daniel in the form of a teacher aide for six and one quarter hours per day and a casual teacher for six hours per day. In addition, the school formulated a welfare and discipline policy for Daniel and formed a case management committee to monitor his enrolment. Daniel commenced his enrolment at SGHS on 8 April 1997. It was not long before Daniel’s behaviour became an issue at the school. He was suspended for violence on five occasions between 24 April and 18 September 1997. After the fifth suspension, the Principal of SGHS investigated other options for Daniel’s education, including delivery of the academic curriculum through distance education at home (with aide support) and access to the school’s resources, sports events and excursions. On 26 September 1997, the Principal wrote to Mr and Mrs Purvis suggesting that Daniel be relocated to the Special Education Unit at Grafton High School. On 4 November 1997, the Teachers’ Federation passed a motion rejecting Daniel’s continued enrolment at SGHS. On 2 December 1997, Mr Purvis advised the Principal that he was determined that Daniel should continue his schooling at SGHS. On 3 December 1997, the Principal wrote to Mr Purvis to advise him that Daniel’s presence at the school posed a threat to the ‘health and safety’ of other members of the school community[4] and a decision had been made that Daniel would be excluded from the school.
Following Daniel’s exclusion, Mr Purvis made a complaint under the DDA that Daniel had been unlawfully discriminated against on the ground of his disability. That Daniel’s problem behaviour was caused by his disability was uncontroversial. It was alleged by Mr Purvis that as Daniel had been excluded because of behaviour caused by his disability, he had, in fact, been excluded because of his disability.
HREOC accepted the argument that exclusion on the ground of behaviour caused by his disability amounted to exclusion on the ground of disability and found that Daniel had been treated less favourably on account of his disability.[5] Upon review of HREOC’s decision, however, the Federal Court found that although Daniel’s behaviour was caused by his disability, it was not within the meaning of disability as defined in the DDA.[6] After a highly technical analysis of the wording of the definition of disability,[7] Emmet J concluded that disability meant, for the purposes of the DDA, the ‘underlying disorder’ and did not include ‘symptoms’ such as behaviour.[8] Upon appeal, the Full Federal Court affirmed this interpretation of the DDA.[9] The implication of this narrow reading of the definition of disability was that SGHS could exclude Daniel because of his behavioural ‘symptoms’ without offending the DDA.
This restrictive approach to the definition of disability attracted criticism from the disability sector as suggesting a fundamental misunderstanding of the nature of disability.[10] Disability is best regarded, according not only to the disability lobby but also to international convention, as encompassing not merely an ‘underlying disorder’, as the Federal Court and Full Federal Court judgments suggest, but also, functional limitations which attach to that disorder.[11] These functional limitations may be exacerbated by the failure of society to accommodate impairment. For example, a wheelchair user is prevented access to a building, it can be argued, not because he or she uses a wheelchair but because no wheelchair access is provided. Commissioner Innes, of HREOC, took an approach to Daniel Hoggan’s case consistent with the view that disability may be either mitigated or exaggerated by the nature of the social response made to impairment. He approached the case on the basis that SGHS had failed to respond appropriately to Daniel’s impairment. He pointed out the lack of training to prepare school staff to manage Daniel’s disability and was of the opinion that SGHS could have done more to accommodate the effects of Daniel’s impairment and thus to control Daniel’s inappropriate behaviour.[12] Emmett J, however, did not consider the adequacy of steps taken to accommodate Daniel and held that the case did not ‘have anything to do with’ the ‘accommodation’ of Daniel.[13] Like Emmet J, Spender, Gyles and Conti JJ, in the Full Federal Court also did not focus on the ‘accommodation’ aspects of the case. Their main concern was the risk to other members of the school community created by Daniel’s propensity to violence.[14]
Like the Federal Court and the Full Federal Court, the majority judgments of the High Court focus on the effects of Daniel Hoggan’s disability on society rather than the effect of any failure by society to accommodate Daniel’s disability on the severity of that disability. Like the Full Federal Court, Gleeson CJ was also troubled by the potential risk to others if Daniel was included at a mainstream school such as SGHS. He highlighted the difficult clash of responsibilities faced by the school authorities — the obligation not to discriminate against people with disabilities under the DDA was, in this case, potentially incompatible with the duty of care owed to all members of the school community.[15] Gummow, Hayne and Heydon JJ, in a joint judgment, and Callinan J highlighted a further problem in a possible disjunction between anti-discrimination law and criminal law should the school not be permitted by the DDA to exclude Daniel. On their analysis, Daniel’s acts of violence could be compared with criminal or quasi-criminal behaviour and they considered it would be a ‘startling result’[16] ‘impossible to believe’[17] that the proper construction of the Act should not permit the school to require compliance with the criminal law. Accordingly, the majority of the High Court held that an interpretation of the DDA which allowed the school to exercise its duty of care to the whole school community and which reconciled anti-discrimination law with criminal law was to be preferred.
In dissent, McHugh and Kirby JJ did consider the appropriateness of the steps taken by SGHS to accommodate Daniel as relevant to the question of whether he had been treated less favourably. They held that ‘the failure by the school to provide such accommodation to enable Mr Hoggan to participate in regular school life, so far as possible, on an equal footing led, correctly on the facts of this case, to the finding of less favourable treatment for the purposes of the Act’.[18] They agreed with HREOC that ‘if the accommodation had been provided, more probably than not the misbehaviour [which led to Daniel Hoggan’s exclusion] would not have occurred’.[19] Thus, McHugh and Kirby JJ were willing to entertain the possibility that an inappropriate social response to disability may exaggerate the effects of a disability. Their approach to the facts of the case suggests the view that the management of disability is a joint responsibility of both society and individual and that any ‘negative’ impact of a disability is not the ‘fault’ or the ‘problem’ exclusively of the person with the disability.
Unlike the Federal Court and the Full Federal Court, however, six of the seven members of the High Court accepted that Daniel’s behaviour was part of his disability for the purpose of the DDA.[20] Nevertheless, the majority was able to find that there had been no unlawful discrimination.
Crucial to the High Court’s deliberations in the case was the vexed ‘comparator’ issue. In determining the question of whether there has been discrimination against a person with a disability within the scope of the DDA, it is necessary to consider whether the ‘circumstances’ surrounding the treatment of the person with the disability are ‘the same or not materially different’ from the circumstances of a hypothetical or actual comparator without the disability.[21] The issue in Daniel Hoggan’s case was whether his violent behaviour was a circumstance which could be considered for the purpose of the comparison. Earlier Australian anti-discrimination tribunal decisions had held that in cases involving challenging behaviour caused by a disability, the behaviour could not be taken into account in the comparison.[22] That is, the treatment of the person with the challenging behaviour was to be compared with the treatment of a person without the challenging behaviour. Such a comparison, of course, made it easier for the applicant to prove that they had been treated less favourably. Relying on this line of decisions, the case for Daniel was that, as the violent behaviour was part of his disability, it should be excluded from consideration. The treatment of Daniel, it was argued by the appellant, should be compared with the treatment of a person without the violent behaviour. On this construction of the Act it is clear that, as a person without the violent behaviour would not have been excluded, Daniel could not have been excluded without discriminating against him. The State’s case was that the behaviour could legitimately be taken into account and that, as a person without a disability who was violent would have been excluded, Daniel was lawfully excluded.
Gleeson CJ was unequivocal: the DDA ‘requires a comparison with the treatment that would be given, in the same circumstances, to a pupil whose disturbed behaviour was not disturbed behaviour resulting from a disorder’.[23] Gummow, Hayne and Heydon JJ, with whom Callinan J agreed, also explicitly authorised consideration of Daniel’s behaviour as part of the comparison. They found that ‘the necessary comparison to make is with the treatment of a person without the relevant disability’, but considered that that it did not follow from that finding that the relevant circumstances could not include circumstances ‘connected with’ the disability, such as, in the present case, Daniel’s violent behaviour.[24]
The majority view that the comparison required in Daniel Hoggan’s case was with a student who exhibited deliberate as distinct from unwilled and involuntary violence is likely to alarm the disability sector as reflecting a bad understanding of the meaning and scope of disability.[25] While the majority was quick to reject the Federal Court narrowing of the definition of disability, their analysis of the comparator issue resonates a similar misapprehension of the nature of disability, a similar denial that disability includes both the physical and functional limitations which attach to impairment. While the legal effect of this decision is that Daniel was excluded because of his behaviour, the practical effect is that he was excluded because of his disability. The dissenting judgment of McHugh and Kirby JJ, by contrast, acknowledged that the view of the appropriate comparator adopted by the majority would ‘seriously undermine the remedial objects of the Act’[26] and found that ‘the proper comparator was a student who did not misbehave’.[27] McHugh and Kirby JJ suggested that, if an act operated ‘harshly’ in a particular case, it was for Parliament to provide a remedy.[28] They cautioned against a judicial approach which allows interpretation to be affected by view as to the desirable outcome: ‘It is essential … that Australian courts give full effect to the language and purpose of the ameliorative provisions of the Act whatever opinion individual judges may have of the justice or wisdom of particular provisions’.[29]
The reasoning of the majority in Purvis exposed a fundamental problem with the structure of the DDA. The interpretation issues in this case can be traced to the fact that the unjustifiable hardship exemption was not available to education providers once a student is enrolled. This exemption renders a prima facie case of discrimination lawful if it can be proved that the provision of special services or facilities to accommodate a person’s disability imposes ‘unjustifiable hardship’ on the discriminator.[30] The hardship may be financial or lie in a detrimental impact on others in a community flowing from the inclusion of a person with a disability.[31] For an educational institution such as SGHS, the unjustifiable hardship exemption would have been available under the DDA only when it could be demonstrated that to enrol a student would cause unjustifiable hardship. So, in the Purvis case, the Department of Education and Training could not argue that Daniel’s existing enrolment at SGHS caused unjustifiable hardship. Indeed, it could be suggested that the applicant chose to rely on the direct discrimination provisions of DDA, rather than on similar provisions in the Anti-Discrimination Act 1977 (NSW),[32] precisely because the exemption was not available.[33] Because the Department of Education and Training could not argue unjustifiable hardship, in order to avoid liability it was forced to argue that there had been no discrimination. Similarly, the courts were forced to find that there had been no discrimination if they were to find Daniel’s exclusion lawful.
The High Court also considered in the context of the Purvis case whether the DDA imposes on service providers, such as schools, a positive duty to accommodate a person with a disability. HREOC, relying on earlier Australian disability discrimination decisions,[34] found that the State had a duty to make a ‘reasonably proportionate response’ to Daniel Hoggan’s disability.[35] The Federal Court rejected the notion that the Act imposed any positive duties on the State in respect of its treatment of Daniel.[36] A majority of the High Court confirmed that there is no duty of ‘reasonable accommodation’ to be implied from the Act. McHugh and Kirby JJ found that, while the effect of the DDA is that, ‘as a practical matter’, a service provider may have to take positive steps to accommodate those with disabilities to avoid a finding of discrimination, the Act falls short of creating a duty to accommodate.[37] Gummow, Hayne and Heydon JJ rejected the argument that the failure to provide reasonable accommodation would amount to less favourable treatment and, thus, discrimination.[38]
The decision in Purvis suggested two law reform options which would allow courts and tribunals more efficiently to assess whether unlawful disability discrimination has occurred: first, amendment of the DDA to make available the unjustifiable exemption after enrolment;[39] secondly, the creation of an express duty of reasonable accommodation or adjustment.
Like the Anti-Discrimination Act 1977 (NSW), the Anti-Discrimination Act 1992 (Qld) (‘QADA’) makes the unjustifiable hardship exemption available both at the point of enrolment and after enrolment.[40] Two cases similar to the case of Daniel Hoggan have been brought under the QADA.[41] In each case there was a preliminary finding of discrimination. In each case, however, the respondent was able to demonstrate that unjustifiable hardship flowed from the complainant’s inclusion; the discrimination was thus ‘exempted’ from penalty under the QADA and the complainant’s case failed. It can be argued that the unjustifiable hardship exemption allows a more honest and direct route to finding no compensable discrimination by an educational institution than the approach authorised by the High Court in Purvis. The unjustifiable hardship provisions explicitly authorise a balancing of the benefits and detriments of including a person with a disability.[42] There is, therefore, no need to manipulate the terms of this legislation to deliver a ‘just’ result.
When the High Court found, in Purvis, that there is no implied duty of reasonable accommodation within the DDA, it perhaps became appropriate for legislators to consider creating an express duty. This has been the approach adopted in such jurisdictions as Canada and the United Kingdom. An express duty of reasonable accommodation places a positive obligation on institutions to take steps to respond to the needs of a person with a disability. How such a duty works to mitigate disability and to reduce discrimination was explained by the Canadian Supreme Court in Eaton v Brant County Board of Education: ‘it is the failure to make reasonable accommodation, to fine-tune society so that its structures and assumptions do not result in the relegation and banishment of disabled persons from participation, which results in discrimination against them’.[43]
It could be argued that recent initiatives by the Federal Government suggest acceptance of the wisdom of these suggested reforms. First, Disability Standards for Education, drafted under the DDA,[44] have extended the operation of the unjustifiable hardship exemption and imposed a duty of ‘reasonable adjustment’ on education providers.[45] Secondly, in order ‘to ensure that the provisions of the draft Disability Standards for Education… are fully supported by the Act’,[46] the Federal Government has recently amended the DDA to extend the applicability of the unjustifiable hardship exemption to post enrolment situations and to ‘clarify the position with respect to the “reasonable adjustments” an education provider may be required to make in order to avoid unlawful discrimination.’[47]
Under the DDA the relevant minister may formulate disability standards in employment, education, accommodation and public transport.[48] It is unlawful to contravene a disability standard.[49] Further, the effect of compliance with standards by a service provider is that the provider will be excused from compliance with the disability discrimination provisions in Part 2 of the DDA.[50] It could be argued, however, that there would be potential problems if the DDA were not amended to match the extension to the unjustifiable hardship exemption provided for in the Standards. First, there is clearly an argument that standards, as a variety of subordinate legislation, should not, and perhaps cannot, be used to enlarge the scope of parent legislation. Secondly, there is the practical problem that, in the event of a dispute over whether an education provider had complied with the Standards, the disability discrimination provisions may again become relevant to the actions of the education provider. As noted above, it is compliance with the Standards that excuses an education provider from compliance with the prohibition of disability discrimination provisions in Part 2 of the DDA. Thus, a complainant could seek to reactivate the DDA disability discrimination provisions by arguing that the education provider had, by not providing some service or facility, not complied with the Standards. It is possible, therefore, that unless the DDA were amended similarly to extend the unjustifiable hardship exemption, the education provider may still be placed in a position where they cannot raise unjustifiable hardship. By amending the DDA to ‘support’ the Standards this potential problem is avoided. In relation to the provision in the Standards for the imposition of a duty of ‘reasonable adjustment’, McHugh and Kirby JJ, in Purvis, suggested some dissonance with the terms of the DDA.[51] The Federal Government’s amendments to the DDA are intended to ensure that provision in the Standards for the making of ‘reasonable adjustments’ is ‘within power’.[52]
The Disability Standards for Education are touted as clarifying the respective rights and obligations of students with disabilities and education providers.[53] While the Standards and supporting amendments to the DDA address problems, identified in the context of the Purvis case, with the operation of the DDA, it remains to be seen whether they will ‘clarify’ this complex area of the law or, by contrast, provide fertile ground in which will grow new disability discrimination disputes.
*BA (Hons) LLB (Hons) DipEd, University of Queensland.
[1] Purvis v New South Wales (Department of Education and Training) [2003] HCA 62; (2003) 202 ALR 133 (‘Purvis’).
[2] Disability Discrimination Act 1992 (Cth) (DDA) s 5(1): ‘For the purposes of this Act, a person (“discriminator”) discriminates against another person (“aggrieved person”) on the ground of a disability of the aggrieved person if, because of the aggrieved person’s disability, the discriminator treats or proposes to treat the aggrieved person less favourably than, in circumstances that are the same or not materially different, the discriminator treats or would treat a person without the disability.’
[3] Disability Discrimination (Education Standards) Act 2005 (Cth) s 3. The effect of the amendment is to repeal the existing DDA s 22(4) and substitute a new, broader, s 22(4): This section does not make it unlawful for an education provider to discriminate against a person or student as described in subsection (1), (2) or (2A) on the ground of the disability of the person or student (or a disability of any associate of the person or student) if avoidance of that discrimination would impose an unjustifiable hardship on the education provider concerned.
[4] For an extract from the letter see Purvis [2003] HCA 62; (2003) 202 ALR 133, 176.
[5] Purvis obo Hoggan v State of New South Wales (Department of Education) (2001) EOC 93-117, 75167 (Commissioner Innes). HREOC was influenced by earlier decisions of itself and of the Queensland Anti-
Discrimination Tribunal which had found that disability included its behavioural manifestations: X v McHugh, Auditor-General for the State of Tasmania (1994) EOC 92-263; L v Minister for Education for the State of Queensland (1996) EOC 92-787; Y v Australia Post (1997) EOC 92-865.
[6]New South Wales (Department of Education) v Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission [2001] FCA 1199; (2001) 186 ALR 69, 77.
[7]DDA s 4.
[8] The Federal Court considered that Daniel’s disability fell within paragraphs (f) and (g) of the definition of disability in DDA s 4: (f) a disorder or malfunction that results in the person learning differently from a person without the disorder or malfunction; (g) a disorder, illness or disease that affects a person’s thought processes, perception of reality, emotions or judgment or that results in disturbed behaviour. Emmet J held that as, in each of those paragraphs, the disorder is ‘limited by a relative clause that describes certain symptoms’ the disorder is separated from the symptoms and the disorder, and not the symptoms, constitutes disability: New South Wales (Department of Education) v Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission [2001] FCA 1199; (2001) 186 ALR 69, 77.
[9] Purvis v New South Wales (Department of Education and Training) (2002) 190 ALR 588, 597 (Spender, Gyles and Conti JJ).
[10] See especially, National Council on Intellectual Disability, ‘Human Rights Legislation Fails People with Disability and their Families: We need a better way of supporting a fair society’ (Press Release, 4 September 2001).
[11] See particularly, World Health Organisation, The International Classification of Functioning,Disability and Health (2002); The Standard Rules on the Equalisation of Opportunities for People with Disabilities, adopted by the United Nations General Assembly, Resolution 48/96, annex (20 December 1993); The World Programme of Action concerning Disabled Persons, adopted by the United Nations General Assembly, Resolution 37/52 (3 December 1982). See also the analysis of the influence of the social model of disability on the DDA in Productivity Commission, Review of the Disability Discrimination Act 1992, Report No 30 (2004), ch 2. See generally, Michael Oliver and C Barnes, Disabled People and Social Policy: From Exclusion to Inclusion (1998) 13ff; Elizabeth Dickson, ‘Understanding Disability: an analysis of the influence of the social model of disability in the drafting of the Anti-Discrimination Act 1991 (Qld) and in its interpretation and application’ (2003) 8 Australia and New Zealand Journal of Law and Education 45. McHugh and Kirby JJ canvas the range of meanings attributed to disability and related terms in Purvis [2003] HCA 62; (2003) 202 ALR 133, 150-153.
[12] Purvis obo Hoggan v State of New South Wales (Department of Education) (2001) EOC 93-117, 75175-75177.
[13] Emmet J considered accommodation in the narrow context of the definition provided in DDA s 4: ‘“accommodation” includes residential or business accommodation’. By taking this narrow approach, he sidestepped the issue of what the school had or had not done to ‘accommodate’ Daniel’s disability, in the sense of ‘adjusting’ to it: New South Wales (Department of Education) v Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission [2001] FCA 1199; (2001) 186 ALR 69, 79.
[14]Purvis v New South Wales (Department of Education and Training) (2002) 190 ALR 588, 596-597.
[15] Purvis [2003] HCA 62; (2003) 202 ALR 133, 138 (Gleeson CJ).
[16] Ibid 186 (Gummow, Hayne, Heydon JJ).
[17] Ibid 196 (Callinan J).
[18] Ibid 159.
[19] Ibid.
[20] Ibid 137 (Gleeson CJ), 141 (McHugh and Kirby JJ), 183 (Gummow, Hayne and Heydon JJ).
[21] DDA s 5(1). See above n 3. Callinan J did not find it necessary to decide the point: ibid 196.
[22] X v McHugh, Auditor-General for the State of Tasmania (1994) EOC 92-263; L v Minister for Education for the State of Queensland (1996) EOC 92-787; P v Director-General, Department of Education (1996) 1 QADR 755.
[23] Purvis [2003] HCA 62; (2003) 202 ALR 133, 137.
[24] Ibid 185-186, 197.
[25] McHugh and Kirby JJ acknowledge that ‘[i]n Mr Hoggan’s circumstances, the behaviour is a manifestation of his disability – for the ‘normal’ person it is an act of free will’: ibid 164.
[26] Ibid 141-142.
[27] Ibid 164.
[28] Ibid 139-140.
[29] Ibid 140.
[32] Anti-Discrimination Act 1977 (NSW) (‘NSWADA’) ss 49C, 49L(4), 49L(5). As the alleged discrimination occurred in New South Wales, the complainant could have commenced proceedings under the NSWADA instead of under the Commonwealth legislation, the DDA.
[33] See the comments of counsel for the first respondent in Transcript of Proceedings, Purvis v State of New South Wales (Department of Education and Training) (High Court of Australia, Gleeson CJ, McHugh, Gummow, Kirby, Hayne, Callinan, Heydon JJ, 29 April 2003) 49.
[34] Jamal v Secretary Department of Health (1988) 14 NSWLR 452; A School v Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission (No 2) (1998) 55 ALD 93; Garity v Commonwealth Bank (1999) EOC 92-966.
[35] Purvis obo Hoggan v State of New South Wales (Department of Education) (2001) EOC 93-117, 75169-75170.
[36] New South Wales (Department of Education) v Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission [2001] FCA 1199; (2001) 186 ALR 69, 79.
[37] Purvis [2003] HCA 62; (2003) 202 ALR 133, 158.
[38] Ibid 184.
[39] McHugh and Kirby JJ suggest such reform: ibid 156.
[41] L v Minister for Education for the State of Queensland (1996) EOC 92-787 and P v Director-General, Department of Education (1996) 1 QADR 755.
[42] QADA s 5; compare the DDA s 11.
[43] [1997] 1 SCR 241, [67] (Sopinka J); cited in Purvis [2003] HCA 62; (2003) 202 ALR 133, 157 (McHugh and Kirby JJ).
[45] The Disability Standards for Education were tabled on 17 March 2005 (‘the Standards’).
[46] Explanatory Memorandum, Disability Discrimination Amendment (Education Standards) Bill 2004 (Cth).
[47] Brendan Nelson and Philip Ruddock, ‘Government Acts on Discrimination against Students with Disabilities’ (Press Release, 12 August 2004). See n 4 above for detail of the amending legislation.
[48] DDA s 31.
[49] DDA s 32.
[50] DDA s 34.
[51] Purvis [2003] HCA 62; (2003) 202 ALR 133, 157.
[52] Explanatory Memorandum, Disability Discrimination Amendment (Education Standards) Bill 2004 (Cth) n 4, s 31(1). By amending the DDA an argument was avoided on the issue of whether standards, as a variety of subordinate legislation, could enlarge the scope of parent legislation.
[53] Ibid.
AustLII:
Copyright Policy
|
Disclaimers
|
Privacy Policy
|
Feedback
URL: http://www.austlii.edu.au/au/journals/UQLawJl/2005/11.html