Action taken and planned in response to the Victorian Charter of Human Rights and Responsibilities
Service Delivery / Advocacy
Change in practice: Working within a rights-based framework
- Wallara Australia described the process of cultural change from a welfare approach, where the care worker has power to decide for a client, to a right based approach, where the client makes all decisions except where intervention is absolutely required. The rights based approach requires a support/care worker to understand they cannot always know the best interests of the client and acknowledge the client’s autonomy. Wallara has established systems to identify where staff have overridden particular wishes of the client and provide training to address the issue.
- In one case a client’s partner was restricted from entering their accommodation because concerns they could not monitor the partner in the residence. The client’s wishes had been unnecessarily restricted and no proper grounds could be given for restricting those wishes. The issue was then returned to the presumption the client’s interests should be granted.
- One organisation experienced problems with a client who had been violent and threatening towards staff. Staff had raised concerns that allowing this to continue was a breach of the Occupational Health and Safety Act 1984 (Vic). The initial response of the organisation was to exclude the client from services provided at the premises. A Direct Care Worker objected to this on the basis that while staff had the right to be safe in their workplace, exclusion from the service may also be a breach of the clients’ rights. As a result the Care Worker successfully negotiated with management to allow the client restricted access to some services and instituted a method for monitoring when the client may become a safety risk for staff.
- Peter Harcourt Disability Services noted a case where clients were able to make an individual decision about exercising their right to vote, against the wishes of their carers. The client’s wishes were uncovered in the course of the staff member using the Human Rights Checklist that is mandatory for all clients supported by the service.
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Client advocacy
Organisations have implemented a variety of strategies to increase their capacity to advocate for clients, or for self-advocacy, including:
- One organisation is developing a Client Committee to increase inclusion of client opinions in service delivery. This will ensure that all decisions made in future with have input from representatives of the clients of the service. At the time of publication no documents were available, but it was envisaged that the privacy policy may be the first to be considered by the Client Committee. Feedback from the committee will then direct changes to policies.
- Community Leaders program: A local Council has developed a community leaders program that brings together leaders nominated by community groups. The meetings train the leaders to carry-out regular ‘community conversations’ on issues that affect their respective community. This allows the Council to reach a maximum number of people through a meeting of only 30-40 people. In late 2007 the leaders were given a training session around the Charter and planned to discuss this information with community members. Although the program was not developed in response to the Charter, it demonstrates as successful adaptation of an existing program to include human rights considerations.
- Several organisations had included or were planning to include the Charter into a check-list of information a client must be made aware of when commencing with the service.
- Litigation: A Community Legal Centre acknowledged the broad possibility of using the Charter, especially in criminal matters, but as yet there are no cases that have considered the Charter. Using the Charter can be a useful advocacy strategy when a person is already in contact with the legal system, but litigation will be of limited use to organisations unless legal proceedings have already commenced
- Awareness raising:
- Placing an article in the organisation newsletter.
- One organisation held discussions with client groups around different rights. The program groups then provide advice back on how to best communicate the rights to other clients.
- The Disability Advocacy Resource Unit (DARU) is planning workshops for disability advocates (including self-advocates) to explain the role of overlapping advocacy tools like the Charter, Equal Opportunity Act 1995 (Vic), the Disability Discrimination Act 1992 (Cth), and the United Nations Convention on the Rights of People with Disabilities.
The training materials can be found here: http://www.daru.org.au/publications/list.chtml?folder=Training%20Workshop%20-%20Presentations
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Is your organisation a human rights leader? Email us at stephanie.cauchi@vcoss.org.au to share your experiences.
Read the full report here: Using the Charter in Policy and Practice
