John Faulkner (NSW, Australian Labor Party, Cabinet Secretary) Share this | Hansard source

Like so many other Australian political parties, the Australian Labor Party has a principled opposition to the use of the death penalty and that is an opposition of long standing. The government has a difficulty with this proposed motion in its current form. If there were a full debate, I would be proposing that the words ‘death sentence by China’ be deleted and ‘death penalty by all nations’ inserted. I have previously long argued in this chamber about my objection to dealing with complex international relations matters by means of formal motions. I commend to the Senate my speeches of the late 1990s on this issue. The government’s view is that it is counterproductive for motions of this kind to single out one country when Australia’s opposition to the death penalty is universal. Under the previous Labor government, Australia ratified the second optional protocol to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights on 2 October 1990. That protocol gives effect to article 6 of the ICCPR, which refers to the abolition of the death penalty, and gives effect to an international commitment to abolish the death penalty by ratifying states.

In keeping with the government’s policy of encouraging universal ratification of the second optional protocol, we encourage all states, including our dialogue partners, to abolish the death penalty. By continuing to discuss this issue, we register our position and encourage progress towards abolition of the death penalty. According to Amnesty International figures released in April last year, at least 3,861 people were sentenced to death and 1,597 known executions occurred in 2006. Ninety-one per cent of all executions in 2006 took place in six countries—China, Iran, Pakistan, Iraq, Sudan and the US. While some countries in our region have abolished the death penalty—Bhutan, Cambodia, Nepal, the Philippines and Timor-Leste—many countries still impose the penalty. In United Nations forums, Australia has consistently called for the abolition of the death penalty. Australia has raised the death penalty’s use during bilateral human rights dialogues with China, Vietnam and Laos, and has joined international protests against the application of the death penalty in specific cases. Not all of these representations are made public because doing so can diminish the effectiveness of those representations.

Since the election of the Rudd government, we have foreshadowed a number of times to the Indonesian government that we will vigorously support clemency pleas by the six Australians facing the death penalty in Bali, should they pursue that course of action. The government has also given strong support to an application for clemency by an Australian man sentenced to death in Vietnam. I want to say clearly, categorically and without question that the government is committed to working with the international community to achieve the death penalty’s universal abolition, but I do say again to the Senate that it is, in our view, counterproductive for motions of this kind to single out one country when Australia’s opposition to the death penalty is universal.