Responding to COVID-19: Project on Public Law and Public Health

Current project

This project will explore the public law dimensions to the current COVID-19 crisis. It will explore the role of Parliaments and parliamentary oversight mechanisms in protecting constitutional and rule of law values; notions of proportionality as an underlying concern in all legal and policy responses to the virus; and administrative justice concerns associated with extensive police discretion. It will also explore the potential role for various human rights norms in shaping public policy responses to the pandemic, including rights to the highest attainable standards of health, freedom of movement, privacy, education, security of the person and rights to equality/non-discrimination

Webinar series

Public Law Responses to COVID-19

Blog posts

AUSPUBLAW, the Australian Public Law blog, which is co-facilitated by the Gilbert + Tobin Centre and edited by Centre members Zsofia Korosy and Elisabeth Perham, is running a special series of blog posts exploring the public law implications of COVID-19. These posts are authored by public law academics and practitioners from across Australia. The special series can be found here.

Media opinion and discussion pieces.

What should governments do to protect jobs and incomes, now and in the future? 
Rosalind Dixon and Richard Holden, 9 April 2020.

Parliamentary break leaves hole in our democracy.
George Williams, 06 April 2020.

Australians must brace for a ‘Big Brother’ intrusion on the personal liberty we all take for granted.
George Williams, 23 March 2020.

Scholarly and policy pieces on public law and responses to COVID-19.

More to come...

Mental health and wellbeing for the public law community.

More to come...