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Moreton Bay City Council violated the human rights of homeless people forcefully evicted from encampments last year, a supreme court judge has ruled.
Lawyers from Basic Rights Queensland acting for the evicted campers brought the case before the court, arguing the council’s decision to use excavators to destroy tents and dispose personal items was unlawful and in breach of the Human Rights Act 2019.
Justice Paul Smith found the council made several “errors of law” when evicting rough sleepers from public parks in April and May last year, and failed to allow the campers reasonable time to find alternative accommodation, which breached their human rights.
“The court also finds the notice decisions failed to have regard to the individual circumstances of each applicant,” he said.
“A justified and reasonable response would have been to extend the notice time periods to enable the applicants to find alternate accommodation bearing in mind that each of the applicants had originally been living lawfully in the parks before the repeal of [local legislation].”
The court ruled that some items of property, including the ashes of a couple’s deceased daughter, were disposed of without consent, and concluded “the council engaged in degrading treatment of some of the applicants”.
BRQ legal practice director Sam Tracy said the decision makes clear that “local councils cannot ignore peoples human rights”.
“Every council in Queensland must consider the impact of their actions, and their obligations under the Human Rights Act towards people experiencing homelessness,” Tracy said.
With social housing waitlists at record highs and rental vacancies at historic lows, BRQ said the camps “represented a symptom of systematic failure”.
“This judgement confirms that ‘home’ even if a tent, is a human rights shelter … public authorities cannot simply ‘bulldoze’ the problems of poverty and housing scarcity out of sight.”
Moreton Bay City Council chief executive Scott Waters said council will take time to “properly consider the ruling, before commenting on any specifics of the case”, but contended the court’s human rights ruling.
“City of Moreton Bay considers the Human Rights Act 2019 (Qld) is not a licence to do what is otherwise unlawful,” he said.
“It should not prevent the enforcement of council local laws made for the safety, health and amenity of the community.”
Waters said council had received 4500 community complaints relating to people experiencing homelessness, which included “lack of available public spaces and parks, safety concerns relating to violence and illegal behaviour, as well as serious public health matters like public toileting and human waste, active vermin and significant food and general waste”.
Prior to the destruction of the encampments, Moreton Bay council amended local legislation, making all camping on public land illegal and punishable with fines of up to $8000.
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