Domestic Workers in South Africa Lead the Way in Advancing Social Protection for Precarious Workers
In a recent South African High Court judgement, the court held the failure to cover domestic workers under Compensation for Occupational Injuries and Diseases Act (COIDA) to be unconstitutional. This...
The Human Rights Implications of China’s Social Credit System
The issue of importing human rights to the digital sphere, especially in the context of state surveillance, has elicited extensive debate. China’s social credit system is the epitome of the...
Mobilising International Human Rights Law to Promote Tax Justice
Hundreds of billions of dollars in revenue are lost to governments – and particularly those of developing countries – annually as a result of deficiencies in the global taxation system,...
Capping Economic Inequalities
Last week, the UK Supreme Court in DA, DS and others v Secretary of State for Work and Pensions upheld a series of legal reforms that capped the level of...
The socio-economic duty: A powerful idea hidden in plain sight in the Equality Act
Section 1 of the Equality Act 2010 asks public authorities to actively consider the way in which their policies and their most strategic decisions can increase or decrease inequalities. I...
Successful Judicial Review of Benefits Payment in the UK
R (Johnson and others) and Secretary of State for Work and Pensions [2019] EWHC 23 (Admin) is an English High Court case relating to the benefit payment, Universal Credit. Universal...
The Two Child Tax Limit Perpetuates the Myth of Poverty as a Moral Failing
Families who have a third child born after 6 April 2017 will not receive child tax credits for the third child (this has been known as a ‘two-child limit’). The...
Austerity Policies in the UK an Impermissible Retrogressive Measure
Under the umbrella of austerity, the UK has pursued a punishing regime of cuts to social welfare benefits and public services. This week the UN Special Rapporteur on extreme poverty...
The Australian Legal Assistance Sector and the Critical Importance of Justice to Human Lives
In February 2017, I was invited to be an ‘expert adviser’ for the Law Council of Australia’s (LCA) ‘Justice Project’. I was initially reticent. Senate Inquiries (2004; 2009; 2015), reviews,...
Discriminatory changes to UK disability benefits: some hope from judicial intervention?
Welfare benefit law and policy has seen considerable controversy over the last few years, as existing benefits are changed and reduced. This April saw the annual changes to benefit levels...
Homeless at Home: Forced Internal Displacement In India
In September 2017, the Prime Minister of India inaugurated the Sardar Sarovar Dam (SSP), which was designated as the second largest dam in the world. Most of the Indian media...
Proposal to make ‘disadvantaged socio-economic status’ a prohibited ground of discrimination under Irish law
The Equality (Miscellaneous Provisions) Bill 2017, was introduced in the lower house of the Irish Parliament at the end of last year and is currently working its way through the...
