Australian Human Rights Commission Annual Report 2021–22 5.6 Performance Analysis – how we are meeting our goals The Commission has recorded important achievements in relation to our goals in the past year. However, the financial challenges faced by the Commission over the past year have significantly impacted on our performance in meeting our strategic goals and outcomes. This is the case across all areas of our activities and functions. For some work areas, such as our legal section, we have had to prioritise tasks that are mandatory under legislation – such as the processing of FOI requests – or otherwise necessary – such as responding to external litigation. We have reduced work on discretionary tasks such as engaging with Parliament through submissions and public inquiries and required extended timeframes for completing other work. We have also conducted more limited outreach in the community, particularly in regional and remote parts of Australia, in the past year. This is due to lack of resourcing as well as necessary limitations due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Statistically, the impact of the Commission’s funding situation is particularly clear in relation to the handling of discrimination and human rights complaints, where the Commission is now facing significant backlogs in handling complaints as well as longer timeframe for the opening of complaints. This is to be expected in a situation where the Commission has reduced resourcing at a time when complaints and inquiries have doubled since 2020, due to issues arising from the COVID-19 pandemic and other social and political matters such as awareness of sex discrimination and harassment in the workplace. Complaint handling is a complex task, and the disputes that are at the centre of many complaints can ‘ossify’ and become more difficult to resolve when extended timeframes apply. It is anticipated that it will take multiple years for the Commission to eliminate the backlog in complaints, and only if appropriate resourcing levels are forthcoming. A lack of resourcing has also meant that Commissioners have been restricted to conducting activities and projects for which external funding support has been obtained. This is not a sustainable option, and it raises concerns about the Commission’s ability to robustly hold government to account for its human rights performance if we can only do this when someone else decides to fund our work. 64