• address economic exploitation by requiring a basic minimum wage that can adequately support workers • address the impact of climate change on vulnerable groups, for example by ensuring protection from harmful health impacts of natural disasters and environmental exploitation • protect against family violence by requiring emergency housing and access to social security • address the gender pay gap by requiring equal remuneration for work of equal value, and the provision of parental leave • address discrimination resulting in poverty by prohibiting the denial of social security based on a person’s status (for example, asylum seekers) • ensure equal access to education for children with disability by requiring the provision of accommodations and supports in schools. ICESCR rights are also closely linked with realisation of self-determination for Indigenous peoples, and are essential to meeting ‘close the gap’ targets, which address socio-economic indicators of disadvantage.51 Until social and economic rights are fully realised in relation to First Nations communities, Australia will continue to have deeply unequal outcomes for sections of the population, based on race. Despite the centrality of socio-economic rights to a fair society, they are often overlooked in favour of ICCPR rights in domestic contexts. As the CESCR Committee observed in a statement to the World Conference on Human Rights in Vienna in 1993: Denial of the right to vote or of the right to freedom of speech, solely on the grounds of race or sex, is loudly and rightly condemned by the international community. Yet deep-rooted forms of discrimination in the enjoyment of 126 economic, social and cultural rights against women, the elderly, the disabled and other vulnerable and disadvantaged groups are all too often tolerated as unfortunate realities. Thus, for example, many human rights advocates have little to say in response to the fact that women in many countries ‘are generally rewarded [for the disproportionate work burden they bear] with less food, less health care, less education, less training, less leisure, less income, less rights and less protection’.52 The Australian public strongly values economic and social rights, indicating that the lack of implementation of ICESCR does not reflect the democratic will of the people. The 2009 NHRCC consultations involved 35,014 written responses and 66 community roundtables with 6,000 people, which were held in 52 locations around Australia.53 The NHRCC compiled and assessed community views about the rights that were most important to Australians. The report found that Protection and promotion of economic, social and cultural rights is important to the community, and the way they are protected and promoted has a major impact on the lives of many Australians. The right to adequate housing, the right to the highest attainable standard of physical and mental health, and the right to education are particular priorities for the community.54 Additionally, research conducted for the NHRCC, set out in the Colmar Brunton Social Research report, highlighted the tendency for Australians to give priority to ‘survival’ rights – such as the right to food, water and clothing and the right to health and medical care. For example, 96 per cent of surveyed respondents considered the right to sufficient food, water and clothing an important or very important right; similarly,