I am an advocate for vaccination

Prominent lawyer Jon Apted says he is very much in favour of vaccination and an advocate for people to take the vaccine.

Apted highlighted this while speaking on Fiji Law Society's virtual discussion on “To Jab or Not To Jab”.

He also says that the right to be free from medical treatment and scientific experimentation means that you cannot be physically forced to get injected against your will.

However Apted says in a workplace where it can be demonstrated that a person is a risk to others, vaccination can be made a requirement.

He says the Fijian Government has herd immunity in mind but they are only doing workplace at the moment and their problem when they go to court will be the principle of sufficiency.

Apted says this is because as part of proportionality, you have to show that your measure is sufficient to achieve the objective because there is no point in doing something and limiting rights if it does not get you to that place.

He also says that according to his reading, the “no jab, no job” policy cannot regulate people working at home because a worker is not entering the workplace as he or she is already there.

Apted says the regulation states that an employer must not let an employee enter the workplace from 1st August if they have not received the first dose.

He says this means that there is room for an employer to allow a worker to work from home without being vaccinated.

Apted says the difficulty here is that a workplace is defined as any place a person works and not just the office.