Posted by David Chibo (203.206.78.200) on January 28, 2002 at 23:52:58:
In Reply to: Cracks begin to appear in the Labor Party posted by David Chibo on January 28, 2002 at 23:35:31:
MIGRATION LEGISLATION AMENDMENT (IMMIGRATION DETAINEES) BILL (NO. 2) 2001
Second Reading
Ms PLIBERSEK (Sydney) (10.32 a.m.)- The Migration Legislation Amendment (Immigration Detainees) Bill (No. 2) 2001 is designed to protect detainees and guards. The strip searching provisions are said to be designed to find weapons before they can be used on other detainees or on guards. In debating this legislation, we really need to ask ourselves some very important questions. Of course the safety of any worker at detention facilities is important, as is the safety of people who are detained in such facilities, but the reality is that in most cases the violence which occurs in these centres is actual or threatened self-harm. We need to ask ourselves the following questions: why is self-harm occurring? Why did the suicide occur? Why did the detainees at Woomera sew their lips together? Why has violence occurred? What can we do to make the detention regime more humane?
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First of all, we face an enormous problem because detainees are not appropriately separated. Recent arrivals are put into detention with people who have gone completely through the refugee determination process and have been rejected. So a lot of people who are likely to be found to be genuine refugees are put into detention centres side by side with people who have been found not to be genuine refugees, who have been in detention for many years and often have nothing to lose. Asylum seekers who are likely to be found to be genuine refugees are also sharing facilities with people who have committed crimes on Australian soil or overseas and are awaiting deportation. It is very important that, when we talk about the safety of guards and the safety of people in detention centres and when we suggest that guards need extra powers, we keep in mind that the vast majority of people in detention pose no threat to guards or to other detainees but they are being inappropriately kept with people who are perhaps a potential threat.
It is worth noting that genuine refugees do very little to avoid detection. Many of them arrive at Kingsford Smith airport and apply for asylum, or they arrive on Christmas Island or on Ashmore Reef. They certainly do not try to sneak in. Most of them are happy to meet Australian authorities because they want to put in an application for asylum. It is in their interests to make contact with Australian authorities, if they are going to be granted refugee status. They can begin the process of actually becoming legitimate Australian citizens.
Also, it is very important to differentiate between the detainees. One of the very first things we can do to reduce the threat of violence against women and children is to take them out of the camps. I am very pleased that the minister has engaged in this three- to six-month trial to have women and children living in the community. If the minister believes that some detainees are potentially violent and that they are manufacturing weapons and need to be strip searched, what on earth are we doing keeping children in detention with these people? Last year about 900 children passed through detention centres and of those children 30 were detained for more than one year. In fact, at the moment there are 39 unaccompanied minors in detention centres. If the minister believes that some detainees are manufacturing weapons with which they may harm guards or other detainees, it is absolutely unconscionable that these children, in particular unaccompanied minors, should be kept in the same facilities as these potentially violent people, as the minister would have it.
The other step we need to take to ensure that self-harm and violence are minimised is to make sure that detainees are released as soon as possible. After identity, character and health checks, we need to release people as quickly as possible into the community. Australia has, as every other country has, an absolute right to make sure that people who are coming into the country are no threat to the community: that they pose no health risks and that their character is good. But once these things have been established we need to process people as quickly as possible and have them living in the community where they can start to be productive members of the Australian community.
It is worth remembering that between 75 and 90 per cent of asylum seekers are found to be genuine refugees and in some groups it is higher. If you look at Iraqi boat people, 97 per cent are found to be genuine refugees; of Afghani boat people, 92 per cent are found to be genuine refugees. What is the point of having these people locked up in detention centres, costing Australian taxpayers $105 a day and losing their sense of self so that when they are finally released they find it very difficult to fit back into the community? What is the point, when they are going to be found to be genuine refugees, of keeping them locked up for years at a time?
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Learning English and finding work are the things that will help these people eventually become good Australian citizens. Certainly, getting an education for their children is the first step to making sure that these families effectively integrate into the Australian community. As I said earlier, 900 children passed through detention centres last year. I am particularly concerned about the provisions for strip searching children as young as 10. In my view, there should not be children in detention centres, and if there were no children in detention centres there would be no need to strip search 10-year-olds.
It is worth noting that people who overstay visas who come as tourists or students or businesspeople and for some reason overstay or make an application onshore for asylum get bridging visas and they are allowed to remain in the community until the matter is determined-whether they are able to stay or not. Certainly, we do not have the minister or anybody else arguing that these people, who are by and large British or American overstayers, are a serious threat to the Australian community.
The actual running of the detention centres in Australia has been a matter that has concerned me for some time. In the discussion over whether we should strip search people and extend the powers to strip search, I think that one of my great concerns has been that Australasian Correctional Management has not run these centres in the way that I think they should be run. The two Ombudsman's reports, the Joint Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs, Defence and Trade report in June this year and the Joint Standing Committee on Migration report last year all raised serious issues about the way detention centres are run. They raised all sorts of issues about the way that staff have dealt with people in the detention centres.
These staff are basically prison guards and they should not be: they should be people who are experienced in dealing with traumatised human beings. Prison guards have been involved in incidences of violence such as the one in Port Hedland where the Port Hedland operations manager pleaded guilty to twice assaulting a teenager, once when the teenager was held by other guards and once when the teenager was handcuffed to his bed. This happened just days before the Port Hedland riot on 21 January, and you have to ask yourself whether perhaps this beating had something to do with the riot.
There is a situation in Villawood at the moment where, on 27 April, 10 detainees allege that they were assaulted by guards when being moved from one section of Villawood to another. There is a videotape of part of the incident; part of that videotape seems not to be there. There is apparently a Department of Immigration and Multicultural Affairs employee who says that she saw at least two detainees assaulted. You have to ask yourself why those detainees have been so expeditiously deported-many of them have been deported since that incident took place. The guards have been sent to Western Australia, so the police cannot question them. There are some very serious questions being raised in the detention centres. There is another reported case of a Somalian woman beaten unconscious by ACM guards, and the case was taken up by the Public Interest Advocacy Centre.
When we are talking about the need to search detainees and their being a threat to guards, I think we also have to consider that, whilst many of the guards, I am sure, are fine, there are reported incidences that have gone before the courts where the guards have been accused of and have pleaded guilty to violence. We need to remember that inmates are much more likely to harm themselves than to be a threat to other inmates or to guards. I believe that these reports of violence on the part of the guards mean that it is imperative that we have a judicial commission into the running of the detention centres. My own personal view is that I see nothing that suggests that Australasian Correctional Management are doing a good job of running the centres.
I think that the experience of the Wackenhut corporation overseas-the corporation that makes $400 million a year out of jailing Americans-is such that it is perhaps not the best parent company to be dealing with traumatised, recently arriving asylum seekers. Wackenhut has a bad reputation in countries such as Belgium, and even in the United States, where they have had contracts cancelled. In one juvenile centre, for example, guards were accused of beating quite young teenagers. I do not think this is a terrific organisation to be dealing with recently arrived, traumatised people.
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We need to think about alternative detention models and, having read about the way that other countries deal with recently arrived asylum seekers, I think you would have to say that Australia is unique in the way that we deal with asylum seekers. There have been many alternative suggestions of ways that we could perhaps deal with asylum seekers differently, including releasing people on cash bonds to Australian citizens and electronic monitoring, which was raised by one of the church groups. Certainly the experiment in Woomera, which has released women and children into the community, is well worth watching. The model that is most often brought up as an alternative model for Australia is the reception centre model run in Sweden. Sweden has more than twice the number of asylum seekers that Australia has per capita but many fewer are detained, and it is against the law in Sweden to detain children for more than a few days.
When discussing this issue, we must remember the international context of our asylum seeker problem. There are an estimated 21 million refugees worldwide. It is worth saying that Australia needs to continue to do its fair share. Twelve thousand a year is a drop in the bucket in terms of our total immigration intake of 85,000. When you think about poor countries like Iran and Pakistan, which each deal with two million refugees, that shows that what is required of Australia is really pretty modest.
We need to act on the international stage to ensure that the underlying problems of the refugee crisis are dealt with. We spend about $120 million a year on detention, but we spend only $14 million a year on helping the UNHCR in its international refugee resettlement effort. It is worth remembering that $14 million is much less than this government spends each month on publicly paid political advertising. While $14 million sounds like a lot of money to the average Australian, when we think about the sort of money that this government wastes on political advertising, it is a tiny amount of money.
We need to remember that the idea of queue jumping is absurd in countries where every social relationship is breaking down, where any person thinking about the refugee question knows that if the lives of their children were threatened in a war zone or after a revolution, they would do anything they could to get their children out of the country and away from such a threat. It does not take a vast stretch of empathy to understand that families are often selling everything they possess-every piece of land-to get one child away from a war zone. Often they are young men, because young men are often pressed into military service. For example, the Taliban are pressing young men into walking through minefields to make sure that the minefields are safe for soldiers to cross. It is not surprising that families turn to people smugglers who are criminals. I do not resile from the fact that organised crime is involved in getting people from one country to another, but it is not surprising that parents are prepared to deal with criminals to save the life of a son who is about to be pressed into military service.
Even if these people are found not to be genuine refugees in Australia, we face a very real problem because we do not have diplomatic relations with, or direct flights to, many of the countries these people have left. That means that if these people are found not to be genuine refugees-the small proportion who are not genuine refugees-they may wait indefinitely in a detention centre in Australia because we cannot send them home to their country of origin.
We need to play a role in addressing the international issues which have created refugees. In the past, Australia played a very positive role in countries such as Cambodia in helping to bring peace to that country, and in rebuilding East Timor. We are doing an excellent job in helping East Timor re-establish itself. We also need to talk to other international organisations about debt forgiveness. Those are the sorts of things that will keep people in place and stop them having to leave their countries. We need to send home non-genuine people as quickly as possible, work with source countries where people are leaving and deal with and support international efforts to deal with the problem in an orderly way.
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It is fair to say that our detention regime is no deterrent. If the choice is to be shot, you would probably prefer to end up in a camp in Australia. The temporary protection visa regime has proved to be no deterrent and neither has Mr Ruddock's nasty video which I believe has become a bit of a laughing stock amongst international diplomatic circles. Labor have committed themselves to re-establishing basic service delivery for people who are found to be genuine refugees. That is vital because integrating people into the Australian community and making sure that they learn English and get a job as soon as possible is the best way of ensuring that there is no ongoing conflict within the Australian community.
The really disgraceful thing about Minister Ruddock's position throughout this debate, not in particular on this legislation, but over the last few years, is that his position has been so much about domestic politics and so little about the lives of the people in detention and how to integrate people into the Australian community. The UN High Commissioner for Refugees called on Australia in June to stop demonising refugees just to score political points. The sort of pamphlet that we have seen in Dickson criticising Labor for being soft on refugees is absolutely aimed at clawing back One Nation voters to the Liberal Party. The minister should be absolutely ashamed of himself for allowing that sort of demonising of refugees for crass political purposes.
The Ombudsman has said that these detainees have fewer rights than jail inmates. It is worth remembering that, when the minister wanted to, he was able to find room for 200 South Lebanese Army soldiers very quickly. It is amazing that we can so quickly find room for an extra 200 SLA soldiers but there is no room for people who have been waiting in camps in Ethiopia, Iran or Afghanistan, who have been living in camps for years, or who have escaped in the most dangerous ways to come to Australia. There is no room for them, but there is room for the SLA. (Time expired)
These are speech notes for a bill on which debate was gagged today:
Migration legislation
In the year of the 50th anniversary of the Refugee Convention, the Prime Minister and the Minister for Immigration are doing everything they can to ensure Australia minimises its international obligations.
This piece of legislation has a number of areas that are cause for concern, and should be fixed by the government.
In denying the right of appeal to the High Court, the Bill may well be unconstitutional.
This Bill affects not only asylum seekers, Certainly changes need to be made to streamline the process of assessing whether asylum seekers are refugees. I would say that everyone involved in this debate would agree that the current situation with people waiting years in detention is completely unacceptable, and we know that some people who apply for refugee status when already in Australia are being taken for a ride by unscrupulous Migration Agents.
There are those agents who will knowingly encourage an applicant to lodge an ambit claim for refugee status in order to remain in the country while prolonging the appeals process.
One notorious agent, Mr Abel Miranda was recently sentenced to 4 year jail for preying on fellow filipinos, charging enormous fees to lodge ambit claims for protection visas.
The great thing for unscrupulous agents about this industry is that your unsatisfied clients are deported at taxpayers' expense.
Of course our refugee intake should focus on offshore applicants who are waiting in camps for entry into countries like Australia. This legislation is more about being seen to be tough, than about actually streamling processessing.
This legislation is just part of the Minister's package and it gives us opportunity to look at our migration legislation more broadly
These pieces of legislation are designed to deal with a crisis that doesn't exist - except as an election strategy for the Minister for Immigration.
136 boats arrived in the course of the last three years. The Minister waits until 5 weeks before an election to introduce legislation which he claims will deal with this problem
Why is it that 60,000 illegal overstayers who came here on tourist or work visas are not a "crisis" but the 4,100 people who arrive without visas on boats are?
It disgusts me to say it, it disgusts me even to think it, but this PM has to be the luckiest politician in history. He encouraged his minister to spend a few years demonising boatpeople, then the Tampa issue allows him to be seen as hard line.
The tragic events of Sept 11 run together in people's minds so that suddenly asylum seekers are potential terrorists.
I'd like to inject some sanity back into the debate by reminding people of some facts:
Myth 1 - Asylum Seekers are potential terrorists
Liberal Peter Slipper said recently, "there was an undeniable link between asylum seekers and terrroists"
The Prime Minister and the Minister for Defence have made sotto voce noises of support for this proposition.
Just 11 of the 13,000 people who sought asylum in Australia last year were rejected on character grounds.
A spokesman for the Minister Ruddock confirmed to the Herald that the one known security risk - an alleged former agent of the Afghan security service, the Khad - had come illegally by air, not boat
Perhaps some asylum seekers may have criminal backgrounds or terrorist connections, and we must guard against these people. Obviously the overwhelming majority do not.
Also worth noting that of the people involved in the tragedy in the US, sixteen entered the US on business or tourist visas. Seven undertook flight training within the US.
If terrorist organisations are as well resourced as we are led to believe, why would they send their operatives to Australia in leaky boats?
The other thing worth remembering is that the Minister for Immigration has recently made a decision to allow 200 South Lebanese Army soldiers into Australia under a special humanitarian category.
I know many Australians of Christian Lebanese background who are fine citizens, but the like most militias, the SLA is known for its brutality, and its attacks on civilians in the refugee camps of soth Lebanon.
Why are these former soldiers more deserving of protection than people fleeing repressive regimes? Could it be anything to do with the Minister's close relations with sections of the Lebanese community?
Myth 2 - We have to look after our own first
This government constantly fails Australians by spending money on their own re-election purposes rather than on health, education, welfare, creating new jobs and protecting existing ones, the environment, making Australia a knowledge nation - all the things that Australians care about.
Just today we have heard from the Auditor General that the Federation trust was a pork-barrelling exercise before the last election. We didn't really need to hear it from the A-G - the Member for Farrer was quite clear about it in his book when he said he wondered what the outcome of the 1998 election would have been if they didn't have the "porkbarrelling" of the Federation Fund to "add a bit of spice".
Once again, the Howard government using your money to buy your vote.
Remember, the Howard government
· spends $20 million a month of your money on government advertising;
· has spent $500 million on consultants;
· bungled the $983 million sale of 53 government properties
· has wasted over $1 billion on IT outsourcing;
· will spend at least $33.7 million for the CHOGM Taskforce and Security; and
· will spend at least $1.9 million for the Queen's upcoming visit.
· We spend $145 million a year on detention centres, but give only $12 m to the UNHCR to help resettle refugees.
Money is not the problem - our priorities are the problem.
Myth 3 - Boat People are Queue Jumpers
In Iraq and Afghanistan, there are no queues for people to jump. Australia has no diplomatic representation in these countries and supports the international coalition of nations who continue to oppose these regimes and support sanctions against them.
Therefore, there is no standard refugee process where people wait in line to have their applications considered.
Few countries between the Middle East and Australia are signatories to the 1951 Refugee Convention, and as such asylum seekers are forced to continue to travel to another country to find protection.
Some of these people who are afraid for their lives are fleeing from the world's most brutal regimes including the Taliban in Afghanistan and Sadaam Hussein's dictatorship in Iraq.
Antonio Domini, Head of UN Humanitarian Program in Afghanistan, states that Afghanistan is one of the most difficult places in the world in which to survive.
In 1999 I spoke about the shocking conditions for women in Afghanistan, where girls cannot be educated and women, even if they are widows, are not allowed to work outside the home.
Myth 4 - Asylum Seekers are Illegal
Under Australian Law and International Law a person is entitled to make an application for refugee asylum in another country when they allege they are escaping persecution.
Article 14 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights states that "Everyone has the right to seek and to enjoy in other countries asylum from persecution."
Many Asylum Seekers are forced to leave their countries in haste and are unable to get appropriate documentation.
In many cases oppressive authorities actively prevent normal migration processes from occurring. Can you imagine asking the Taliban for a passport?
People who arrive in Australia without proper documentation with the intention of seeking asylum are unauthorised arrivals
Of course, it is illegal to overstay a visa. The vast majority of estimated 60,000 illegal overstayers in Australia are from western countries, including 5,000 British tourists. Of course, its no surprise that the minister doesn't use the rhetoric of "crisis" in relation to these people - who are unquestionably illegal.
Myth 5 - Australia Already Takes Too Many Refugees
Last year Australia committed to taking 12,000 refugees. We didn't even meet that target - we were 1,632 short.
When the Minister cries crocodile tears about "illegals" taking the place of "genuine refugees" remember that.
Australia receives relatively few refugees by world standards. Next year Australia is again likely to receive 12 000 refugees through its humanitarian program. This number has remained static for three years, despite the ever-increasing numbers of refugees worldwide.
There are about 21 million refugees internationally now, and the number will inevitably grown should war break out in Afghanistan on top of the civil war, drought and famine the country has faced for decades.
Australia accepted 20 000 refugees each year at the beginning of the 1980's.
Myth 6 - We're Being Swamped by Hordes of Boat People
300 000 refugees arrived in Europe to seek asylum last year. In contrast, 4174 reached Australia by boat or plane.
In 2000, Iran and Pakistan each hosted over a million Afghan refugees.
The real burden of assisting refugees is borne in the main by the world's poorest nations.
Myth 7 - They're Not Real Refugees Anyway
97% of applicants from Iraq and 93% of applicants from Afghanistan seeking asylum without valid visas in Australia in 1999 were recognised as genuine refugees.
Generally, 84% of all asylum seekers are found to be legitimate refugees and are able to stay in Australia.
Myth 8 - They Must Be 'Cashed up' to Pay People Smugglers
It is alleged that people who have the resources to pay people smugglers could not possibly be genuine refugees.
The UNHCR disputes claims about 'cashed up' refugees saying that payments made to people smugglers in fact range from $4000 - $5000 AUD.
In reality, many families and communities pool their resources in an attempt to send their relatives to safety - often they are attempting to save young men from being pressganged by the Taliban into the front line where they are used as human mine clearers.
People smuggling is a crime that the international community needs to combat.
Instead of blaming people who will do anything to escape death or persecution, we should be offerring to help transit countries such as Indonesia improve their customs and immigration services.
Of course the PM wasn't interested in talking to President Megawati over the Tampa issue - and as it turned out, she wasn't interested in talking to him either, when he eventually tried phoning her a week after he started making public pronouncements about what Indonesia should do.
Surely improving our working relationship with transit countries such as Indonesia is a first step to combatting people smuggling - not an afterthought as it has been for this Minister.
The criminals who are prepared to profit from human misery in the people smuggling trade are also likely to be behind the small arms trade and drug trafikking.
We need to work with countries in our region to prevent people smuggling, and we need to help source countries overcome the reasons people are fleeing.
Its also worth remembering that the fact someone is educated or once had a good job could be an added reason for them to be persecuted, rather than a protection.
A recent article in the Telegraph told the story of Siad and Musdau Abrahim, who with their children, escaped from Afghanistan. Siad was a general surgeon and Musdau a gynaecologist. Siad had been forced by the Taliban to cut off the hands of two people who he was told were thieves.
He was threatened, and forced to perform the operations but fled Afghanistan with his family to avoid having to do the same in the future.
Myth 9 - There is no Alternative to Mandatory Detention
Fact: Asylum seekers claims need to be assessed for legitimacy. Australia is the only Western country that mandatorily detains asylum seekers whilst their claims are being heard. Asylum seekers are not criminals and detention should be minimal. At a cost of $104 a day per head the policy of detention is very expensive. Community based alternatives to mandatory detention can be found internationally and within the current Australian parole system.
As I have said in the past, children should never be kept in detention centres, and detention centres should not be run by private companies such as ACM.