Pearls and Irritations

Category: Immigration

  • Elaine Pearson. Australia should reconsider refugee transfers to Cambodia


    The Australian government should press Cambodian authorities to implement key reforms to improve treatment of refugees in Cambodia before transferring any refugees from Nauru. 

    In new Human Rights Watch interviews, asylum seekers and refugees living in Cambodia described hardships as a result of the Cambodian government’s failure to process regular nationality documents and due to poor economic conditions in the country. These include: difficulties in obtaining employment, denial of access to education, substandard access to health services, extortion and corruption by local authorities, and discrimination by officials and the public. Refugees said fear of mistreatment by the authorities kept them from speaking out or joining organizations to bring complaints.

    In September 2014, Australia and Cambodia signed a Memorandum of Understanding whereby refugees will be voluntarily transferred from Nauru to Cambodia. The Australian government will fund temporary accommodation and resettlement services for the refugees for at least one year, and then on a case-by-case basis, and health insurance will be provided for five years. The Australian government also committed to provide an additional A$40 million (US$35 million) over four years in development assistance for other projects in Cambodia as part of the bilateral refugee resettlement agreement. 

    “The Australian government shouldn’t make the refugees in Nauru suffer further by dumping them in a place unable to adequately resettle or reintegrate them,” said Elaine Pearson, Australia director at Human Rights Watch. “Cambodia should fix its faulty refugee protection and support services frameworks before accepting any refugees from Nauru, and the Australian government should insist on that.”

    In November, Human Rights Watch interviewed 10 refugees and asylum seekers currently living in Cambodia, and consulted with refugee and migrant support organizations, human rights groups, and United Nations agencies. Most of these refugees and asylum seekers requested Human Rights Watch to withhold their names and nationalities for fear of retribution.

    Cambodia took over issuing refugee status determinations from UNHCR in 2009, and currently hosts 63 refugees. Under Cambodia’s Sub-Decree No. 224 of 2009 on Procedures for Recognition as a Refugee or Providing Asylum Rights to Foreigners in the Kingdom of Cambodia, the government should issue residency cards and ensure refugees have the same legal rights as legal immigrants.

    “Human Rights Watch has discovered that five years on, not a single refugee has ever received a Cambodian residence card, let alone citizenship,” Pearson said.

    Citizenship in Cambodia requires prior possession of a residence card in order to go through the naturalization process. Instead, refugees are issued a prakas, or proclamation, by the Ministry of Interior that confirms their right to stay in Cambodia, but cannot be used for the many official purposes that require presentation of an ID card or travel document.

    Refugees have not received international travel documents and generally lack other basic personal documentation, such as family books, which officially specify the membership of families with local authorities, and are necessary to live a normal life in Cambodia.

    “This piece of paper [prakas] is absolutely useless,” a refugee told Human Rights Watch. “To get a job, a driver’s license, open a bank account, buy a motorbike, or even receive a wire transfer, you need to show a passport, not this piece of paper.”

    Cambodia’s agreement with Australia also states that refugees will be issued with the prakas as well as refugee resident cards and ID cards in accordance with Sub-Decree No. 224. But so far, current refugees in Cambodian have been denied those documents. The agreement further obliges Cambodia to provide international travel documents, but based on the experience of implementing its own sub-decree, this seems unlikely, Human Rights Watch said.

    “After five years Cambodia can’t even follow its own law on refugees, so Australia is, at best, naive to believe this deal will be any different,” Pearson said. “The Australian government only has to look at Cambodia’s poor human rights record to be wary of its commitments to protect refugees.”

    Elaine Pearson is the Australian Director of Human Rights Watch. 

  • John Menadue.  We pass by on the other side.

    We are one of the richest and most privileged people in the world but our recent performance on Ebola, foreign aid and refugees tells the world a quite different story.

    On Ebola, our response has been grudging and slow. We tendered one excuse after another. We moved quickly however to commit our military to combat again in Iraq and Syria. Our Medical Assistance Teams which we have deployed in humanitarian disasters like the typhoon Haiyan in the Philippines were ready to go to West Africa. They had volunteered and had vaccinations. The AMA urged us to get cracking. After a very lengthy delay the government decided to outsource our assistance. Our tardiness was in stark contrast to the response of countries such as the UK and the US. All the advice from experts was that the best way to address the Ebola outbreak was at its source. We knew that the medical and health facilities and hospitals in Liberia and other countries in the region were closing because the qualified staff were contacting Ebola and dying. Several hospitals were bereft of any staff. Healthcare in West Africa was near collapse but we delayed. Liberia has an income per head of $US454 p.a.; ours is over $US68,000. It is hard to recall a situation where our response has been so miserable.

    The UNHCR told us a few days ago that there were 13.6 million refugees displaced by the wars in Syria and Iraq. That is more than the combined populations of Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane and Perth, our four largest cities. By our involvement in the war in Iraq we have contributed to this humanitarian disaster. But our refugee intake has remained unchanged at 13,750 p.a. Kevin Rudd had promised to increase it to 20,000 and Tony Abbott agreed before the last election. He then changed his mind and kept the quota at 13,750. If we adjusted our intake according to our population increase since the time of the Indochina refugee program, we would now be taking over 35,000 refugees p.a. which would still be quite small in relation to our migrant intake. Whilst the humanitarian tragedy in the Middle East escalates, we continue to turn our back.

    We are also ignoring our responsibilities as a wealthy country in overseas development assistance. In the last budget, the biggest cut in government spending was in overseas development assistance. We spend more on our cats and dogs than we do on ODA. At the same time that it cut funding for the poor of the world, the government kept in place a whole range of programs that advantaged the wealthy, such as superannuation concessions and subsidies to the mining industry.

    Surely we can do a lot better than this.

  • John Tulloh. Israel High Court upsets Government on asylum seekers

    Israelis have been observing the month of repentance (Elul). As far as their government is concerned, it is members of the High Court who should be repenting. They have infuriated the Netanyahu government with an order to shut down a detention centre for asylum-seekers within 90 days and to reduce maximum detention without trial from one year to 60 days.

    It is all about what is called the Infiltrators Prevention Bill. This contained stiff measures to curb the influx of African asylum-seekers or, as the government calls them, illegal infiltrators.

    Israel has an estimated 48,200 asylum-seekers, mainly from Eritrea and Sudan. Many are fleeing genuine persecution. But some are almost certainly more interested in economic benefits than a sanctuary.

    About 2200 of them have been locked up in the Holot detention centre deep in the Negev desert near the Egyptian border and the subject of the court decision. Although called an ‘open’ facility, detainees were subject to three roll calls a day and the nearest town was 65 kms away. The inmates were locked up overnight and not allowed to work.

    In a 7 to 2 judgment, the court described the conditions there as ‘wretched’ and said the law ‘violates human rights in an essential, deep and fundamental way’. The judgment continued: ‘Infiltrators do not lose their right to their full dignity in coming to this country by any means necessary. They do not shed their (right to) dignity when they enter custody…and their right to dignity stands even if their arrival to the country was through illegal infiltration’.

    The Israel Interior Minister, Gideon Sa’ar, said he would not accept the High Court verdict. In a TV interview, he said ‘Israelis have rights, too. The state cannot accept a situation where it has no tools to deal with illegal infiltrators’. The result, he added, would mean ‘we won’t have a Jewish democratic state because our borders will be overrun with illegal infiltrators’.

    He ignored the fact that unwanted immigration had dropped to a trickle since the fence along the Egyptian Sinai border was completed in late 2012. But he did note that since the one-year detention law was introduced last December, the number of asylum-seekers leaving had tripled.

    The Israeli government has so far countered the court ruling in three ways.

    Firstly, it is investigating whether the Knesset can introduce new legislation, which, subject to certain provisos, could bypass the High Court. So much for the separation of powers.

    Secondly, it has announced the construction of an ‘open’ detention facility elsewhere consisting of tents where there would be only two roll calls a day.

    Thirdly, it has increased the payment offered to asylum-seekers willing to leave from up to US$1500 to up to $5000. But many Africans say no amount of enticement would encourage them to leave because of the fate they fear awaits them if they return home. Some say they would go if they could be resettled in a third country.

    Most of the African arrivals have descended on South Tel Aviv, a poor area, where they rely on NGOs and volunteers to survive. Many of the local residents want to see the visitors move on, saying they fear for their safety.

    However, the High Court justices did not offer any solution to the problem. Their sole interest was interpreting the law.

    According to an article on Israel’s The Real News website, Israel has an awkward dilemma. It says it has no real means for asylum-seekers to be assessed as refugees. If an African can achieve refugee status, then what about the hundreds of thousands of Palestinians who fled or were expelled after the 1948 war? It is a question Israel prefers to avoid.

    One asylum-seeker advocate wrote in the Jerusalem Post, ‘As Jews, we are taught we must love the stranger because we were once strangers in the Land of Egypt. We must not mistreat runaway slaves because we were once runaway slaves’. But many Israelis worry that the character of their country which they regard as essentially the homeland for Jews is under threat from the arrival of non-Jews from Africa.

    As it is, Israelis have had 30 years of experience of Africans living in their midst. These are the Ethiopians who fled the unrest back in the 80s, declaring they were Jewish. In a momentous airlift by Israeli planes, thousands were collected from refugee camps along the Sudan border and taken to Israel. Well before then, these Beta Israelis, as they are known, were officially declared by senior rabbis to be Jewish. Today there are 84,000 of them in Israel, many of whom have struggled to adapt to life there and the Hebrew language. But they are regarded as Jewish and therefore entitled to live in Israel without question whereas the Eritreans and Sudanese are not.

    It is certain that the Netanyahu government will continue to take a hardline approach to asylum-seekers and what, perversely, is called the Basic Law on Human Dignity and Freedom. In order to govern, it needs the support of ultra-nationalist and religious parties which have no empathy for the visitors no matter what the Torah teaches them about helping strangers.

    For now, though, the asylum-seekers remain in a legal limbo held as a collective rather than as individuals. Since Israel does not investigate their refugee claims, they are not granted any rights, cannot work and thus face a future with no way forward other than backward.

     

    John Tulloh had a 40-year career in foreign news.

     

     

     

  •  Claire Higgins. International legal obligations once shaped our refugee policy

    The refugee policy of the Fraser government is often invoked in debates about Australia’s current approach to asylum seekers. While the small number of boat arrivals between 1976 and 1981 cannot be compared to the many thousands who arrived between 2009 and 2013, the political difficulties in that era were far greater than simply the reception and processing of asylum seekers. By contrast with more recent policy, the Fraser government overcame these difficulties by choosing to fulfil Australia’s international legal obligations under the Refugee Convention and by explaining this imperative to the Australian community.

    Then, as now, the government was acutely aware that Australia was one of the only parties to the 1951 Refugee Convention and its 1967 Protocol within the region. Indeed, Australia ratified the 1967 Protocol only three years before the first Vietnamese boatpeople began to arrive in 1976. The Department of Immigration admitted that Australia was now ‘locked in’ to obligations and ‘had never envisaged’ forced migration on this scale. Yet instead of working to distance Australia from the Convention, the Department of Immigration worked to explain to the public that compliance with international legal and moral obligations was integral to Australia’s ‘credibility and status as a civilised, compassionate nation’.

    In fulfilment of these obligations, the Fraser government established Australia’s first formal refugee status determination procedure and used this mechanism to reassure the public that all boat arrivals were being rigorously assessed. Even though, in reality, the boatpeople could not be repatriated, the government nonetheless declared that only those found to be genuine refugees would remain in Australia. This was a clever strategy. By employing it, the government was able to emphasise the importance of giving due effect to Australia’s obligations under international law while maintaining the appearance of control over the entry of asylum seekers. There was no need to resort to the image of a militarised ‘national emergency’.

    Behind the scenes, the Fraser government was mindful to ensure that its response to asylum seekers should not be in breach of the Convention. The archives record how officials ruled out turning back boats and establishing closed detention centres due to the moral and legal implications of these measures. This was despite intelligence reports that up to 100,000 people could potentially sail to Australian shores. UNHCR records show that even the investigation and deportation of 146 fraudulent asylum claimants aboard the fishing vessel VT838 in 1981 was undertaken with the full knowledge of UNHCR’s Australian office.

    In public, the Fraser government sought to marry arguments about Australia’s international obligations with the need to move on from ‘White Australia’. Instead of expecting impoverished regional neighbours to shoulder the burden of resettlement, as Australia is now doing, the government encouraged the public to see that the admission of asylum seekers would enhance the nation’s standing in the eyes of the world. Efforts to improve Australia’s image abroad would come to nothing, the ministers for Immigration and Foreign Affairs announced, ‘if we now respond to the Vietnamese refugee question in a narrow, ungenerous and emotive way’. Given that the new UN High Commissioner for Human Rights has recently accused Australia of a ‘chain of human rights violations’ in relation to its offshore processing system, these issues are as relevant as ever.

    Working closely with UNHCR to expand and diversify the refugee intake was central to the Fraser government’s long-term vision for Australia’s immigration program. Immigration Minister Ian Macphee collaborated with his Labor shadow Mick Young to speak at public meetings around Australia on the benefits of non-discriminatory entry criteria and refugee resettlement. Macphee and Young recognised that the Indochinese intake was ‘a major wrench to the Australian people’, which brought about ‘more discussion about where our immigration policies were headed than took place at any previous time’. They ‘copped abuse’ from some members of the public as a result. Yet their bi-partisan efforts were based on the belief that these questions were vital to the nation’s future. On reflection, Macphee told the house in 1984, ‘I believe we are now a less parochial people’.

    The number of boat arrivals may have been much smaller during the Fraser era, but the political challenge was great. The Fraser government demonstrated that Australia can give effect to its international legal obligations while carefully managing the public’s response to asylum seekers. In looking to the past we are reminded that these objectives are not mutually exclusive.

    Dr Claire Higgins is an historian and a Research Associate at the Andrew & Renata Kaldor Centre for International Refugee Law at UNSW

     

  • George Lekakis recalls meeting Gough Whitlam.

    ​

    Dear John

    I just wanted to share a memory or two with you before this day is over.
    My father came to Australia in 1954 and he always told me that he
    never felt Australian until Gough was elected in 1972.
    In 1993, at the tail-end of my first visit to Greece, my uncle took me
    to the Byzantine ruins of Mystras on the outskirts of Sparta in
    Lakonia.
    We were sweltering that day as we walked about that amazing setting.
    As we were about to leave, a familiar voice came into earshot. I
    turned to see a tall man perched on a walking stick with a
    handkerchief wrapped over his head. I didn’t recognise him at first –
    I had only been hearing Greek for four months. But the voice
    resonated.
    I decided to move closer to the old man who was encircled by a bevy of
    important Greek scholars. As I approached, the scholars motioned me
    away, but there was another bloke – a bearded fellow – who called out
    to me:
    ” Do you wanna meet Gough?”
    “Yes,” I said.
    ” Come over here,” he said.
    About 15 minutes later after Gough had explained the history of the
    place to the bevy, the bearded fellow waved me over.
    I’ll never forget it – at the summit of Mystras, of all places!
    It’s probably not right for journos to have heroes, but I have a couple.
    The Chicago journalist Mike Royko is one of them.
    But Gough touched my family in so many ways.
    Blessings,

    George Lekakis is a writer for The New Daily.

  • The Italian solution.

    Last night the ABC program, Foreign Correspondent, carried a remarkable and moving account of the work of the Italian Navy in rescuing ‘people fleeing conflict or economic despair in the Middle East and Africa’.

    The Italian Admiral in charge of the operations in the Mediterranean said ‘We have the duty in these cases when we are at sea to intervene to save human life. If we are not at sea, then we can’t see what happens. We can close our eyes, turn off the lights and in that way, there’s no need to “turn back” the boats because they will die. We need to remember that International Rights exist. There are international laws that our countries have ratified’.

    I wonder if the Commander of Operation Sovereign Borders, Lt Gen. Angus Campbell, has time to watch this remarkable account of humanity in action.

    The Italian Navy shames our navy.   John Menadue

    See link to program below.

    http://www.abc.net.au/foreign/content/2014/s4106724.htm

  • John Menadue. Asylum seekers – institutionalised cruelty, the banality of evil and immorality.

    You might be interested in this repost.  John Menadue

    The recent statement by the Australian Catholic Bishops on asylum seekers says ‘The current policy has about it a cruelty that does no honour to our nation … Enough of this institutionalised cruelty … We call on the nation as a whole to say no to the dark forces which make these policies possible.’

    In her book ‘Eichmann in Jerusalem’, published in 1963, Hannah Arendt refers to the ‘banality of evil’. Her thesis is that Eichmann was not a fanatic or sociopath, but an extremely stupid person who relied on cliché rather than thinking for himself and was motivated by professional promotion rather than ideology.  She says ‘The sad truth is that most evil is done by people who never make up their minds to be good or evil’.

    In his post in this blog on February 17, reposted below, Hugh Mackay speaks of ‘international brutality … why not call our asylum policy what it is – immoral?’

    Our policies towards asylum seekers – cruel, evil and immoral- depend on our first dehumanising and then demonising asylum seekers. They are not like us and do not deserve empathy and protection.  It is an attempt to dull and chloroform our consciences.

    • Asylum seekers are illegals and akin to criminals. We launder our language to hide the cruelty and brutality of our policies. Even the Department of Immigration now uses the term ‘illegals’ which they are not.
    • Asylum seekers are so devoid of humanity that they would even throw their children overboard.
    • Journalists are excluded or deterred from visiting detention centres because we might hear of the hopes and fears of vulnerable people.
    • How can we have sympathy for asylum seekers who buy the services of people smugglers?
    • They are Muslims.
    • They are ungrateful foreigners who riot in detention centres.
    • They commit crimes in the community and should be treated and listed like paedophiles.
    • They bring disease and wads of cash.
    • They throw documents overboard and don’t tell the truth.

    As this day by day process of demonization proceeds the spark of humanity, decency or the divine in each of us is snuffed out. We are made to look foolish and soft if we respond to “our better angels”.

    Our leaders are not just determined to dehumanise asylum seekers but play mind games with us by suggesting government policies are designed to save people drowning at sea. If only there was the smallest bit of truth in this the government would be sending out ships to rescue desperate people at sea and ministers would be waiting hopefully for the UNHCR or the Nobel Prize committee to make a humanitarian award.

    Through political spin and by good people staying silent, we are losing our moral compass on what is right and decent. As Lord Lane, the former UK Lord Chief Justice put it ‘Oppression does not suddenly stand on the doorstep with a toothbrush moustache and a swastika armband. It happens step by step.’

    It is happening despite our asylum “problem “being minor compared with other counties and particularly poor countries like Pakistan.

    In allowing evil and cruelty to win our political terrain we could  recall the words of Pastor Martin Niemoller who was imprisoned by the Nazis ‘First they came for the communists and I didn’t speak up because I wasn’t a communist. Then they came for the Jews and I didn’t speak up because I wasn’t a Jew. Then they came for the Catholics and I didn’t speak up because I wasn’t a Catholic. Then they came for me and by that time there was no one left to speak up for me.’

    We don’t seem to care that perhaps in a decade we will be as ashamed of our present asylum and refugee policies as we are now for what we did  to our ‘stolen generation’.

    Where is our anger and concern?

    I recall a speech some time ago by Bill Moyes, the former host in the United States of the Weekly Public Series on PBS. He said ‘What has happened to our moral indignation. On the heath, King Lear asks Gloucester ‘How do you see the world?’ and Gloucester who is blind answers ‘I see it feelingly.’  I feel it feelingly also.  The news is not good these days. I can tell you though that as a journalist I know the news is never the end of the story. The news can be the truth that sets us free – not only to feel, but also to fight for the future we want. And the will to fight is the antidote to despair; the cure for cynicism … What we need is what the ancient Israelites called hochma – the science of the heart – the capacity to see, to feel and then to act as if the future depended on you.’

    And it does depend on you and me.

    We are acting cruelly and immorally. Evil now has an everyday face. But we pretend it is not us. Yet the opinion polls tell us that it is us – that we want to treat asylum seekers this way. Scott Morrison tells us ‘I get so much encouragement when I walk through Cronulla, go down to the beach or up to Miranda Fair’.

    Hannah Arendt said ‘The sad truth is that most evil is done by people who never make up their minds to be good or evil.’  That “sad truth” is happening in Australia today. We are standing by and letting it happen.

     

  • Mike Steketee. Abbott faces the reality of multicultural Australia

    While many conservatives continue to hold to the Howard line against multiculturalism, Tony Abbott is adjusting to the reality that Australia is a multicultural country, writes Mike Steketee.

    “The Australian Government will be utterly unflinching towards anything that threatens our future as a free, fair and multicultural society; a beacon of hope and exemplar of unity-in-diversity.”

    This is how Tony Abbott expressed his defence of Australian values before the United Nations Security Council this week.

    Many, probably most, Australians will find his words commendable, if perhaps unremarkable. Yet not so long ago, he would never have put it that way.

    His views on multiculturalism used to align with those of his conservative predecessor, John Howard, who hated the “m” word and avoided it at all costs. As he wrote in his autobiography, Lazarus Rising: “My view was that Australia should emphasise the common characteristics of the Australian identity. We should emphasise our unifying points rather than our areas of difference.”

    His views translated into action, with his government’s abolition of the Office of Multicultural Affairs and the Bureau of Immigration, Multiculturalism and Population Research and with the substitution of “citizenship” for the “m” word in the Immigration Minister’s title.

    Many conservatives continue to hold to the Howard line. According to Senator Cory Bernardi, “the naïve … proclaim multiculturalism as a triumph of tolerance when in fact it undermines the cultural values and cohesiveness that brings a nation together”.

    Queensland National MP George Christensen this week supported a ban on burqas. In 2013, Scott Morrison, then shadow immigration minister, argued thatmulticulturalism “simply means too many things to too many different people and increasingly runs the risk of fuelling division and polarising the debate, which is the antitheses of what it is supposed to achieve”.

    But Abbott no longer counts himself amongst the critics. Two weeks ago, he said: “I’ve shifted from being a critic to a supporter of multiculturalism, because it eventually dawned on me that migrants were coming to Australia not to change us but to join us.”

    His conversion goes back some years. In Battlelines, the book published in 2009, not long before he became opposition leader, he wrote that he previously had underestimated “the gravitational pull of the Australian way of life”. The influx of people from a long list of countries who applied to become Australian citizens, “far from diluting ‘Australian-ness’ …. shows people’s enthusiasm to join our team”.

    That would be Team Australia of recent invocation.

    In 2012, as opposition leader, he explained an experience that helped changed his mind:

    With (historian) Geoffrey Blainey, I used to worry that multiculturalism could leave us a nation of tribes. But I was wrong and I’ve changed my mind. The scales fell from my eyes when I discovered – while running Australians for Constitutional Monarchy, would you believe – that the strongest supporters of the Crown in our constitution included indigenous people and newcomers who had embraced it as part of embracing Australia.

    The irony is that this conversion has come at a time when multiculturalism is under greater stress than at any time since its introduction by the Whitlam government. Each successive wave of immigrants to Australia has caused friction, stretching all the way from the Irish in the 19th century to the post-World War II surge of Italians, Greeks and other Europeans and the large numbers of Vietnamese who arrived in the wake of the Vietnam war.

    Yet the cycle became a familiar and reassuring one, from initial resentment and discrimination towards new immigrants to acceptance and later celebration.

    “Wogs” used to be a term of derision; now it is a badge of honour for many of Italian and Greek origin. Despite some initial tensions and problems with crime, the successful integration of Vietnamese into a nation that only recently had abandoned the White Australia policy was eloquent testament to a tolerant society.

    Immigrants typically worked hard and soon spread out from the then poor inner suburbs as they became more affluent. Their sons and daughters started marrying outside their ethnic group and often became indistinguishable from other Australians.

    In short, as Abbott came to realise, Australia changed migrant families more than they changed Australia.

    The 2005 Cronulla riots, sparked by an attack on lifesavers by young men of Lebanese origin and fuelled by inflammatory comments by broadcaster Alan Jones, shattered the image of Australia as a model of racial harmony. Still, it could be rationalised as an isolated incident. Harder to dismiss is the emergence of home-grown jihadists who regard themselves as enemies of Australia – hardly a stellar example of unity in diversity.

    Unlike previous immigrants, some from the Middle East, predominantly Lebanese with often low education levels admitted by the Fraser government in the wake of the Lebanese civil war, did not follow the traditional path of working, inter-marrying and generally spreading out into society. For some, unemployment, crime and racism contributed to alienation, particularly amongst the young.

    In some senses, Abbott’s conversion may be more rhetorical than real. On coming to government, he shifted responsibility for multiculturalism from the immigration portfolio – something for which Morrison may be grateful – to Social Security, suggesting a narrowed focus.

    That brings it under Kevin Andrews, a big “c” conservative who, as immigration minister in 2007, cut the intake of African refugees because he said they had more trouble integrating into Australian society.

    Deriding their religion, criticising how they dress, let along branding them as terrorists, is seriously counter-productive.

    The Australian Multicultural Council, an advisory body to the previous government, is in limbo, with all its nine positions listed as vacant, although a spokesperson for Andrews told me the Government is in the process of appointing new members.

    The ministry of multicultural affairs under Labor has been downgraded to a parliamentary secretary’s position, filled by Senator Concetta Fierravanti-Wells, who, although a member of the hard right of the NSW Liberal Party, is preaching the success of multiculturalism.

    As prime ministers need to do, Abbott is adjusting to the reality that Australia is a multicultural country. The Government frontbench includes members with strong ethnic connections – Treasurer Joe Hockey (Armenian-Palestinian), Finance Minister Mathias Cormann (Belgian), Government Senate leader Eric Abetz (German), suspended assistant treasurer Arthur Sinodinos (Greek) and Fierravanti-Wells (Italian).

    Abbott is conscious that the ethnic vote can swing the result in federal seats, particularly in Sydney. He disappointed some of his strongest supporters with his decision to drop the so-called Bolt amendments to the Racial Discrimination Act after widespread opposition from ethnic groups.

    In this area and particularly in the current context, rhetoric matters – all the more so when it comes from the nation’s leader. Abbott is setting the right tone, balancing his uncompromising language against would-be Australian terrorists with words of reassurance for the Muslim community and an appeal to other Australians not to overreact.

    Given the rise of Islamic State and threats of beheadings in Australia, it is easy to lose perspective. The number of Muslims in Australia has risen rapidly – by 69 per cent between the 2001 and 2011 censuses. But they still number fewer than 500,000 and represent just 2.2 per cent of the population, fewer than the 2.5 per cent who are Buddhists.

    The vast majority are as law abiding as any other Australians. They have alerted Australian authorities to planned terrorist attacks. Deriding their religion, criticising how they dress, let along branding them as terrorists, is seriously counter-productive.

    Mike Steketee is a freelance journalist. He was formerly a columnist and national affairs editor for The Australian. View his full profile here

    This article was first published by the ABC, The Drum, on 26 September 2014.

  • Portraits of Humanity

    An exhibition by Wendy Sharpe is planned for February/March next year.   See details below and contacts for Wendy Sharpe and Lee Meredith of the Asylum Seekers Centre. JohnMenadue.

    Renowned artist, Wendy Sharpe, is developing a portrait exhibition to highlight our common  humanity with asylum seekers.  A previous Archibald winner and 2014 finalist, Wendy is drawing portraits of 39 refugees and asylum seekers as her contribution to creating public awareness and putting a human face to the issue.

    “This is not about politics.  I want to show our common humanity,” she said.  “I want to show that they are people like us, with hopes and dreams just like ours.

    “Many of those I have met during this project have fled situations of great danger, whether it is political, cultural or religious.

    “I can’t imagine how it would feel to have to leave everything behind.  But they have had to leave their family, their home, their culture and their country.  All of these form your personal identity.  But they have survived and are now focussed on rebuilding their lives and starting all over again.  It has been an inspiring experience for me.

    “Through these portraits I want to reach out to as many people as possible, especially those who may be confused by the many myths about the issue or feel uncomfortable with what is currently happening.”

    The exhibition will portray people who are living legally in the community while they wait for their applications for protection to be processed as well as some who have recently been granted protection.

    “This exhibition will continue projects I have undertaken in the past, particularly as an official war artist,” said Wendy.  “The portraits will be displayed in a major exhibition and then placed on sale.  I will not be receiving any commission and intend to donate the proceeds to support the vital work of the Asylum Seekers Centre in Sydney which provides personal and practical support to asylum seekers, such as legal advice, accommodation, health care, food and employment assistance.

    Melanie Noden, CEO of the Asylum Seekers Centre, said it is an incredible honour to have the support of an artist of Wendy’s status.

    “We believe that most Australian’s want to see asylum seekers treated with respect and dignity while they are in our care and waiting for their applications to be processed.

    “Through her art Wendy will be sharing the lives of asylum seekers with the general public, and show that underneath all the troubles and politics around the issue, we are all the same.”

    The exhibition will run for four weeks in February/March next year at The Muse Gallery, Sydney TAFE, Harris Street, Sydney.

    We are grateful to the following supporters for their contribution towards making this exhibition possible:  Sydney TAFE,  Michael Amendolis and Kadmium Art+Design Supplies.

    Contacts:  Wendy Sharpe:  0448 887 319, 

    Lee Meredith, Asylum Seekers Centre:  0432 062 122

     

  • Robert Manne. “When the facts change I change my mind. What do you do, Sir.” JM Keynes

    You might be interested in this repost. John Menadue.

     

    I have been a supporter of refugee rights since the mid-1970s, when with others I formed the Indo-China Refugee Association. During the period of the Howard government I wrote tens of thousands of words in defence of the asylum seekers fleeing from Iraq, Afghanistan and Iran. This interest arose from family history. Not only was I the child of refugees from Nazism. I very recently discovered that not long after my father was accepted by this country he wrote passionate articles in The Jewish News expressing, on the one hand, gratitude to Australia, and, on the other, radical astonishment that the most anti-fascist element in the community, Jewish refugees, were subject to petty forms of discrimination as enemy aliens. I mention all this to make it clear that what I am going to say this afternoon is delivered with a heavy heart.

    The asylum seeker issue, or more accurately, the issue of those asylum seekers who arrive by boat, has been near the centre of Australian politics for the past fifteen years. Opinion has generally fallen into two broad camps—the friends of the asylum seekers and their enemies. These camps have now become very rigid. Thought has become frozen. As happens when thought is frozen, dishonesty abounds.

    The dishonesty of the enemies of the asylum seekers is familiar. They deny or diminish the human cruelty of their deterrent policies—mandatory indefinite detention; temporary protection visas; offshore processing; tow-back to Indonesia. They close their eyes to the damage these deterrent policies inflict upon the reputation of this country, especially in the Asia-Pacific region where the White Australia Policy is remembered. Their attitudes moreover reek of hypocrisy. The enemies of the asylum seekers opposed the idea of deterring boat arrivals by sending eight hundred to Malaysia on the grounds that it was not a signatory to the United Nations Refugee Convention. They simultaneously advocated towing boats back to Indonesia, itself not a signatory to the Convention. In public, they shed crocodile tears about the hundreds of drownings that occurred under the policies of Rudd and Gillard. In private despite the mass drownings they were delighted with the political advantages the accelerated arrivals offered to the Abbott Opposition, as a WikiLeaks cable revealed.

    Of more interest to me however is the dishonesty that I have witnessed among my former allies—the friends of the asylum seekers.  From late August 2001 the Howard government introduced the policies of offshore processing on Nauru and Manus Island and occasional tow-back to Indonesia, known as the Pacific Solution. Between 2002 and 2007 virtually no asylum seekers arrived by boat. And yet throughout these years, almost without exception, the friends of the asylum seekers refused to admit that in its deterrent objective the policy had worked.

    In 2008 the Rudd government dismantled the Pacific Solution. Shortly after, the asylum seeker boats returned, eventually in much larger numbers than during the Howard period. Under Howard there were approximately 13,000 boat asylum seekers; in just the final year of the Gillard government some 25,000. And yet the friends of the asylum seekers rarely admitted that it was the dismantling of the Howard policies that was primarily responsible. Frequently the friends of the asylum seekers claimed that with firm political leadership the anti-asylum seeker sentiment of the Australian people could be turned. This denied the meaning of hundreds of public opinion surveys and flew in the face of common sense.

    Most troublingly, the friends of the asylum seekers failed to register the moral meaning of the 1100 certain or probable drownings that took place under Rudd and Gillard. There was great anguish at the time of the mass drowning following the sinking of SIEV-X in October 2001 for which the Howard government was blamed. There has been even greater anguish following the recent terrible death of Reza Berati on Manus Island for which the policies of the Abbott government have been blamed. But among the friends of the asylum seekers, the mass drownings that took place under Rudd and Gillard barely registered or lingered in collective memory. I frequently read articles by prominent friends of the asylum seekers berating the present policies of offshore processing and tow-back where even the fact of mass death by drowning is not mentioned.

    In their principled opposition to all forms of deterrent policy, many friends of the asylum seekers are wedded to a Kantian absolute—for them it is never permissible to save a greater number of lives by treating certain people, like those presently marooned on offshore processing centres on Nauru and Manus Island, as a means to an end. Others are legal absolutists, for whom, no matter what the consequences, it is never permissible for what they believe is the letter or spirit of international law, in this case the UN Refugee Convention, to be violated by a regime of offshore processing. Yet others are indifferent to the political dimension of the asylum seeker question. For them there is no problem for the Labor Party, the only opposition party that is a serious contender for government, to hand a permanent political advantage to its Coalition opponents. This position implies that in Australia today the asylum seeker issue should trump all other considerations, for example whether or not our country becomes involved in the most vital question of our era—the struggle to combat global warming.  In my view, all these forms of absolutism—moral, legal, anti-political—are wrong-headed. On the asylum seeker issue many moral, legal and political questions have to be balanced and taken into account. The world is complex. Asylum seeker policy is inherently very difficult.

    Because of their commitment to one or another form of absolutism, almost all friends of the asylum seekers now advocate the dismantling of the policy of offshore processing and tow-back, in other words a return to the policy of the Rudd government in 2007-8. Our only reliable guide to what might eventuate if they succeeded in their ambition is what happened in the past. Following Rudd’s abandonment of the Pacific Solution, three things occurred. The issue of asylum seekers helped undermine the government’s popularity and served the interests of the Coalition. Asylum seekers arrived by boat in accelerating numbers—in 2010-11, 5,000; in 2011-12, 8,000 and in 2012-13, 25,000. Most importantly, in these few years, on their way to Australia, some 1100 asylum seekers died at sea. Those who now advocate the end of the current policy of offshore processing and tow-back, a policy that has quite predictably stopped the boats, need to explain why history will not repeat itself.

    There is another consequence of the present position of the friends of the asylum seekers—by campaigning for the dismantling of offshore processing, they have abandoned any prospect of contributing to the formulation of a more humane and politically realistic asylum seeker and refugee policy. One aspect would be to look to conditions in the offshore processing centres and the ultimate fate of those presently there in such a way that suffering was diminished but the deterrent purpose maintained. The other would be to look to the future of the thirty thousand or so recently arrived asylum seekers in Australia who are being treated with great cruelty by the present government. Some of these people are in detention centres. A larger number are on one or another form of bridging visa, waiting for their asylum seeker claims to be assessed. Some with adverse ASIO assessments have been imprisoned without trial for life. Many are living in penury. Many are not allowed to work. These people are promised that even if they are assessed to be genuine refugees they will never be allowed to become permanent citizens.

    Through the combination of these policies, Australia for the first time in its history has a government that is consciously engineering the creation of an immigrant under-class.  As there is now an effective deterrent at the border, older ineffective domestic deterrent policies—like mandatory detention, temporary protection visas, absence of work rights or access to decent welfare services—are not only cruel but entirely purposeless.  They are also quite predictably creating social problems for Australia in the future. All these policies should be abandoned.

    It is, moreover, a misunderstanding to think that Australians are hostile to refugees. Historical experience and almost all opinion polls show that Australians are opposed not to refugees but to those who arrive without visas by boat. It was more politically difficult for the Fraser government to accept the 2,000 Vietnamese spontaneous boat refugee arrivals than the tens of thousands selected by the government from the South-East Asian camps.

    Rather than advocating the dismantling of offshore processing, the friends of the asylum seekers in my opinion could play a far more fruitful role by the advocacy of full human rights for those asylum seekers presently on Australian soil, and an annual refugee intake of 30,000 refugees chosen from among those in most desperate need, like the persecuted Hazaras of Afghanistan or the Rohingyas of Myanmar, the ethno-religious groups most closely experiencing what the Jews of Central Europe experienced in the late 1930s. This is the kind of policy that the Labor Party could realistically take to the next election. It is the policy for which I intend to fight.

     

    This talk was delivered to Limmud Oz in Melbourne on Sunday, June 8 2014. Limmud Oz is a Jewish Festival of Ideas.

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

  • Andrew Kaldor. Are We Paying Too Much To Stop The Boats?

    One of the claims that some commentators like to make about Australia’s asylum seeker policy is that it saves money. It’s got to be cheaper to stop the boats than to have people coming to our shores that way to seek refuge. Right?

    Wrong. It is not easy to find the actual total costs of Australia’s policy of mandatory detention and offshore processing across all agencies because no government has ever provided a total figure. But the National Commission of Audit recently released data which shines a light on the huge and rapidly increasing costs of our policies.

    By the Audit Commission’s reckoning, Australia now spends the same as the United Nations High Commission for Refugees (UNHCR) spends on its entire global refugee and displaced persons operations.

    The UNHCR is responsible for helping and protecting some 50 million displaced persons around the world, including 11.6 million refugees. It expects to spend about $3.5 billion (US$3.3bn) in 2014. To cover 10,000 staff and all relief for the emergencies in Syria and Iraq, and Africa, as well as the protracted situations worldwide.

    Compare that with the $3.3 billion Australia spent in 2013-14 on the detention and processing of boat arrivals. It has been the fastest growing Government programme over recent years, increasing from $118 million in 2010 at the average annual growth rate of a staggering 129 per cent.

    Next year, the Department of Immigration’s budget is about $2.9 billion for that operation. But this number probably understates the total costs. It appears to ignore the extra aid to Papua New Guinea for signing the Manus Island deal, $420m over four years. It also ignores the costs of the AFP, ASIO, and State judicial system. Moreover, the value of current contracts issued by the Immigration Department, just for offshore detention for the 2014-15 fiscal year, has been estimated to be $2.7 billion [Source: data compiled by Nick Evershed, The Guardian, 25 August 2014].

    The most expensive and least efficient part of Australia’s policy is offshore detention. The commission calculated that offshore processing costs Australian taxpayers is 10 times more than letting asylum seekers live in the community while their refugee claims are processed. The cost for detaining one asylum seeker offshore for one year is over $400,000, compared with $239,000 for onshore detention and under $100,000 for community detention. The cheapest option is a bridging visa which costs $40,000 a year. Moving all the asylum seekers to bridging visas, which are no guarantee of permanent settlement, would save the Federal Budget around $2 billion.

    The huge cost of overseas detention should be carefully examined particularly when other programmes are subject to budget cuts. An assessment should include a comparison of our expenditure with other countries, other government programmes, and particularly to the UNHCR.

    Given that Australia currently has about 34,000 people at various stages of the asylum process, expenditure of $3.5bn is extraordinarily expensive and wasteful.

    Sweden, which received around 54,000 asylum seekers in 2013 and expects more than 60,000 this year, spends some $1bn (7B kroner ) – a third of our costs – to manage almost double the number of asylum seekers.

    The UK will spend $3.13 billion (1.8bn pounds) on its entire immigration and border operations in 2014-15. Compare this with the Immigration Department’s total budget for 2015 of $4.8 billion.

    Compare this also with our spending priorities domestically. Proposed higher education cuts will save a total $3.1 billion over the next four years, equal to the costs of deterring the boats for one year.

    Using the data made publicly available, the savings from placing all asylum seekers on bridging visas for one year would equal, for example, the revenue gained from the unpopular fuel excise indexation over the next four years.

    Australia spends more on managing maritime asylum seekers than the total government funding for R & D. Total budgeted funding for research in 2014-15 is $2.55 billion.

    The $7 Medicare co-payment, designed to build a $20 billion research fund, is forecast to raise about $2.7 billion next year – still less than our cost of deterring asylum seekers.

    And to put these costs into a cultural perspective, stopping the boats costs about as much as funding the ABC, SBS, Arts Council, Australian Institute of Sport and National Parks put together.

    The “Winning Edge” plan by the Australian Institute of Sport to move our performance from world class to world best, receives an appropriation of $180 million. That is equivalent to holding about 450 asylum seekers in offshore detention for one year.

    In a new book Refugees: Why Seeking Asylum Is Legal And Australia’s Policies Are Not, authors Jane McAdam and Fiona Chong argue that the extraordinary expense of our deterrence measure is not justified by empirical evidence about the behaviour, threat or legitimacy of asylum seekers. We have better, cheaper options.

    The economic burden of stopping the boats is massive and unnecessary. Politicians on all sides of the debate should take the cost of our current approach into account.

    The question we should all be asking is this: is stopping the boats as important as our spending on research, or the entire budget of recreation, sport and culture?

    Andrew Kaldor is a Sydney businessman, philanthropist and founder of the Andrew and Renata Kaldor Centre for International Refugee Law at NSW.

     

     

     

  • John Menadue–We stopped the boats; we will now stop the jihadists

    You may be interested in this repost. John Menadue

     

    By linking boat arrivals and jihadists in the one sentence, a couple of weeks ago, Tony Abbott sounded very much like a dog-whistler that we can expect to hear more from in the future.

    He knows there is widespread, although a mistaken perception, that most boat arrivals were Muslims and that Muslim jihadist are a threat to Australia. A lot of dog-whistlers are going to feed on that perception.

    Scott Morrison has shown us what is likely to be in store. He told Jane Cadzow in the SMH that he had urged the coalition partners ‘to ramp up the questioning … to capitalise on anti-Muslim sentiment’.

    In my blog of December 31 last year ‘Are most asylum seekers and refugees Muslims?’ I wrote about the refugee settlement figures for two years that were then available – Calendar year 2010 and April 2011 to March 2012. With some qualifications, the figures showed that in the first period 51% of refugees were Christian, 26% Muslim and 23% ‘other’. In the second period, 42% were Muslim, 34% Christian and 24% ‘other’.

    In assessing refugees of course, no religious test is or should be made. Further the figures will vary from year to year on religious background depending on the asylum flows and countries of violence and persecution, e.g. from the Middle East, Myanmar, Africa or Sri Lanka. The Christian outflow from the Middle East is likely to continue as Christian minorities face continuing persecution and death.

    The figures that I mention above do not show that most asylum seekers are Muslim.

    It is also a mistake to suggest in any way that most Muslims are Jihadists. Some will be, but every group has its extremists and hot-heads that must be managed.

    I have not yet seen any figures to suggest that the Jihadists from Australia now fighting in the Middle East were former asylum seekers or refugees. Many of them look to be Australian born converts with very non-Middle Eastern names. Converts often have a habit of being more extreme. Every community has social misfits ,seeking notoriety and looking for excitement.

    It is the responsibility of the Australian government not to act with political opportunism over this problem, but to very forcefully and deliberately deal with extremists who leave this country to fight battles overseas that have got nothing to do with Australia. Where appropriate citizenship should be denied, passports withdrawn and breaches of our laws resolutely pursued. We can’t build a diverse and strong multi-cultural Australia if some of our number is allowed to abuse our hospitality and fight old battles overseas.

    In gathering intelligence on jihadists we will depend on ASIO and ASIS. Although my experience with these two organisations is dated they don’t give me much confidence.  They do attract a lot of odd bods, with little effective review of their performance. My experience was that ministers and senior officials are easily seduced into the unreal world of information and misinformation, facts and untested gossip.

    The Muslim leadership in Australia also has to bear a heavy responsibility in helping to manage the hot-heads in their communities. It may be apocryphal but I heard that during the Balkan War of 1991-99, Paul Keating summoned the Serb and Croat leaders in Australia, and warned them if violence continued between their communities, he would ‘knock your f… head’s off’. It sounds very Keatingesque – blunt and to the point. But to me it highlights the responsibility of leaders of our new communities to their new country.

    I have seen warnings but no evidence that Australians have involved themselves in the Israeli/ Gaza conflict

    I hope we can keep the dog-whistlers at bay, who will want to make the link between boat arrivals, Muslims and Jihadists. It is a sensitive issue and must be handled in a sensitive and resolute way without political opportunism intervening.

    Firmness is required by both the Australian government and its agencies, and the Muslim leadership in Australia.

     

  • Xanthe Emery: Family violence and immigration – is the message getting across?

    Family violence in Australia is at epidemic levels, with some horrific high profile cases dominating the news in 2014. Migrant women in Australia are extremely vulnerable to violence from their partners. Threats to cancel a woman’s visa are used to frighten, intimidate, and coerce her to stay in a violent relationship. More could be done to ensure that migrants are aware you don’t have to remain in a violent relationship to obtain a visa.

    Visas for family members of Australian citizens, permanent residents, and some eligible New Zealand citizens will make up 32% of the migration programme for Australia in the 2014-15 financial year. Partner visas (including spouses, de facto couples and fiancés) make up the vast majority of the visas in the family stream. In the 2014-15 year, the government has planned for 47,825 partner visas.[1] Generally, partner visas are granted first as temporary visas. After approximately two years, temporary partner visa holders can move to a permanent partner visa, once they have satisfied the Department of Immigration and Border Protection (“DIBP”) that the relationship with their sponsoring partner is genuine and continuing.

    However, in certain circumstances, a person can be granted a permanent partner visa, despite the fact that the relationship with their sponsoring partner has ended. One of these exceptions is where a visa applicant can demonstrate that they have experienced family (or domestic) violence at the hands of their sponsoring partner during the relationship. Very specific evidence is required to satisfy DIBP that violence has occurred, and the burden of providing the evidence remains with the visa applicant. These are referred to as the ‘family violence provisions’, and are part of measures to ensure that vulnerable migrants (predominantly women) don’t have to choose between their visa and their safety. 

    A number of recent high profile cases of family violence have caused politicians, the media, and the public to turn their attention to an issue that is a national disgrace. In 2013, there were 27,000 domestic assaults reported to NSW police.[2] And this only reflects assaults actually reported. An Australian Bureau of Statistic study in 2005 found that 82% of women who experienced violence from a current partner did not report it to police. Globally, intimate partner violence is one of the leading causes of death for women.[3]

    For migrant women in Australia, social isolation, lack of English language skills, unfamiliarity with Australian law, or dependence on sponsors, means they may be particularly vulnerable to domestic violence, and less able to take steps to leave a violent relationship. One of the most powerful tools partners use to suppress and control migrant women is the threat to have her visa cancelled or have her “kicked out” of Australia. Many women disclose a fear of immigration officials appearing at their front door and escorting them straight to the airport. Coupled with this, is the fear many women have for their futures if they return to their home country, separated and shamed. Additionally, the fear of losing access to children influences women to remain in violent relationships.

    In the 2012-13 financial year, there were 867 family violence claims made to DIBP. This is a small proportion of the number of partner visas but likely doesn’t reflect the true number of women at risk because many women do not report violence to police, let alone to Immigration.

    Family violence is not unique to particular ethnic groups or people from low socio-economic backgrounds. Migrant women from a variety of countries, ethnicities, religious affiliations and economic standing experience family violence from their sponsoring partner.

    So are we doing enough to ensure that migrant women are aware they can access protection in Australia and don’t need to choose between an abusive relationship and being forced to leave Australia? Many victims do not know that their partner has no power to cancel their visa and are unaware of the existence of the family violence provisions.

    The challenge for DIBP and Australian policy makers is to protect the family violence provisions from fraud, whilst ensuring that migrant communities are aware of the existence of the provisions and the help that is available. Abuse and misuse of the family violence provisions will have the biggest impact on genuine family violence victims. If the family violence provisions are viewed as a loophole for gaining residency, genuine family violence victims are likely to be viewed with suspicion. Seeking and then accessing help, as well as speaking up about their experiences, can be an extremely difficult ask for migrant women. Adding to this a sense that they must prove what they have been through is real, can be too much for some to cope with.

    Additionally, many women are unable to access legal assistance during this most difficult time. Financial vulnerability, and limited community legal services, means many women must try to fumble through complex immigration regulations unguided. For example, providing a letter instead of a statutory declaration, or a social worker failing to name the perpetrator of the violence in their evidence, can mean a person’s visa is refused. The consequences for mistakes here are serious. What is also important to remember is that while negotiating their immigration status and dealing with DIBP, many migrant women are also suffering from the trauma of their experiences, homelessness, and abject poverty.

    Funding has been cut to women’s refuges in NSW and a number of refuges are closing down. This is a big problem because many women are referred via the refuge for further help, including legal assistance. Often, a victim’s first point of call is the Domestic Violence Crisis Line and/or the police. Victims who are then homeless are usually assisted to find accommodation in a women’s refuge. The refuges have great staff and social workers who then assist their clients to sort out their various issues. There are serious concerns that without refuges, many women will become homeless, but also this vital referral ‘hub’ will be lost. This will mean more women are unaware of what to do about their immigration situation if their relationship ends with their sponsor.

    Australia’s migrant community, particularly women at risk of social and cultural isolation, would benefit from a targeted campaign that makes clear what their rights are once they arrive in Australia, and that violence need not be tolerated in order to hold on to a visa.

    Xanthe Emery is a solicitor at the Immigration Advice and Rights Centre, a community legal centre in Sydney.

    [1] Migration Programme statistics from the Department of Immigration an Border Protection: https://www.immi.gov.au/media/statistics/statistical-info/visa-grants/migrant.htm

    [2] ‘Time to act on domestic violence’, Sydney Morning Herald, 7 March 2014: http://www.smh.com.au/comment/smh-editorial/time-to-act-on-domestic-violence-20140307-34cqt.html

    [3] K.M. Devries et al, ‘The global prevalence of intimate partner violence against women’, June 2013: http://www.cugmhp.org/gamma/wp-content/uploads/2013/10/TheoVos2013-article3WomenViolence.pdf

  • Hugh Mackay. Does every moral lapse make the next one easier?

    The political decline of the Abbott government has been remarkable. No other federal government in recent history has fallen from favour so soon after an election, nor languished in the polls so intractably (consistently trailling Labor 47-53 for more than six months).

    The question is: why?

    There are at least two answers. The obvious one is political incompetence: in particular, the government’s blindness to the reality of its situation. By “its situation” I don’t just mean its challenging relationship with the Senate; I mean the fact that, like many oppositions coming to power, it had less to crow about than it was prepared to admit.

    Forgive me if I repeat a well-worn argument: oppositions don’t win elections, governments lose them. If a government is doing reasonably well, we don’t throw it out. (In fact, we are so unwilling to change federal governments, we’ve only done it six times since 1949.) A government must be seen to be terminally incompetent, or worn out, before we replace it.

    The Coalition came to power in 2013 courtesy of a deeply divided Labor government with a hopelessly discredited leader. The majority of voters did not want Tony Abbott as their prime minister, but their urge to thump Labor was overwhelming. Put bluntly, they voted for the Coalition because it was not Labor.

    A smart leader, newly into office, would respect the implications of that. Be modest in your first-term goals, so you can take the people with you; let the voters learn to trust you; build consensus as a platform for your longer-term policy objectives.

    Not this lot. Having promised “no surprises”, having foreshadowed a measured and steady approach, they went berserk: from the lunacy of knights and dames and the assault on welfare support for the young unemployed to Senator Brandis’s disastrous foray into the “bigotry” debate and Christopher Pyne’s unheralded proposals for new university fee-structures, they have kept the surprises coming. Worse, they claim a mandate for whatever they do, as if the electorate had pondered a long list of policy options and decided, on balance, that they preferred the Coalition’s over Labor’s.

    All this is read by the voters as arrogance. And arrogance, in Australia, is the cardinal sin.

    There’s a less obvious explanation for the government’s woes that runs even deeper than any of that: this is a government that appears to have lost its moral authority.

    Moral authority is a subtle, nuanced thing: once lost, it is hard to win back. It’s partly a matter of whether the electorate trusts the leader and cabinet, and partly a question of whether the voters’ nobler nature is being appealed to. But moral authority is also a function of the moral tone of a government’s policies – especially its signature policies – and the way they affect its approach to government.

    So which policies set this government’s moral tone?

    No one could have failed to notice that “stop the boats” was, and remains, one of the signature policies of the Abbott government – right up there with repealing the carbon tax.

    If “stop the boats” only meant “let’s find a way to stop people-smugglers from exploiting refugees as profit-fodder”, we could all sign up to that, though it’s obviously a regional challenge that calls for skilled diplomacy. But the slogan loses all its moral force when it is used as an excuse to brutalise legitimate asylum-seekers who are already here.

    And it becomes even less defensible when it is used not only to imprison and abuse refugees seeking asylum in Australia, but to palm them off to countries far less well-equipped to absorb them than we are. (Cambodia? Are we serious?)

    One of the most devious aspects of the government’s defence of its treatment of asylum-seekers is that “we are trying to stop people drowning at sea”. (Labor employed precisely the same sophistry.) If this were true, it would have resulted in a vigorous policy of air-and-sea rescue patrols committed to saving any refugees at risk of drowning. So the claim is self-evidently hypocritical.

    That piece of silliness aside, “stop the boats” has become such a totemic, mesmeric slogan, it’s tempting to fall for the idea that the legitimacy of the policy has been established by its apparent success. Perhaps the government doesn’t realise that, even though it has persuaded many voters to support the policy, the grim reality of its execution was always bound to set alarm bells ringing in the national conscience. We know that dark deeds are being performed in our name that will eventually come back to bite us.

    But the government’s loss of moral authority does not spring from just that one policy: the real problem is that when there is a moral black hole at the very centre of a government’s rationale (“the end justifies the means”), a more general moral laxity becomes possible.

    This taps into an ancient issue: if a man betrays his wife, does that make it easier for him to betray his country? Does stealing once make stealing a second time more likely? Does every moral lapse make the next one easier?

    Let’s see how the dominoes might fall in this case.

    Once you have learnt to live with a policy that hits desperate refugees where it hurts most – denying them identity, dignity, freedom and hope – it becomes easier to be tough on your own poor, elderly, unemployed and marginalised. Thus, the inherent unfairness of the May budget can be traced to this malaise at the core of the government’s philosophy.

    Similarly, once you ignore your international obligations regarding the treatment of asylum seekers, it becomes easier to ignore other obligations to the global community – like the need to decarbonise the economy by urgently ramping up our production of clean energy. Thus, the proposed scrapping of the Clean Energy Finance Corporation and the scaling back of the emissions target can also be linked to a general reluctance to accept moral responsibility (except when it comes to military support for the US in the Middle East).

    In such a relaxed moral climate, it becomes easier to break promises. The long list of broken election promises, from pensions to ABC funding, is extraordinary even by the low standards of contemporary politics.

    It’s not only easier to break promises, it’s also easier to be blithe about doing it. Once you’ve enshrined a Big Lie at the heart of your signature policy – insisting that “these people have come here illegally” when they most assuredly have not – other lies are easier, whether it’s the lie about school funding (“We’re on the same page as Labor”) or the lies that deny promises have been broken (“No, we haven’t broken our promise about superannuation …”).

    The Abbott government might not yet fully appreciate the cumulative effect of all this on voter sentiment – an effect compounded, of course, by its extravagant pre-election posturing about integrity, probity, promise-keeping and “Labor’s lies”.

    Any government can recover from political ineptitude, and the heightened terrorist threat and redeployment of troops in Iraq will probably lift this government’s stocks in the short term. But the loss of moral authority is an underlying problem that won’t go away, because it is a loss that diminishes us all.

     

    Hugh Mackay’s new book ‘The Art of Belonging’ is published by Macmillan on 30 September 2014.

  • David Isaacs and Ian Kerridge. Asylum seeker’s ‘brain death’ shows failure of care and of democracy.

    The news that Hamid Kehazaei, a 24-year-old Iranian asylum seeker detained on Manus Island, has been diagnosed as brain dead following his transfer to the Mater Hospital in Brisbane is a tragedy. That it is a tragedy for this young man and his family is unquestionable The news – but the extent of this tragedy may be much more pervasive than we realise.

    If the emerging details of his case are correct, Kehazaei developed septicaemia as a complication of cellulitis (skin and soft-tissue infection) arising from a cut in his foot. This, in itself, is disturbing.

    Severe infection can result in brain death – either from infection of the brain itself (meningitis, encephalitis or brain abscess), or from brain injury due to a lack of oxygen resulting from cardiac arrest (as appears to be the case here), or from reduced blood supply to the brain. Yet it is very uncommon, especially in a young, previously healthy man.

    Such a case could occur in Australia and has been described in 2012 in young Indigenous adults in Central Australia. Nevertheless, severe sepsis resulting from a foot infection is preventable. And a case like this occurring in an Australian national would raise serious questions about the appropriateness of the antibiotics used and the timeliness of care.

    Most cases of brain death result from traumatic brain injury, stroke or lack of oxygen to the brain following asphyxia, near-drowning, or prolonged cardiopulmonary resuscitation.

    What happened to Hamid Kehazaei raises concerns about the adequacy of care provided to him during initial treatment, including wound care and antibiotics, and how soon he was transferred to expert medical care, first to Port Moresby and subsequently to Brisbane.

    If this young man became ill and had his brain die while seeking asylum in Australia and while in our care, then we must examine the details of his case and ask ourselves not only whether it was preventable but whether our policies and processes actually contributed to his death.

    But how can we even begin to ask these types of questions when we know so little about the circumstances in which he became ill, and his subsequent care?

    Protestations that this is due to the necessity of respecting privacy and confidentiality, ethical principles that are core to the health professional-patient relationship, are to some extent correct. But they also obscure important features of this case.

    The government is simply wrong to claim that this issue should not be “politicised”. What is ultimately at issue here is the way in which domestic politics and border policy impose norms (rules of behaviour) that are antithetical to medicine and health care and, fundamentally, to democracy.

    Medicine, like biomedical science, requires transparency and honesty to be clinically and ethically sound. Peer review, clinical audit, root-cause analysis, family conferences, conflict-resolution strategies, case consultation, multidisciplinary team meetings, mortality and morbidity meetings, open disclosure policies: all rest on the importance of transparency and respect.

    In contrast, we know very little about the people who seek asylum in Australia. Everything is secret – their arrival, their situation, their medical need, their illnesses, and their death.

    This requirement for secrecy has largely overwhelmed efforts by many good people – legislators, human rights lawyers, refugee advocates, health workers, politicians and ordinary citizens – to shine a light on what is happening to people in detention.

    The Immigration Health Advisory Group has been disbanded, restricting the degree to which the health professions can critique the care available to asylum seekers. And even those tasked with providing medical care to asylum-seekers struggle to advocate for the people under their care.

    Policies restrict the degree to which they can care for their patients or refer them for specialist care not available in the detention centres. Contracts bind them to secrecy and many, often shocked by what they have seen, are prevented from speaking out by legal threats and intimidation long after they’ve returned to the mainland.

    The language of “border control” has been used to excuse political secrecy. But such secrecy is what we usually associate with autocratic governments and is the antithesis of democratic ideals.

    What this case illustrates, yet again, is that the asylum seekers detained on Manus and Christmas Islands and Nauru have been excised not only from the laws that determine access to Australia but from the care we should provide any vulnerable person for whom we are responsible. And from the ethical principles upon which medicine and our health system are based.

    If we care about these people, and if we truly believe in the humane values that ground medicine and the moral principles that ground democracy, then we need to do two things. The first is to hold a truly independent inquiry into the care of people in detention. And the second is to end off-shore processing.

    David Isaacs is Professor of Pediatric Infectious Diseases at University of Sydney.

    Ian Kerridge is Associate Professor in Bioethics & Director, Centre for Values and Ethics and the Law in Medicine at University of Sydney. 

    This article was first published in ‘The Conversation’. 

  • Ben Lewis. The false advertising of mandatory detention and “Stopping the Boats”

    Spend any amount of time listening to Australian policy makers or reading Australian media and you’re certain to hear a familiar phrase: “Stop the Boats”. It has become such a political imperative within the Australian asylum seeker debate that “Stop the Boats” is rarely even challenged.  But putting aside the question of whether Australia should (or even can) “Stop the Boats”, there is a fundamental flaw in the logic . . . the key policy which underpins the “Stop the Boats” thinking—namely mandatory detention—has been shown to be false advertising.

    The truth is that there is no empirical evidence to suggest that harsh immigration policies such as mandatory detention deter irregular migration. That’s because, when it comes to human migration, countries by and large don’t have control over who leaves a territory or to where they are headed. Empirical research for decades has shown that immigration policies are predominantly responsive to, not determinative of human movement.

    According to a 2011 study conducted by UNHCR’s chief detention researcher, Alice Edwards:

    “Pragmatically, there is no empirical evidence that the prospect of being detained deters irregular migration, or discourages persons from seeking asylum. In fact, as the detention of migrants and asylum-seekers has increased in a number of countries, the number of individuals seeking to enter such territories has also risen, or has remained constant.” 

    For example, over the past three decades, many Europe countries have significantly expanded their use of detention in response to irregular asylum seeker and migrant arrivals.  The result?  European migration figures have increased from an estimated 49 million in 1990 to 58 million in 2000 to 70 million in 2010. The same can be shown in the United States. Despite decades of “tough on immigration” policies, including annual detention figures approaching half a million, and a Congressional “bed mandate” requiring 34,000 migrants to be in detention every single day, the period from 2000-2010 was “a record setting decade of immigration” in the United States.

    Detention policies don’t deter. So why then do Australian policy makers stubbornly cling to the assertion that mandatory detention of asylum seekers and irregular migrants isn’t simply good policy, but is actually necessary to curb irregular migration when it’s clear the facts don’t support it?

    Part of the blame undoubtedly lies with the Australian public. The Australian policy of mandatory detention—roundly criticized outside of Australia—remains overwhelmingly popular within. Even as recently as last week, Australian Immigration Minister Scott Morrison defended the practice of detaining asylum seeking children using the staid “stop the boats” rhetoric, and with the legitimacy of broad public support for the country’s mandatory detention policy.

    Part of the blame also lies with Australian policy makers for continuing to use anecdotal rather than empirical evidence to justify the mandatory detention policy. As the editor of this blog has rightly pointed out, this is “sloppy policy evaluation” at best. Experts are in agreement that mandatory detention policies have no measurable impact on the number of irregularly arriving asylum seekers and migrants. There are a number of common sense—and empirically established—reasons for this.  According to Robyn Sampson, a leading researcher from Swinburne University:

    “Several studies have been undertaken to establish which factors most impact the choice of destination of asylum seekers and refugees and irregular migrants.  According to this body of research, the principal aim of asylum seekers and irregular migrants is to reach a place of safety. Asylum seekers and irregular migrants often have very limited understanding of the migration policies of destination countries before arrival and rely on people smugglers to choose their destination. Rather than being influenced primarily by immigration policies such as detention, most refugees and irregular migrants choose destinations where they will be reunited with family or friends; where they believe they will be in a safe, tolerant and democratic society; where there are historical links between their country and the destination country; where they can already speak the language of the destination country; or where they believe they will be able to find secure work quickly due to a perception of the country as one of wealth and prosperity.” 

    So to recap—the principle determinants of the choice of destination country for asylum seekers and irregular migrants are:

    1. Safety;
    2. Family;
    3. Perceptions of democracy;
    4. Historical links;
    5. Common language; and
    6. Perceptions of wealth/prosperity. 

    Most migrants, it turns out, are just the same as you and I.  They want to go to the nearest safe place where they can be together with their families and not be persecuted—bonus points for a common language, culture, or job opportunities. A policy of mandatory detention fails to address any of these; it merely punishes those who arrive in the false belief that if asylum seekers and irregular migrants are punished badly enough, they’ll simply stop coming.

    To an outsider, the irrationality of the mandatory detention policy would be comical if not for all of the pain and suffering it is causing. You may be able to “Stop the Boats” by physically restraining asylum seeking children and families before they reach you, but you certainly won’t deter future arrivals by punishing them once they get here. And why would you want to—especially when the overwhelming majority have been shown to be legitimate refugees, fleeing for their lives? (By the government’s own statistics, since 2008, 92% of all asylum seekers arriving by boat have been granted refugee status.)

    What are needed are not more “tough” immigration policies, but comprehensive regional solutions that attempt to address the root causes of insecurity that prompt human movement. The good news is that better policies do exist; policies that can be supported by empirical evidence and that respect international human rights obligations. But one thing is clear: better policy making won’t be built on the continued justification of mandatory detention as a deterrent. Detention as a deterrent is just false advertising.

    Ben Lewis is the Advocacy Coordinator of the International Detention Coalition (IDC). He is an international human rights lawyer with extensive advocacy experience working with irregular migrant populations in the US and Latin America. The views in this blog are his own.

  • Peter Hughes. Australian Jihadists: Is Revoking Citizenship the Answer?

    One of the policy solutions being considered by the Australian government to deal with the expected problem of returning Australian jihadists is to preclude their return to Australia, or expel them, by revoking their Australian citizenship.

    The recently released report of the Independent National Security Legislation Monitor (INSLM)[1] recommends that the Minister for Immigration and Border Protection be given the power to do this on national security grounds.

    The idea of using Australian citizenship legislation to indirectly solve a problem that cannot be solved directly is not new. Some time ago there were calls to revoke the Australian citizenship of ageing, suspected World War II war criminals in the hope that this action would get them out of the country. We “knew” that were guilty, but couldn’t actually prove it in a criminal justice process.  It was argued that an administrative decision under the Australian Citizenship Act would function as a work-around. The idea was never adopted by government for good reason, including the fact that there was no guarantee that anyone who lost their Australian citizenship in that way would actually be accepted to return another country.

    It is not clear what it is expected would be the actual outcome of the citizenship solution. Revocation of the Australian citizenship of someone who has already engaged in jihadist activity would have the benefit of denying further access to Australia, but would not stop the person from circulating freely in the world and engaging in further political violence.  Only prosecution, conviction and incarceration, whether overseas or in Australia, would achieve that.

    Citizenship solutions are always harder in practice than they look.

    The INSLM Report suggests that Australia should respect its obligations under the 1961 UN Convention on the Reduction of Statelessness, and that revocation of citizenship should only occur in relation to jihadists who are dual nationals. Unfortunately, there is nothing in the Report to tell us whether or not the relevant suspects are dual nationals and therefore whether anyone’s Australian citizenship could in practice be revoked.

    And then there is the question of how a decision to take away citizenship would be made. Existing Australian citizenship policy and law set a high bar for revocation. Before revocation of the citizenship of a naturalised citizen can even be considered, the person must have been convicted of a serious offence (primarily fraudulent acquisition of citizenship) committed before becoming a citizen. Offences committed after becoming a citizen are a matter for the criminal law and are not a basis for revocation of citizenship. There is no provision for loss of citizenship of an Australian-born citizen, except where the person is a dual citizen who serves in the armed forces of a country at war with Australia.

    For jihadists, would a conviction for some offence be required or just suspicion? If the latter is sufficient to take away a person’s citizenship, the status of Australian citizenship is seriously weakened.

    The government is right to look seriously at any measures which could restrict violent activity by Australian jihadists, either overseas or in Australia. However, it should weigh up very carefully whether the uncertain citizenship solution can make any substantive difference to the problem before introducing any new policy.

    The report moves on from the question of jihadists to make a broader condemnation of dual citizenship, noting that the INSLM “does not see why, as a matter of public policy, an Australian citizen should also be able to be a citizen of another country” and “by its nature, dual citizenship is deeply problematic”. It goes on to say that that “its (dual citizenship) permission in Australia since 2002 does not render it anything like traditional” and recommends that “the 2002 legislated policy in favour of dual citizenship should be reconsidered”.

    This analysis would probably come as a surprise to the estimated 4 million Australian citizens who enjoy dual citizenship.

    Most Australians dual nationals are people who migrated to Australia and then acquired Australian Citizenship. Retention of their first citizenship is, in practice, a matter between them and their country of birth. There is nothing much the Australian government can do about this and it has not attempted to do anything since the commencement of the status of Australian Citizenship in 1949. The sensible policy priority, as in other migrant receiving countries such as the USA and Canada, has been to integrate migrants through encouraging take-up of Australian citizenship, rather than to sever past linkages.

    The anomaly in Australian citizenship law was that, until April 2002, an adult Australian citizen who was Australian-born lost his or her Australian citizenship if they took out the citizenship of another country. This created the ridiculous situation that an Australian-born person was in a much less favourable position than a migrant Australian citizen.

    Implementation of this restrictive policy was in practice arbitrary as the Australian government had no way of knowing which Australians had taken out another citizenship. The only people that were recorded as losing their Australian citizenship were those who were unlucky enough to reveal their acquisition of foreign citizenship, perhaps while in contact with an Australian mission abroad. For example, an Australian woman seeking to register a child born overseas as an Australian citizen might find that, not only was the child not a citizen, but that her own Australian passport had to be confiscated on the grounds that she had not been an Australian citizen for years, by virtue of acquisition of another citizenship.

    This restrictive approach became completely untenable when Australian-born citizens began to live and work abroad in much larger numbers as part of a globally mobile workforce. A diaspora estimated at about 1 million Australians (living mostly in the UK and North America) came into being. Many of them found that for practical reasons they needed to take out foreign citizenship, but wanted to keep their personal and family links with Australia to allow frequent travel between countries and possible return. The Australian approach to dual citizenship was also increasingly out of step with the USA, Canada and the UK which permitted their nationals to take out another citizenship without loss of their original citizenship.

    The Coalition government secured the passage of legislation in 2002 to stop Australians losing their citizenship through acquisition of another, on the advice of a report of the Australian Citizenship Council chaired by former Governor General and Justice of the High Court, Sir Ninian Stephen.[2] A key justification was that Australia would benefit economically and socially by retaining linkages with its expanding diaspora, even if some of them also became citizens of other countries. That argument remains valid.

    Dual citizenship is not without its problems, including in the consular realm, but the current policy settings remain in the national interest and should be left alone. Tinkering with them is unlikely to have any impact at all on the Australian jihadist problem.

    Peter Hughes PSM, Visiting Fellow, Crawford School of Public Policy; Visitor, Regulatory Institutions Network, Australian National University

    This article was first published in edited form in the Lowy Institute Interpreter.  http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/20/Australian-jihadists-citizenship-solution.aspx

    [1] Annual Report of the Independent National Security Legislation Monitor, Brett Walker SC, 28 March 2014.

    http://www.dpmc.gov.au/INSLM/index.cfm

     

    [2] “Australian Citizenship for a New Century”, a report by the Australian Citizenship Council, February 2000

    http://catalogue.nla.gov.au/Record/280935

    “Loss of Australian Citizenship on Acquisition of Another Citizenship”, A discussion paper on Section 17 of the Australian Citizenship Act 1948, June 2001.

    http://catalogue.nla.gov.au/Record/2553377

     

  • Clare Condon SGS. Sanctioned Violence: What does it do to our society and relationships?

    Some violent acts, depending on where and how they were perpetrated, are regarded as criminal. Others, however, are sanctioned by society, even applauded and cheered. Some are blatant; others are covert and subtle. Some are justified by cultural norms, by the blind eye or the deaf ear; they happen behind closed doors. Others are justified by official permission and approval, or even by public opinion.

    I wish to highlight four areas of sanctioned violence which I believe impact adversely on society and relationships. 

    Australia’s response to asylum seekers and refugees

    Currently in the Australian community, the government is justifying the use of violence to stop the smuggling of asylum seekers. This inhumane approach has bipartisan political support; it is driven by public opinion and generated by the politics of the fear of the stranger. The government’s actions are hidden from the public’s eye through secrecy and by holding people in detention in remote areas of Australia, or offshore in developing countries, such as Nauru and Manus Island, Papua New Guinea.

    The government’s often-used mantra “Stop the boats” demonises desperate people fleeing violence and persecution. By using emotive language, this policy is justified in a subtle but no less sanctioned form of violence towards humans. In letters from the government justifying this behaviour, people seeking refugee protection have been called “illegal maritime arrivals”. Their identity as humans has been expunged.

    Such demonisation sanitizes the reality for the Australian public. As a consequence, our societal and racial relationships are diminished and subtly eroded. We can begin to believe that some humans are more worthy than others, and that such actions are justified and normal, when in fact the government of the nation is engaged in sanctioned violence.

    Children are being held in detention centres. ..These children are exposed to brutal, negative and neglectful modelling. The consequences of such detention are likely to breed a dissociative reality for these children, leading to a spiral of hatred and evil within their own life experiences.

    As citizens we must ask: what behaviour do we propose for the future human development and relationships for these innocent children? Is society encouraged to be vindictive, self-serving, aggressive in all its relationships with anyone who is identified as a stranger, rather than a society which is welcoming, other-centred, and compassionate, respecting the dignity of the other in those relationships? One response from the government stated it would not be involved in “misguided compassion”. True compassion is a strong virtue. It is the antithesis of violence. There is nothing weak and soft about a well-guided compassionate response. 

    Sanctioned violence in sport

    Sport is a feature of a nation’s life and culture, especially in Australia. It has an essential role to play in a healthy society. Violence on the playing field and amongst spectators not only sets a bad example to impressionable young people, it is destructive of basic civil relationships. It can instil fear and anxiety, especially in children. . There are significant vested interests to subvert any attempt to study the area in a serious manner.

    It seems that violence in contact sports has increased. I suspect that the introduction of high monetary stakes, as well as sports betting, has influenced this increase. Do the normal expectations of civil behaviour cease once players step onto the field? Does the constant replay of violence and thuggery seek to justify this behaviour?

    One is not a ‘real man’ unless he is like these highly paid, macho stars. Is it not time for some extensive research on the facts and some community discussion on the type of role modelling that sport ought to be portraying to young people, and what kind of relationships society might expect to support and sustain in an advanced civil democratic society? 

    Domestic violence – the hidden nightmare for many women and children

    You might think it odd that I have placed violence in sport before one of the most hidden and often sanctioned – violence of the household or domestic violence – which impacts mostly on women and children. It is often hidden, excused and justified from a male perspective. The macho image often promoted by sport can become the macho image for some men in their daily behaviour. Are they connected?

    Australian research[1] indicates that: 17% of women aged 18 and over have experienced sexual assault since the age of 15; 87% have a relationship with the perpetrator; only 1 in 7 who experienced violence from an intimate partner had reported the most recent incident to police; women with an intellectual disability are 90% more likely to be subjected to a sexual assault than women in the general population.[2] Between 2010-11 and 2012-13, there was a 29% increase in the number of children who were subjects of substantiations of sexual abuse, thereby reversing previous downward trends.[3] Most of these are from the lowest socio-economic areas.

    These statistics are chilling. Domestic violence often leads to homelessness, further abuse of children, significant health issues for the woman and her children, ongoing economic hardship, unemployment, and social, psychological and family isolation. Thus, the capacity for building strong, healthy and mutual relationships in the future is undermined and damaged severely.

    Does media violence have an impact on human behaviour?

    There would be some who would say the jury is still out. Conflict is what makes a good story! Violence has always been part of the movie world, but now violence in movies, TV shows and electronic games has become the norm. They are louder, bloodier and more vicious. Some US research suggests that by the time a child is 18, he or she has watched some 200,000[4] acts of violence.

    There have been hundreds of reports with diverse views on the impact of media violence, particularly on children. However, there is reasonable consensus that long exposure of children to violence portrayed in the mass media leads to long-term aggressive behaviour.[5]

    My concern is the impact sanctioned violence has on society and our relationships. Some of the consequences can be corrosive and long-term. Where violence is sanctioned and regarded as acceptable and routine, then societal norms are being established for the future. Such acts become embedded in the cultural fabric of society.

    If it is acceptable for a government to treat strangers in a cruel and demeaning manner, then it becomes acceptable for the citizen to treat the stranger in a similar manner. If it is acceptable to use excessive violence on a sports field, then why not off the field in school yards? If it is acceptable to exercise violence in the private space of home, then why not on the streets? If it is acceptable to spend hours watching real or virtual violence on a screen, why not activate the same violence in ordinary relationships?

    My congregation of religious women follows the fifth-century rule of St Benedict, a way of life which helped to civilise Europe after generations of wars. Benedict’s dictum for his followers was that all should be structured so “that the strong have something to strive for and that the weak have nothing to run from”.[6]

    In those areas of our society where violence is sanctioned, we citizens need to actively participate in social engagement and collective action. We need to say no more, we can do much better. “Compassion is the very final possibility for saving the human person in his or her naked existence in the face of the direct negation of this existence”.[7]

    This is an edited version of an address delivered by Sister Clare Condon SGS at the Australian Human Right Commission https://www.humanrights.gov.au on August 13, 2014.

    Sister Clare Condon is the Congregational Leader of the Sisters of the Good Samaritan of the Order of St Benedict, Australia’s first ‘home-grown’ congregation of Catholic Religious women www.goodsams.org.au


    [1] Cindy Tarczon and Antonia Quadara, The Nature and Extent of Sexual Assault and Abuse in Australia, December 2012, The Australian Centre for the Study of Sexual Assault www.aifs.gov.au/acssa/statistics.html

    [2] CASA Forum 2014 Victorian Centres Against Sexual Assault

    [3] The Child Protection Australia Report 2012-13 of the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare

    [4] American Academy of Paediatrics, Media Violence, 19 October 2009 http://pediatrics.aappublications.org/content/124/5/1495.full

    [5] The Australian Psychological Society in 2013 updated its report: Media Representations and Responsibilities: Psychological Perspectives

    [6] Rule of Benedict, Chapter 64:19

    [7] Walter Kasper, Mercy, Paulist Press, New Jersey, 2013, p.29

     

     

  • John Menadue. Refugees and asylum seekers..a re-think on Temporary Protection Visas.

    I have long argued that Temporary Protection Visas (TPVs) should be rejected on the grounds that they don’t deter asylum seekers, people are left in limbo and because TPV holders could not sponsor family which resulted in risky boat journeys by women and children.

    It is time to think again about TPVs.

    At the present time there are over 30,000 asylum seekers in detention or in the community awaiting refugee assessment. That caseload is the result of the large influx of boat arrivals following the collapse of the Malaysian Agreement and the refusal of the Coalition and the Greens to agree to changes to the Migration Act which would have helped give effect to the agreement made with Malaysia.

    The current outstanding caseload is the highest I can recall. The previous highest number was 19,600 after Tiananmen which was a very homogeneous group.

    The large caseload of over 30,000 people from a variety of countries will take over three years to process, if all goes well!  We need to urgently consider ways to reduce this lengthy process. The introduction of TPV’s would help.

    Despite the often contentious debate on TPVs in Australia, giving a person a form of temporary protection, depending on the specifics of the arrangements, may be consistent with Australia’s obligations under the Refugee Convention. A number of countries provide some form of temporary protection alongside permanent protection arrangements. For example, people granted asylum in the US must wait one year before applying for permanent residence.

    The UNHCR acknowledges that, at times, temporary protection may be the most appropriate arrangement. For example, in circumstances where there are mass influxes (generally involving larger numbers than experienced by Australia), temporary protection may be a valid tool in ensuring protection is available for asylum seekers while allowing authorities the breathing space to more fully examine and determine the need for  permanent protection and stay in a country at a later stage.

    The Coalition Government had planned to reintroduce a form of TPV’s for irregular arrivals. But before the Senate changed on July 1, the ALP and the Greens defeated a proposal to reintroduce TPV’s. As a result of this political stalemate the government decided to use the existing Temporary Safe Haven (TSHV) and Temporary Humanitarian Concern (THCV) visa instead of TPVs.

    Asylum seekers for whom potential protection issues are identified (and satisfactory health and security checks completed) will be progressively placed on THSVs. They will then be granted a THCV for up to three years. If the assessment of protection claims does not identify any ‘potential protection issues’ asylum seekers will be placed on bridging visas. In this way the government has moved away from both the statutory and non-statutory protection visa assessment arrangement but has taken steps to ‘temporarily resolve’ cases quickly through the use of existing visa mechanisms. As the current arrangements apply, however, it would appear that many asylum seekers will remain in a state of limbo with neither a decision on their protection claim nor, if people are not refugees, on their removal. The consequences of this are that people could remain indefinitely on some form of temporary visa without a final determination of refugee status with the inevitable long-term impact this has on mental health. Extensive and expensive litigation is inevitable.

    This form of temporary status only delays a decision on the asylum claim for some time. Such an arrangement is not sustainable in the long term from the social wellbeing of asylum seekers, the cost involved as well as concerns of the broader community.

    At some point a final refugee determination needs to be made, whether it leads to temporary or permanent stay. It is quite unreasonable, where Australia has accepted that its protection obligations have been engaged, to allow people to remain in a state of limbo. It is cruel and destructive.

    In his evidence to the Human Rights Commission the Minister for Immigration and Border Protection said that asylum seekers would have trouble having their claims processed until he could offer a ‘visa product’ that only gave temporary residence. He added the absence of TPV’s at present ‘removes the possibility of considering alternative options for those currently on Christmas Island or elsewhere in Australia who arrived before July 19 2013’

    It is to be hoped that the ALP and possibly the Greens might sit down with the government and try to negotiate a satisfactory compromise.

    Negotiations to resolve this issue could include

    • The length of the visa (three to five years),
    • The assessment process at the end of that period.
    • What happens for people re-assessed and found to be refugees again?
    • Some sort of re-entry rights for TPV holders leaving the country for a short period.
    • The nature of benefits offered to people whilst on TPVs.

    The change of government and the large case load of 30,000 do require cooperation to obtain an acceptable compromise. TPVs are not ideal but they would be preferable to the present arrangements. Major effort is required to process the large caseload as quickly as possible.

  • John Menadue. Scott Morrison at the Human Rights Commission.

    Minister Morrison, assisted by the Secretary of his department, continued his aggressive ways at the hearing on August 22.

    He said that his policies discouraged asylum seekers risking their lives at sea. He described himself as the champion of the voiceless, ‘the ones that are at the bottom of the ocean’.  He clearly wants to occupy the high moral ground.

    But was it really concern about deaths at sea which motivated his campaign against asylum seekers arriving by boat? Wikileaks reported that ‘a key Liberal strategist told the US Embassy in November 2009 that the boats issue was “fantastic” for the Coalition and ‘the more that came the better’ (SMH 10 December 2010).

    In Opposition the Coalition did not want the boats to stop. It did its best to ensure that the Labor Government did not stop the boats. That is why the Coalition sided with the Greens to block the agreement with Malaysia. The collapse of that agreement set in motion a dramatic increase in boat arrivals that ultimately led to Manus and Nauru.

    Scott Morrison’s concern for deaths at sea was not reflected in numerous comments he made in opposition to demonise asylum seekers. He told us that asylum seekers bring ‘disease’, everything from TB and hepatitis C to chlamydia and syphilis. He told 2GB that boat arrivals bring ‘wads of cash’ and large displays of jewellery. He urged his parliamentary colleagues to ‘ramp up the question to … capitalise on the anti-Muslim sentiment’. He described as a ‘government-funded junket’ Commonwealth government assistance for an 8-year old boy whose parents had been drowned off Christmas Island. He complained about the cost of holding funerals in Sydney for asylum seekers who had died off Christmas Island.

    That was not the moral high ground. But If Scott Morrison now feels a sense of moral responsibility that is to be welcomed.

    At the Human Rights Commission Scott Morrison avoided answering the question whether detention of children, or adults for that matter, deterred boat arrivals. He should have said, but didn’t, that there is no evidence that mandatory detention deters boat arrivals. We now know very clearly that what has deterred boat arrivals was not mandatory detention but government policies denying resettlement in Australia for any person who come by boat. It was the Rudd Government that started taking us down this path. That is why boat arrivals stopped and not because of mandatory detention.

    Both Scott Morrison and the Secretary of his department took exception to the President of the Commission, Gillian Triggs characterising the detention centres as prisons. The detention centres may not have armed guards, but they are worse than prisons. First, the detainees are not convicted criminals and they are not illegals. They are overwhelmingly vulnerable people seeking freedom from persecution. Over 80% of boat arrivals have been found to be genuine refugees. But not being criminals or illegals, we put them in hell-holes where many of them go out of their minds.  For innocent people the result is worse than being in prison.

    Second, we locate these detention centres in remote places with the clear intention of making it very difficult for detainees to have contact with friends, family or advisers. We are frightened that if the community hears their true story, we will show more concern and compassion. So we lock them up in remote places where we cannot hear their cries. Inmates at Long Bay are treated better than that.

    There is a major problem when the Minister for Immigration is both gaoler and guardian of children. A sensible start to winding back this appalling situation in the detention of children is for the minister to separate his roles.

    More importantly we need to quickly wind back mandatory detention for almost all asylum seekers. It punishes but does not deter. The evidence is quite clear on that. Unfortunately a succession of Immigration Ministers have pretended they are political tough guys by locking up both adults and children.

    What is more there are large savings to be achieved in winding back mandatory detention. Immigration detention costs over $3b per annum. Over $2b could be saved instead of filling the pockets of Serco, Transfield, the Salvation Army and others. The Commission of Audit pointed to the enormous differences in the costs of detention. For offshore detention it was $440,000 per head in 2013-14.; for on shore detention it was $ 239,000 and for community detention it was$ 90,000.  The most cost effective and the most humane is release into the community on bridging visas which cost $22,000 per head. In 2013-14

    Humanity and cost saving points to ending mandatory detention. Few comparable countries mistreat asylum seekers the way we do.

    Just as we now have a Royal Commission on sexual abuse I am sure that down the track we will have a Royal Commission on our treatment of asylum seekers.

  • Elizabeth Elliott. Compassion goes missing on Christmas Island

    When it comes to children in need, most Australians feel compassion.

    Most will applaud today’s announcement that ‘Boat Kids’ will be released into the community. However this decision does not go far enough. It includes only kids aged less than 10 years (excluding many vulnerable teens); only those detained on the Australian mainland (excluding kids on Nauru, Manus and Christmas Islands); and only kids who arrived before July 19th 2013. Furthermore, the number to be released includes kids already living in community detention housing.  

    Christmas Island is a remote tropical ‘paradise’ in the Indian Ocean, over 2600 km from Perth or Darwin. When I visited with the Australian Human Rights Commission in July 2014, as part of their Inquiry into Children in Detention, it was ‘home’ to 174 children, including 26 unaccompanied minors – all boys aged between 14 and 17 years.  Australia continues to detain kids, despite the United Nations Guidelines on the Detention of Refugees that ‘Children should not be placed in detention’ and that ‘Minors who are asylum-seekers should not be detained’.

    Compassion, it seems, has gone missing on Christmas Island.

    ‘Home’ for families in these immigration detention centres consists of a small metal cabin, some 3 x 3 metres squared in one of two rows of similar cabins separated by a wooden walkway. Add a bunk bed and a cot to the rooms and there remains little space for a child to learn to crawl or walk, or for exploratory play. According to the father of a 2 year old boy “the housing is dirty, sub-standard, hard to be there. The child keeps hitting his head on items in the room – the bed, the shelf – because of the lack of space.”

    Cramped conditions, a punishing climate and overcrowded living in close proximity to scores of families make for little privacy and dire health consequences. Childhood infections spread quickly. When we were there many children had a respiratory virus and there had been outbreaks of gastroenteritis. We repeatedly heard the refrain “my kids are always sick.”

    The air-conditioned environment exacerbates symptoms in the many children with asthma. Others have medical conditions requiring assessment, medical or surgical treatment on the mainland – and for some the long wait for transfer had been intolerable.  A two and a half year old with no speech, a 6 year old with deafness requiring grommets for glue ear, a child with a facial abscess needing surgical drainage, a boy with an undescended testes, a child with rotten teeth, a girl with sleep apnoea….

    Of greater concern than signs of physical ill-health, however, are the psychological symptoms we heard of from many children.

    They reflect past and ongoing trauma, including the depression and self-harm many have witnessed in their own mothers. Stress in young children was manifest by onset, in detention, of bed-wetting, nightmares and defiant behaviour. In older children we heard of refusal to eat, separation anxiety, regression of speech, development of stutter, mutism and social withdrawal. Some expressed their stress through their art. A 10 year drew his ‘family home in jail’ and a six year old drew herself behind bars, with the caption ‘I want go out’ . Crying was ubiquitous in these images.

    Conversations with teenagers, who could articulate their predicament, were particularly poignant.

    They became distressed, describing flashbacks of trauma experienced at home, during harrowing boat trips to Australia, and during their time on Manus, where some were sent as a result of incorrect age determination. According to one boy who went to Manus, ‘I saw with my own eyes one boy hung himself in a cupboard – they were taken to hospital.’ They talked of their fear of being returned to Manus when they turned 18. 

    All spoke of feelings of hopelessness, sadness and lack of a future. They talked of frequent crying, families missed, lost expectations, lack of education and feelings of guilt because they had not fulfilled their family’s hopes after more than a year in ‘Australia.’  One boy summed this up as ‘a horrible situation. I feel depressed, preoccupied with my misfortune. I have not smiled or laughed the last few months. There is nothing to make me happy or to tell my family to make them happy.’  Some talked of self-harm and some spoke of death. In the words of one 12 year old girl ’My life is really deth. I don’t know why I’m in the jail realy. I don’t kill any body.’

    Detention of children for lengthy periods is in contravention to the UN Convention of the Rights of the Child. This states that ‘The arrest, detention or imprisonment of a child shall be in conformity with the law and used only as a measure of last resort and for the shortest appropriate period of time.’ The UN Human Rights Committee reiterates this: ‘Asylum seekers who unlawfully enter a State party’s territory may only be detained for a brief initial period in order to document their entry, record their claims, and determine their identity.’  Most people have now been detained on Christmas Island for over a year and the anniversary of their arrival came as a bitter blow for many.  One man asked ‘Is it the Australian government’s aim to make us all go mad?’

    As victims of a policy that dictates that any arrival by boat after July 19th 2013 will never be settled in Australia, many have accepted their fate of settlement offshore. But their arbitrary detention without assessment for refugee status has left them in an intolerable limbo. One father said ‘If they won’t have us in Australia, find somewhere else for us to go. We can’t go home.’ A mother expressed her anguish, ‘The criminals, at least they know their sentence – we don’t.’ Many felt guilty for placing their children in such a predicament. As one mother said, ‘Even if I did something wrong, coming here, why ruin the life of our kids?’

    As a reflection of their increasing despair and frustration about the adverse conditions for their children, a group of young mothers with young infants resorted to self-harm.

    When we visited 10 such women – deemed at future risk – were under 24-hour surveillance by guards, not nurses. Despite this mental health crisis the centre has no resident psychiatrist. ‘I swear the physical health is not so much a problem. It is the stress and the psychological impact of the detention that is getting to us,’ said one mother of two.

    It is outrageous to keep asylum seekers in the limbo of uncertainty. It is unacceptable to keep children in detention on Christmas Island, and it is unjust to deny children optimal health care and education.  One mother said ‘one of the most important concerns for my baby is he has not received his BCG vaccine – when everyone in the world should receive it. They say ‘we don’t have it’ or ‘later’ – the story changes.’ In the words of one child, ‘I not want to sit in jail? I want to go school….in here no have school everyday. Please help me?’

    Australians might well ask ‘Where is the compassion on Christmas Island?’

    If we are to retain our international standing as a civilised society, we cannot continue to persecute children seeking asylum as a deterrent to others.

    Elizabeth Elliott AM, is the Professor of Paediatrics and Child Health, Sydney Medical School and Consultant Paediatrician at the Children’s Hospital at Westmead.

     

     

     

     

     

  • Frank Brennan SJ. We think we have a problem!

    Eureka Street has run an article by Frank Brennan which highlights the far greater problems that the US has in managing its land border with Mexico. Frank Brennan also reflects on sending refugees to Cambodia, our locking up of children in Immigration detention facilities and the holding of 157 people including over 30 children in detention on a ship in the Indian Ocean for almost a month.

    See link to the Eureka Street article below. 

    John Menadue

     

    http://eurekastreet.com.au/article.aspx?aeid=41857

  • John Menadue. Is there light at the end of the dark tunnel?

    In my blog of April 17 I outlined ways in which we might find a way out of the refugee quagmire. It is reposted below. 

    There is speculation that the government may announce an increase in the refugee intake to help the Christians and other minorities suffering dreadful persecution in Iraq and Syria. I hope this turns out to be the case and the beginning of a return to a more humane refugee policy.

    I could almost write Tony Abbott’s announcement. ‘Now that we have stopped the boats and put the people smugglers out of business, we can assist refugees in Iraq and Syria who are facing appalling persecution. By stopping the boats, we can increase our humanitarian intake in cooperation with UNHCR. This will be an orderly and regular program rather than allowing people smugglers to determine who comes to this country.’

    In my blog that I referred to, I suggested that the government should increase ‘regular arrivals from 13,750 to 20,000 per annum. This would be a useful start’.

    After the Howard Government’s pacific solution took effect, the refugee intake was increased from 7,642 in 2000-01, to 12,247 in 2006-07. In those same years, the settler/migrant intake was increased from 107,366 to 140,148.

    In that blog  of  April 17 I suggested  other actions that we could take which would be consistent with an ‘orderly’ refugee program – orderly departure arrangements with Afghanistan and Sri Lanka; alternate migration pathways and allowing asylum seekers on bridging visas in Australia to work.

    If Tony Abbott makes the announcement that I hope he will, it might be an opportunity to start rebuilding a bipartisan approach to refugee policy. 

    Even with the issue of boats off the political agenda, there are a lot of things that we can usefully do to protect the vulnerable and to restore our international reputation. John Menadue.

    Repost from April 17

    Is there a way we can turn this dross into gold, or if not gold, then a valuable metal? Is there a way through the present impasse that is both humane and practicable? I suggest there are some areas where we could have a broader discussion and decide what might be acceptable to the Coalition and the ALP. Surely some area of bipartisanship can be found. I suggest there are six areas which we should focus on.

    1. Action in the latter days of the Rudd Government followed by Operation Sovereign Borders has largely stopped boat arrivals. With so few ‘irregular’ arrivals, I suggest we should focus our attention on “regular arrivals” and increase the humanitarian program from 13,750 to 20,000 pa. This would be a useful start. It would demonstrate that the government is prepared to respond to asylum seekers and refugees in need provided they come through ‘regular channels’. (If today we took the same number of refugees that we took during the peak of the Indochina program and adjusted for population increase, our humanitarian/refugee intake would be about 35,000 p.a.)
      After the Howard Government’s Pacific Solution took effect, the refugee intake was increased from 7,642 in 2000/01 to 12,247 in 2006/07, the last year of the Howard Government. In those same years the settler/migrant intake was increased from 107,366 to 140,148.
      It is clear that having ‘stopped the boats’ as the Howard Government told us, they then considerably increased both the humanitarian and migrant intake. We should do the same again.
    2. Many Australians are concerned about the recent deaths and injuries on Manus and earlier on Nauru. It seems that asylum seekers where attacked by thugs within the Detention Centre on Manus. That is extraordinary and reflects on every Australian. A man has been killed in our name. We have a moral responsibility for any asylum seeker who comes to Australia and then is transferred to another country. To clarify the situation, I suggest that our moral responsibility should be strengthened by establishing a clear legal responsibility as well. We could do this by amending the Migration Act to ensure that there is ‘effective protection’ which is enforceable under Australian statute for any person that we transfer to another country. It would provide a discipline which is clearly lacking at the moment.‘Effective protection’ enforceable in Australian courts would need to be spelled out in the Migration Act to include such issues as non-refoulment, legal status when in another country, humane treatment consistent with the dignity and safety of the individual, and swift and efficient processing of claims. Surely the Coalition and the ALP could agree on ‘effective protection’ when asylum seekers are transferred to another country. The UNHCR should be asked to monitor ‘effective protection’.
    3. We need to address persecution and discrimination in source countries by negotiating Orderly Departure Arrangements with Afghanistan, Pakistan and Sri Lanka. Many asylum seekers coming to Australia come from these countries. We negotiated an ODA with Vietnam in 1983 whereby 100,000 Vietnamese came to Australia over many years instead of taking dangerous and irregular travel by land and sea. The Hazaras in Afghanistan and Pakistan desperately need our help through an ODA.
    4. We should consider other migration pathways that would reduce pressure on people to flee their countries. The largest number of asylum seekers coming by boat before the clamp down were Iranians.  I suggest that we should look at 457 visas or other migration pathways for young people from Iran. They would be great settlers.
    5. We need to address the issue of 30,000 asylum seekers in our detention centres and in the community whose refugee status has not yet been assessed. Immigration Detention Centres are very expensive and damaging to the individual. More asylum seekers should be carefully released into the community under bridging visas whilst their claims are being assessed. Most countries do this. In 2005 the Howard Government introduced the Community Care Pilot Scheme to assist asylum seekers in the community. Its focus was on case management. This pilot scheme became the Community Assistance Support (CAS) program and has worked well for asylum seekers in the community. Unfortunately a hostile political climate has made governments wary of developing the scheme. CAS should now be expanded.
      Further, as asylum seekers are released into the community, they should have the right to work. It is important both for their dignity as well as being in the interest of the Australian taxpayer. Surely the major political parties could agree on this. We have seen how country businesses like meatworks and fruit picking have welcomed asylum seekers.
    6. The only viable long term solution to desperate people taking risks in coming to Australia is through regional processing in transit countries and particularly in Indonesia with the cooperation of the UNHCR. We must bend our backs to do that. Julie Bishop would have an interest in this as it would help generate good will in our relations with Indonesia. We also need to build better relations with UNHCR.

    Surely we can find some bipartisan common ground in these six areas. Maybe we could find ways of turning dross into gold, or at least silver.

     

  • Bob Douglas and Claire Higgins. Beyond Operation Sovereign Borders.

    Recently in The Saturday Paper Max Opray reported on the harrowing story of two 16 year-old Vietnamese asylum seekers, who have been removed from their Adelaide school without warning, and placed in closed detention in Darwin. The boys are among around 30,000 asylum seekers who are currently in Australia awaiting resolution of their protection claims. Many live without work rights, and many fear sudden re-detention or removal. Indeed, the boys’ case has led to fifteen other Adelaide teenagers in a comparable situation to go into hiding, wary of a similar fate.

    So why were the boys re-detained? Was it to deter prospective asylum seekers? To encourage those who are already here to withdraw their applications for refugee status? The only explanation for their re-detention was this notice from their official guardian, Scott Morrison: “The Minister for Immigration and Border Protection has made a decision that your residence determination is no longer in the public interest.”

    Experts in this field do not believe that the punitive treatment of the 30,000 is a worthwhile deterrence measure. During an all-day Roundtable at Parliament House on July 11, some of Australia’s most experienced policy makers and stakeholders agreed unanimously that inflicting further cruelty on those who are currently on Australian shores will not succeed in deterring the people smuggling enterprise or those who are desperate enough to attempt the journey. So these 30,000 people should be expeditiously, fairly and generously processed, using a range of migration pathways.

    Securing this level of agreement at the Roundtable was highly significant, because those present represented a diverse range of viewpoints on this issue. Participants included parliamentarians from the ALP, the Liberal party and the Greens, a former Indonesian ambassador to Australia, a strategist from Malaysia, UNHCR’s former assistant High Commissioner for Protection, former senior immigration and defence officials including former immigration minister Ian Macphee and retired Chief of the Defence Force Adm Chris Barrie, academics and representatives from the churches, refugee advocacy groups  and civil society, including Expert Panel member, Paris Aristotle.

    The Roundtable also achieved broad agreement that Australia should raise its humanitarian migration quota to at least 25,000 persons annually and peg it at a fixed percentage of the annual migrant quota. Doing so would not only ameliorate the legacy caseload of around 30,000 people who are now on our shores, but also help to decompress the refugee burdens of our regional partner countries. While these 30,000 are being assessed (and it is recognised that this cannot happen overnight) people in community detention should be able to apply to work and support themselves, and above all must be treated in a humane and dignified manner.

    The issue of humane treatment of the 30,000 was a key focus for the Roundtable, and sudden de-detention of the Vietnamese asylum seekers underscores the urgency of this question. The two boys had arrived in Australia by boat in March 2011, and after 17 months of mandatory imprisonment on Christmas Island and in other Australian facilities were eventually moved into community detention in Adelaide. They had settled in and were attending school, only to now be re-detained. Our group of experts recognised that while Australians may be nervous about unauthorised migration and want reassurance that migration intakes will be managed carefully, this does not justify the harsh or unfair treatment of those who are in our care.

    Furthermore, Roundtable participants acknowledged that Australia’s current treatment of asylum seekers can have a deleterious impact on human capital, potentially depriving the Australian economy of valuable long-term contributors. Studies have shown that refugees are a young, enthusiastic and entrepreneurial cohort, and that the Australian community will embrace them for it. The case of the two Vietnamese asylum seekers is a perfect example of this: the boys were working hard in year 10 and year 11, playing competition soccer and daring to hope that they could become permanent Australians. Their school community has launched an online petition calling for their return, and the ‘Bring Back Our Boys’ campaign has received international media coverage and more than 11,000 signatures to date.

    Roundtable participants agreed that recent policies have debased Australia’s previous excellent reputation as an international citizen and that the current policy response is ignoring the complexity of the ongoing global challenge of forced migration and the need for Australians to better contribute to the protection of a growing number of vulnerable people.

    Our group of experts understood that that there is no policy silver bullet solution to this complex issue. The best we can do as responsible members of a world community is to evolve and share with other countries in our region a plan to manage people flows in ways that are respectful to countries like Indonesia and Malaysia and can help to ameliorate their refugee problems as well as ours.

    To achieve this, our Roundtable agreed to support the development of two ongoing “track 2 Dialogues”. The first dialogue series would build a new network of influential thinkers and policy makers in key countries in our region, some of which are transit countries for refugees hoping to come to Australia and some of which are countries of origin of people being displaced or threatened. The other “Track 2 Dialogue” on which we are collectively embarked is with the Australian community. Much of this work will require long-term consultation and negotiation. In the short term, however, the answer is simple: the treatment of asylum seekers already within Australia must immediately change for the better, as the lives of 30,000 vulnerable people and the future strength of the Australian community depend on it.

     Emeritus Professor Bob Douglas AO is a Director of Australia21. Dr Claire Higgins is a Research Associate at the Andrew & Renata Kaldor Centre for International Refugee Law at the University of New South Wales

    An edited version of this post appeared in ‘Inside Story’.

     

    The Roundtable was convened by Australia21, The Centre for Policy Development and The Andrew and Renata Kaldor Centre for International Refugee Law at UNSW on 11 July 2014. The background discussion paper for the Roundtable, ‘Beyond Operation Sovereign Borders: A Long-Term Asylum Policy for Australia’, can be found at www.cpd.org.au and a full report on the Roundtable will be available later this year.

     

  • John Menadue. . Come by air – no problem!

    Many newspapers this morning are full of stories about fraud and bureaucratic negligence over air arrivals. The integrity of the visa system is being called into question.

    One June 20, last year, I posted an article ‘Come by air – no problem!’ It is reposted below. This blog highlighted the widespread preoccupation with boat arrivals.

    Other major issues have been overlooked,including the 50,000 plus in our community, who having overstayed their visa have ‘disappeared’

     

    Repost: Come by air – no problem!

    There is an easy way to solve the boat people “problem”. It is simply to get as many asylum seekers as possible to come by air. It would be a win/win for everyone. There are many reasons for proposing this.

    • The politicians and the media show no interest whatsoever in the asylum seekers who come by air. (In the last 10 years, over 78% of asylum seekers have come by air, although in the last two to three years, the proportions have changed in favour of boat arrivals.) But the fact remains, we are not concerned at all about air arrivals.
    •  This would solve the political problem We could also ignore the media misinformation
    • We don’t put many air arrivals into detention as we do boat people. So this could potentially save us up to $2 billion in detention costs.
    • Asylum seekers who come by air live freely in the community, and  are allowed to work. Boat people are not. So allowing more air arrivals to work saves the taxpayer and there is no need for asylum seekers to break the law and work in the grey economy.

    There are also good business opportunities here  for Qantas and other airlines. They need to set up joint ventures or appoint good agents to help as many asylum seekers to get visas to enter Australia  by air with Qantas or others. How can this be done?

    • Most asylum seekers who come by air promise that they are coming to Australia as a visitor, student or working holiday maker. Having got into Australia they then apply for refugee status and live happily in the community until their status is resolved.
    • So entrepreneurial agents can perform a personal and national service in helping asylum seekers come by air. We know there are some very efficient “agents” in southern China. China always tops the list for the number of asylum seekers who come by air. What a boon for both airlines and agents!
    • Clive Palmer has proposed that asylum seekers should fly to Australia. He said recently ‘All that needs to happen is that the government needs to stop telling airlines and other people not to give [asylum seekers] safe transport. If they come down here by air and if they are refugees that’s one thing. If they haven’t got a legitimate claim they can go right back on the plane the next day.’

    Clive Palmer clearly sees it as a win/win for everyone. As would other people.

    • Tony Abbott would surely applaud as it is an even better solution than his Pacific Solution to control our borders.  People smugglers would be put out of business
    • The media would obviously think it was good policy because it has shown very clearly that it is only concerned about boat people. Air arrivals are quite un-newsworthy.
    • Taxpayer money would be saved and airlines could make more money.

    But to disappoint Tony Abbott and the media, I must admit that some of the above is nonsense. You probably detected my tongue in cheek a few paragraphs ago!

    • Agents would need to encourage visa applicants to make false declarations about the reason for them coming to Australia.
    • It would be unfair to persons who genuinely faced persecution and who would have no way of getting a visa.
    • Asylum seekers who come by air, although many are quite deserving, have a success rate in refugee determination of just over 40%. For boat arrivals it is over 90%.

    Put simply, our preoccupation with boat people is a dishonest and misleading ploy. It is done deliberately to incite fear. For some reason boat people are a special threat. And Tony Abbott and the media play it for all it is worth. As reported by the SMH on 10 December 2010 “a key Liberal Party strategist told the US Embassy in 2009 that the more boats that come the better”

    The important issue is the total number of asylum seekers who come to Australia and not their mode of arrival. As an island continent we should not be surprised that really desperate people try to come by sea without a visa.

    The Coalition and the media have performed dishonestly over boat people. Following in John Howard’s footsteps, Tony Abbott and Scott Morrison are deliberately inciting fear about boat people, yet show no interest at all in air arrivals. Where is the consistency in this?  For the media it is partly political partisanship, as with The Australian, but for most others it is laziness.  Pictures of unkempt bearded men on boats are so much more newsworthy. It is much harder to get pictures and stories of asylum seekers dressed in suits who come by air every day and all day through our airports. And no group exhibits more laziness  on this issue than the ABC, particularly its Canberra correspondents.

    Why do we continue to beat ourselves up only about asylum seekers who come by boat but ignore those who come by air and treat the latter much more generously particularly as the have a much lower success rate in refugee determination?

    John Menadue

     

     

     

     

  • Kerry Murphy. The persecutions.

    In March 2001, the Taliban dynamited the ancient Buddha statues of Bamian because the Taliban leader, Mullah Omar, claimed they were ‘idolatrous’ and idolatry is banned in Islam.  In July 2014, ISIL destroyed the ancient tomb of the prophet Jonah in Mosul for the same reason.[1]  This site was considered a sacred site for Jews, Christians and Muslims for centuries.  Tragically it is not just ancient cultural monuments that are being destroyed by ISIL.  Other accounts refer to smashing of statues in churches and the looting of churches.  What is especially worrying and amazing is their willingness to publicise their war crimes and not merely claim them for themselves, but boast about it.

    There have been Christian communities in the Nineveh plain of northern Iraq for possibly 1700-1800 years.  Some of the Christian communities in Syria and northern Iraq can trace their origins to the early spread of Christianity throughout the Middle East and then Roman Empire.  For nearly two millennia they have survived but ISIL is possibly the most dramatic threat they have faced.[2]

    Initially Christians in Mosul hoped they might be spared the sectarian attacks on Shia by ISIL.  Then on July 14, they noticed the Arabic letter ‘nuun’ ( ن ) for Nasriya (Christian) was daubed outside their properties.  Then ISIL gave the estimated 35,000 Christians an ultimatum to 19 July – convert, pay the jizya tax, or be killed.

    The jizya is a tax levied on non-Muslims in Sharia law.  In ISIL’s case, the jizya was clearly protection money mafia style, and its onerous level was beyond the capacity of many.  This left the Christians with no real option but to flee their homes and abandon their goods.  Some claim they were robbed by militants as they fled, an added indignity.

    ISIL also daubed the Arabic R ( ر ) for rafidah or ‘rejectors’ on the homes of Shia and minorities such as Shabaks and Yazdis and Turkman Shia.  This is a Sunni term used to denigrate those who do not follow their particular religious interpretation.

    More reports are coming out of stoning for adultery, beheading of Shia prisoners (often from the Iraqi or Syrian militaries) and even the execution of the Sunni imams in the main mosque in Mosul, who were seen to be not teaching ‘correct Islam’ and so had to be killed.  One ISIL posting bragged about the execution of ‘rafideh’ for Eid – with horrific pictures of the terrified men in trucks, then kneeling before open pits to be executed.[3]

    It was these type of extremist actions that alienated the Sunni tribes from Al Qaeda in 2007 and lead to the ‘Awakening’ movement whereby Sunni tribal leaders supported the US against Al Qaeda.  It is a disaster for Iraqis that the Iraqi Prime Minister al Maliki has become so sectarian in his policies and actions that the Sunnis feel they are better protected by supporting the Salafist extremists in ISIL than their own Government.  Some Sunnis see Maliki as an ‘Iranian’ and others refer to the ‘good old days under Saddam’.

    The willingness of ISIL to publicise their war crimes – beheading prisoners, shooting prisoners kneeling before ditches and smashing religious icons and statues – is extremely worrying.  They obviously are not afraid of facing war crimes trials for their actions and probably they assumed they are immune from such prosecution may well be sadly right.

    Sadly for the Christians and other minorities of Iraq and Syria, they will not be able to return to their homes for some time, if at all.  The fact that many Palestinians still have their house keys from their homes in Israel which they fled in what they call the ‘Naqba’(catastrophe) of 1948 gives no hope to yet another group of refugees from the Middle East.

    Iraqis tell me that this focus on religion and sect is new in Iraq.  Baghdadi Christians and Muslims would celebrate each other’s religious holidays and exchange greetings and presents for Christmas and Eid.  Intermarriage between Sunni and Shia families was not uncommon, especially in Baghdad.  Now the situation has changed dramatically and sectarianism dominates.  Militias are forcing out such Sunni/Shia couples from their homes, others are being forced to separate just because their spouse is a different sect.[4]

    The labelling of communities with letters designating their status will immediately create fears in our post holocaust world.  We have seen this before.  In an inversion of this, Iraqis in Baghdad and Irbil protested in the streets holding up signs saying things like ‘I am Iraqi and I am a Nasriyan’ or others said ‘We are all Nasriyans’.  There were also protests in London and Paris with people wearing T-Shirts with just the Arabic letter on them, just as it has been seen in the graffiti daubed on homes in Mosul. On Lebanese TV a well-known TV personality wore a T-Shirt with the letter ‘nuun’ ( ن ) and said ‘We are all Nuun’. Others are putting the symbol and letter on Facebook in solidarity with the persecuted. [5]

    Hopefully such intercommunal and intercultural/religious stands will become possible again in Iraq and Syria, though I fear it will take a long time before there is much progress and the extremists are isolated and disempowered.

    Kerry Murphy is a Sydney solicitor who practices in immigration and refugee law.

  • Lisa Petheram. Listening to young people’s voices on Refugee and Asylum Seeker Policy

    “They are playing with our lives…every year I get older
    …I want to start a family but I can’t    ”.

    What are young people in Australia thinking about refugee and asylum seeker policy?
    Two youth roundtables recently held by Australia21 have given some insight into the ways that young Australians think about these issues, and their visions for the future. The youth roundtables were held as part of a broader project Australia21 has been undertaking in collaboration with other groups – Asylum Seeker Policy: A fair, just and effective approach. As part of this project, a collection of short essays and a discussion paper on the options have been compiled. Also, on the 11th of July, Australia21 co-hosted an expert roundtable on this topic at Parliament House, with the Andrew & Renata Kaldor Centre for International Law (UNSW) and the Centre for Policy Development.

    The first youth roundtable was held in Canberra with support from the Crawford School at ANU, with 38 young people aged 18-30 from the public. The second youth roundtable was held with Settlement Services International (SSI) in Sydney with 35 young people of the same age group, specifically of refugee and asylum seeker background. In both workshops a rich picture diagramming approach was used—to understand participants preferred futures around refugee and asylum seeker policy. Discussions from both roundtables were remarkably wide- ranging and insightful and had much overlap in content and opinion, despite participants being from very different experiential and cultural backgrounds. Conversations reflected a strong desire for change in policy and practice in Australia, and a sense of disillusionment and disappointment about public perceptions and treatment of refugee and asylum seekers.

    At the Sydney roundtable, the overarching message was that the refugee journey is long and difficult. “I thought when I got to Australia the hard part was over, but now I have to start again from nothing. It is hard in a different way. I can’t seem to get a start anywhere and it is hard to have hope until I can.” After arriving in the settlement country most people need a range of personally targeted supports to settle successfully, particularly in communities where refugee status carries stigma. Some of the current policy settings seem designed to frustrate that journey rather than support it, and to waste human potential. People appeared to be resilient and energetic but sorely tried.

    Participants commonly expressed strong frustration at the inhumane ways refugee and asylum seekers are treated through restrictive policies, as well as the way they are often stigmatized in the media and by the general public. “We are not animals, we are human”. There was a strong yearning to be treated and to live like others. It was suggested there needs to be strong, empathetic leadership and programs to address stigma and encourage community engagement. “I want to live in an Australia where the Prime Minister has been a detainee and knows what it’s like”. Another participant used a picture of birds being fed, to communicate her hope that if Tony Abbott fed the birds he may develop empathy. One said he would say to the Government “Please make decisions like you are deciding about someone from your own family

    There was much disappointment about new policies that create more uncertainty and fear.  Many were frustrated by being unable to plan or make any goals and being in “limbo land”, especially around study, work and family. “I don’t have anything good to tell myself in in the mirror in the morning. I want to build my life in Australia, but I can’t…How can I ever ask anyone for their daughter’s hand in marriage?”. In particular the inability to work while being processed is excruciating for many of the participants. They talked of having much passion, experience and qualifications and wanting to contribute in Australia by working, but losing resilience and hope. There was also frustration by those that were allowed to work, where time and energy put into gaining qualifications and experience were not recognized “I want to share my skills with Australia”

    At the Canberra roundtable sadness and anger was expressed about the treatment of refugee and asylum seekers. There was much concern particularly around mental health of people in detention and in communities. It was emphasised that policy makers and public should be strongly encouraged to reframe their current ways of thinking about refugee and asylum seekers, and be more open, sincere and unprejudiced in their discourse on the topic. Calls were also made for ‘grown up’ and progressive leadership, and for Australia as a nation to be more cognizant of equality under the law, and our moral and international obligations.

    It was argued that refugee and asylum seekers are often dehumanised in these debates; they are generally not seen by the general public and policy makers as ‘real people’, but as statistics, or criminals who should be behind bars. It was suggested that greater attention needs to be placed on more appropriate and creative solutions to domestic processing, especially in terms of the location and speed of processing. In an ideal future, Christmas Island and Nauru would be closed, and the money saved could be directed towards supporting communities to be involved in the processing and resettlement of refugee and asylum seekers. There were also strong calls for policy modification to ensure that people can have opportunities to contribute more fully to society (e.g. allowing people working rights while being processed).

    Young people have been engaged by Australia21 as part of this project as it is believed they can offer fresh thinking and innovative solutions that are valuable contributions to the policy making process. The outcome from the youth roundtables was reported on at the expert roundtable by a youth representative and will also be incorporated into a full report that will be released later in 2014.

    For more information about Australia21’s project on refugee and asylum seekers and youth engagement, please see www.australia21.org.au

  • Mike Steketee. Mandatory detention punishes but it does not deter.

    “It has not been easy for organised world opinion in the United Nations or elsewhere to act directly in respect of some of the dreadful events which have driven so many people from their own homes and their own fatherland but at least we can in the most practical fashion show our sympathy for those less fortunate than ourselves who have been the innocent victims of conflicts and upheavals of which in our own land we have been happy enough to know nothing” – Robert Menzies, Prime Minister, broadcast for the opening of World Refugee Year, September, 1959.

    Even some of the strongest supporters of the Liberal party and its policy of turning back the boats   cannot feel comfortable about many of the actions being taken in the name of securing our sovereign borders.

    They do not fit easily with the small “l” liberal philosophy that was an important part of the big “l” Liberal party that Menzies founded – beliefs that have been muted but not eradicated under successive conservative Liberal prime ministers in John Howard and Tony Abbott.

    In waging war against people smugglers, we are punishing their clients, who have turned to us for help – help that we have offered through our membership of the Refugee Convention. The armoury directed at deterring asylum seekers from coming by boat, implemented by Labor and Liberal governments, is astonishing in its extent and ferocity.

    Most of it achieves nothing other than degrading and in some cases ultimately destroying people’s lives. It is all the more pointless now that the one deterrent that has been effective – turning around the boats – has been implemented. As explored further later, a group of Australian experts on refugee policy believe there is a better way, even working within the present political constraints.

    We should do all we can to discourage people from taking dangerous sea journeys but we should also ensure there are alternatives for genuine refugees. The gold standard was achieved under the Fraser government.

    Deaths at sea have always been a feature of refugee flows. A document prepared for the Australian Cabinet in 1979 estimated that between 50 per cent and 70 per cent of those fleeing in the wake of the Vietnam War drowned.

    Then, as now, people driven by sheer desperation continued to get on boats. Then, as now, government action stopped the boats. Then, unlike now, people were given an alternative: Australia joined the US, China and Canada to reach an agreement under which each country took substantial numbers of Vietnamese and Vietnam agreed to stop pushing people out of the country. Australian officials, together with those from other countries, processed people in camps in Malaysia and other South-east Asian countries and flew the successful applicants to Australia.

    Without the same sense of crisis and with refugees fleeing from many different countries, it has been impossible to replicate such an arrangement. Instead, successive Australian governments have chosen other options, all  specifically rejected by the Fraser cabinet, like turning back boats – which then Foreign Minister Andrew Peacock told Cabinet, prophetically as it turned out, “would be courting international pariah status” – offshore processing, Australian detention centres and temporary protection visas.

    Turning back boats is the one policy that has unambiguously achieved its objective of stemming the flow of boat people. But it comes with costs. For some, the danger at sea has been replaced by the risk of forced return to the country from which they fled – like the 41 asylum seekers Australia sent back to Sri Lanka, a country which, assurances of a peaceful nation to the contrary, continues to persecute Tamils, including through torture and sexual violence, according to the US State Department, the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights and Amnesty International, among others. There is the farcical saga of the 157 asylum seekers kept on a floating Australian prison on the high seas to ensure there is no blemish on Immigration Minister Scott Morrison’s record of stopping the boats. There is the damage to the relationship with Indonesia, including the likely long-term consequences for co-operation on refugee issues.

    Stopping the boats may solve a political problem in Australia but it does so by dumping the issue into other country’s laps. People smugglers will look for other countries to which to send their clients. Genuine refugees who are deterred from fleeing by Australia’s tough policy run the risk of persecution and worse.

    The other policies of deterrence in Australia have not worked. The two big flows of boat people – between 1999 and 2001 and between 2009 and 2012 – occurred after the introduction of mandatory detention as a blanket policy in 1994.

    Not only has it failed to stop asylum seekers coming by boat but it has inflicted untold damage on their lives. The evidence is consistent and unambiguous, most recently from the Human Rights Commission’s visit to Christmas Island – that people left in limbo, with no guarantee of an end point,   despair over their future and can bear the mental health scars for the rest of their lives. The effects on children, 983 who remained in detention centres at the end of May, are particularly rapid and severe.

    At least most of the people who made it to Australia by boat before the gates slammed shut are now either living in the community on bridging visas or in community detention. Immigration Minister Scott Morrison wants to implement a form of temporary protection visas for those found to be refugees.  With no commitment that the visas will be renewed or that they will not be sent back, it is another form of enforced limbo, leading to the same spiral of despair and mental illness. Most of them have been denied the right to work, creating yet another source of despair. Jane McAdam, professor in international refugee law at the University of NSW, describes it to The Drum as “creating a broken future citizenry”.

    Legislation introduced last month by Immigration Minister Scott Morrison sets up yet more hurdles for asylum seekers. One measure lifts the threshold for people at risk of torture applying for so called complementary protection (an alternative to refugee status) to 50 per cent. “In reality it means that if even an asylum seeker has a 49 per cent chance of being tortured, Australia will still send them home,” says McAdam.

    She was one of 35 experts from diverse backgrounds and perspectives, together with federal MPs who met a fortnight ago to look at future policy. The details of their discussions are confidential until a report is released later this year but a discussion paper http://cpd.org.au/wp-content/uploads/2014/05/Final-Policy-Paper-Beyond-Operation-Sovereign-Borders-03.06.14.pdf that was fed into the process points to a better way forward.

    It suggests detention should be kept to an absolute minimum, given the harm it causes. Asylum seekers should be given firm timelines for processing their claims, even though it might take three years to make decisions, given the large numbers involved. In the meantime, they should have work rights and health and welfare safety nets. If those found to be refugees are granted only temporary protection initially, there should be a defined process leading to permanent residence. Those not found to be refugees should receive reintegration help when returned to their countries.

    Because of the harsh condition in Nauru and ManusIsland, claims there should be processed within a year. As well, asylum seekers should be allowed some freedom of movement outside the detention centres. Better co-operation with other countries in the region should include more funding to help other governments support asylum seekers.

    These and other proposals would be steps towards restoring our standing as a nation to which many Australians, including Liberals, aspire – one that was among the first under the Menzies government to adopt the Refugee Convention and that Menzies described in the same broadcast in 1959: “It is a good thing that Australia should have earned a reputation for a sensitive understanding of the problems of people in other lands; that we should not come to be regarded as people who are detached from the miseries of the world.”

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

  • John Menadue. Suffer the little children to come unto me…

    Well, not so if they are Palestinian children or asylum seeker children in our detention centres.

    At last counting there were 1,230 Palestinians killed in Gaza as a result of 3,000 or more air and artillery strikes. 56 Israelis have died. Close to 1,000 of those Palestinians killed were civilians, including children. Only three Israeli civilians died. Just imagine the outcry of the Israeli lobby if those figures were reversed and 1000 Israelis had been killed… Clearly the Israel lobby and many others don’t regard Palestinian civilians and children of equal value to their own.

    In her article ‘Grief grips Gaza’ in the SMH on August 2, Ruth Pollard tells the searing story of the carnage in Gaza. For link to story, see below.

    http://www.smh.com.au/world/grief-grips-gaza-20140801-3czlw.html

    The Israelis and their apologists around the world, including President Obama and Prime Minister Abbott, say that Israel has a right to defend itself. That is true, but it is only a very small part of the truth. They refuse to honestly admit that the core of the problem in Palestine is that land was stolen by Israel from the Palestinians in 1967. There will be no peace without justice. There will be no justice until Israel withdraws from the land it has stolen from the Palestinian people.

    But whilst this political impasse continues with the support of the Israeli lobby, the people of Palestine are suffering an appalling fate.

    Closer to home we have also had a searing account of the treatment of children in our detention centres. The Human Rights President, Professor Gillian Triggs has told us of the misery and trauma of children in our detention centres. She has been vividly supported by Elizabeth Elliott who is Professor of Paediatrics and Child Health, University of Sydney and Consultant Paediatrician at the Children’s Hospital at Westmead, Sydney. She accompanied Professor Triggs to Christmas Island. Professor Elliott has described the mental and physical symptoms of disease of children in detention where they are beyond health and hope. She has spoken of escalating rates of mental ill health. The distress was expressed as overwhelming sadness and hopelessness and manifest most dramatically by the high prevalence of self-harm in young mothers and psychological symptoms in their children.

    Professor Elliott described how the children expressed their mood through drawings. These drawings were bleak and about guns, barbed wire and tears.

    By way of contrast, my wife and I visited the Archibald Prize exhibition last week which featured the ‘Young Archies’ – portraits by 5 to 15 year olds. These beautiful portraits were in such contrast to what Professor Elliott has shown us by children on Christmas Island. The Young Archies of the same age as the asylum seekers drew beautiful portraits of people they loved and who loved them – mainly family. The contrast between the two lots of drawings highlighted very graphically the trauma we are inflicting on children in our care. And to think that Scott Morrison is the legal guardian of these children in detention!

    There is not just institutional violence against children in the Catholic Church and other institutions. It is happening now in our detention centres, this very day.

    For God’s sake, for the children’s sake and for our own sake, stop this inhumanity both in Gaza and in our own detention centres. The tears of the children will not wash away our guilt. At the very least we should stop wringing our hands and do something about it.

  • Refugee success

    In recent years we have been getting a diet designed to diminish, denigrate and demonise asylum-seekers and refugees.

    We have lost a sense of proportion and the enormous contribution which refugees have made to this country.

    I have set out below links to information and articles which describe the remarkable way in which we have accepted refugees in the past and the way that they have helped build Australia. It is a thrilling story. These links are provided courtesy of the Refugee Council of Australia. Some of the information may be a few years old but the stories are current. John Menadue

     

    http://refugeecouncil.org.au/r/rpt/2010-Contributions.pdf 

    http://www.theage.com.au/executive-style/strive/they-came-they-conquered-20130419-2i4wf.html   

    http://www.21stcenturynews.com.au/refugees-great-australian-entrepreneurs/