Adam Bandt (Melbourne, Australian Greens) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The Migration Amendment (Repairing Medical Transfers) Bill 2019 has a really simple proposition. The government is putting forward the basic idea that if you're sick you shouldn't be able to get medical treatment. That's what this government is saying to all of the people whom Australia has locked up in prisons or on prison islands because they've committed no crime but have done nothing more than come here and try to seek our help, often fleeing war, trauma and persecution. They've come here, and the Australia government, under successive governments, under a bipartisan policy, has made them sick. It has locked people up in indefinite detention when they have committed no crime. It has said to young children, 'Even though you have done nothing wrong, you are going to spend your future unable to live freely and play like every other child does.' When you do that to people, it makes them sick. We've been told that time and time again, under a Liberal government and under a Labor government. This policy of offshore indefinite mandatory detention breaks people. It breaks them to the point where children have tried to kill themselves. We've had reports of people trying to set themselves on fire. That is what we have done to people.

The health crisis in these camps is, as I say, at breaking point. If you live in Australia and you are so sick that you set yourself on fire or you consider taking your own life, there is help available to you. If you break your leg, there is help available to you. Most people in this country have no problem with the proposition that even prisoners who get sick are entitled to medical treatment. Yes, they've committed a crime and, yes, they're serving a sentence, but that's no reason to also say that if you get sick you can't get medical treatment. At the end of the day, people are human beings, and there's a basic principle that we have—or that we should all have—for each other, which is that if you get sick, no matter who you are, you are entitled to the treatment that will get you better.

That wasn't happening for people who were on Manus or Nauru or in detention. What was happening was that people were getting incredibly sick—as I say, to the point where they would consider taking their own lives. They were getting so sick, and because this government, following the principles set down by previous Labor and Liberal governments, was saying, 'You're not allowed to live in Australia. We're going to put you offshore, out of sight, out of mind,' they were in places where you couldn't get the kind of help that people need, so bad was their health and so poor in many instances was the medical treatment that was being given to people.

So people were crying out, saying, 'Give us the treatment we need to help us get better.' They had some friends and some advocates here. Groups like the Asylum Seeker Resource Centre, the Human Rights Law Centre and many doctors and lawyers said, 'Okay, if the government's not going to give them the help that they need and deserve, then they should be brought to Australia to be given that help.' And every time they tried to make that happen, this government and this minister stood in their way and forced them to go to court to get basic medical treatment.

Just think about that for a moment. This government, this home affairs minister, has overseen them in a prison or in detention where, by definition, it helps break them to the point where they get sick. When they get sick and someone says, 'Give them medical treatment,' the government says, 'No. You go to court. Make us give them medical treatment.' People were going to court, and people were getting the medical treatment that, finally, they needed, but with no help from this government.

When the Australian people found out about this, they said, 'There's something wrong here. There is something wrong if we are not giving people the medical treatment they deserve.' So in the last parliament we passed a bill that had a very simple proposition: if you get sick you're entitled to medical treatment, especially if you're under Australia's care, even if you're living in detention—especially if you're in detention. The bill that was passed had a lot of safeguards in it. Did it go as far as I wanted or the Greens wanted and end offshore detention? No. Did it say everyone should be processed here in Australia? No. We didn't have support from Labor or Liberal on that one, because they all agree on offshore detention. What it did do was say that if you're sick you can be brought here to get the medical help you need.

Despite all the rhetoric from the government, the people who were brought here still remained in detention while they were here. It's not like they got brought here and let out. I say that's what should happen if they're genuine refugees, but it doesn't. They got brought here and were kept in detention while they got the help they needed. And the minister still retained the power to step in if there was a security threat issue. In every other instance, if independent doctors said, 'No, they need medical help,' they were entitled to get it. That legislation passed, because it was the right thing to do.

I want to pay tribute to the former member for Wentworth, Kerryn Phelps, who worked with the crossbench to lead the charge. I want to acknowledge the work of the former opposition leader, the member for Maribyrnong, as well because it did take guts to stand up and do that in the face of what we knew would be an onslaught of misleading statements and untruths from the government and the opposition. And, of course, it came.

For one moment, there was an attempt to wind back this bipartisan policy, and I pay tribute to the members of the crossbench and the Labor Party who worked together to make that happen. I know there are a number of people who worked very hard on this over a period of time. And the good news is, it was working. After this bill got passed we saw sick people getting the help they needed, and what the numbers bore out is what we feared all along—there weren't security threats. These people didn't have security threats hanging over their heads. There was no reason to deny them medical help. What we found was that when the independent doctors said, 'No, someone needs help,' most of the time the minister agreed and they were brought here. So we didn't have to go through this tortuous court process. We didn't need to have the minister saying, 'I'll only give you treatment if you can go and convince a judge.' No. If a doctor says you need treatment, you get it. And people were getting it.

Of the people who were fronting up and had doctors saying, 'This person is so sick they need treatment,' in the first instance, 80 per cent of the time the minister agreed. The minister agreed and said, 'Yes, they need to come here.' Gone was this appalling and unjustifiable use of public money to keep sick people sick—all the lawyers and the clogging up of the court system by this government blocking legitimate claims. Eight out of 10 times, the minister looked at it and said, 'Under this new law, actually it's right; they should come here and they should get help.' There were not floods, as the minister and the government might have you believe—floods and floods of the new independent panel that was put in by the minister overriding the minister's decision. In fact, there have only been eight instances where the minister has been overridden. This tells you that, by and large, the people who are getting help under this legislation are people who need it. They are sick people and, eight out of 10 times, the minister agrees they're sick, and so they get the help they need without having to go to court. That is the law now, and this government wants to change it.

This government wants to go back to the old way of doing things where, even if the minister agrees that you're sick, you have to go to court, and the minister and the government will fight you with all the vast resources of the Australian government. They will fight you and fight you and fight you. If you get sick and die along the way, so be it; we don't care. This system is working. It is getting help to the people who need it. They are getting the treatment that they need, and this government wants to deny that to them.

We now have a question to answer in Australia. Regardless of where you stand on whether you think offshore detention is right—whether you think it's right to keep people locked up for not having committed any crime—we now have to deal with the very obvious fact that under this government's watch there are now hundreds of people who are sick because the government has made them sick. What are we going to do with those people? Are we going to say they are not entitled to medical help, which is what this government wants to do, or are we going to allow this legislation to stay in place so that they can just get the help that they need? Obviously the government doesn't care whether sick people get worse or die. It's quite happy to leave them in conditions where they don't get the medical care they need and in fact are going to make them sicker. It's quite obvious the government doesn't care.

If this bill passes this place—unless this government has a change of heart, for which you need a heart in the first place—and goes to the Senate, I say to all the members of the Senate: by rejecting this bill, you are not posing a security risk to Australia. By knocking this bill back, you are not changing the government's border protection policies. I'd love it if the medevac bill changed the government's border protection policies, but it doesn't. It's not my preference, but, if you believe in offshore detention, indefinite detention and all of those things, you can still knock this bill back, because this bill does nothing for Australia's security. All this bill does is say it's going to be okay from now on for the minister to dip his hand into the public purse, take money that could be going to schools and hospitals and use it to go to court to stop sick people from getting treatment. That's what the government's asking for. The government is asking for the right to use public money to stop sick people getting treatment.

Now, no-one agrees with that. That's why the medevac bill passed both houses of parliament last time. It's why the Australian public thought it was a very good idea. I urge members of this place but especially members of the Senate: whatever your perspective on those broader issues, keep in place a law that is working. We know it's working. We know people are getting the help that they need. Allow that to continue to happen, because, otherwise, if you vote with the government on this, you are voting to make sick people sicker unnecessarily and you're voting to say it doesn't matter if someone as a result of all of this ends up with permanent illness, ends up with damage or decides to take their own life, because that's what has been happening. I plead with this place and with the other place to leave the law intact and to reject this bill.

Ged Kearney (Cooper, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Assistant Minister for Skills) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise today to speak on the Migration Amendment (Repairing Medical Transfers) Bill 2019, though I take umbrage at that title, because nothing needs to be repaired when it comes to the medevac legislation. It is working exactly as it should—getting sick refugees the health care they need. The policy of indefinite detention is making them sick, so if anything needs repairing it's that policy. If anyone needs repairing, it's the traumatised people this government is stranding on those islands for political gain. If any one thing needs repairing, it is our national psyche that has had to cope with the burden of conscience this horrible policy is inflicting on us.

In my first speech to this House, I referred to that damage on our national psyche and I said:

We must, as a priority, move the asylum seekers off Manus and Nauru to permanent resettlement and ensure that indefinite detention never happens again.

My commitment in this House is to the cause of humane refugee policy. It is to foreign policy and foreign aid that proactively supports people as they flee conflict.

I have worked every day to honour that commitment. It is why I was proud to work alongside my Labor colleagues, the indefatigable refugee sector and the crossbench on the medevac legislation.

It's inconceivable that the parliament, through legislation, had to force the Liberal government to get sick people, including children, to health care. Let me repeat that: the medevac legislation exists because this government was refusing to provide health care to refugees and asylum seekers when they needed it. They are in our care. They are our responsibility. They are suffering because of this government's policies.

Last year, we saw a collapsing and dire health situation for refugees and asylum seekers on Manus and Nauru. Anyone who heard tragic accounts from the UNHCR, Medecins Sans Frontieres or the ASRC would be left in no doubt whatsoever that the refugees and asylum seekers who are detained on Manus and Nauru are sick because of their indefinite detention. I thank the refugee sector for all the hard and wonderful work they do. It is the hopelessness and helplessness of their situation which causes the high incidences of psychological issues from depression and anxiety to the incredibly heartbreaking cases of resignation syndrome and suicide. It should never have come to this. These are people who sought our protection, not illegally but with the full recognition of international conventions of people seeking asylum. Enough is enough. The cruelty of the Minister for Home Affairs and his government is despicable.

Labor opposes the repeal of the medevac legislation. The Minister for Home Affairs has taken pains recently to trash the reputation of the medical panel involved in assessing the applications for medical evacuation. He has vigorously argued that two doctors from Nimbin can force the government to bring people from Manus or Nauru to Australia. I'm not sure why the minister is particularly offended by doctors in Nimbin, but the fact is that the panel includes some of Australia's most respected doctors, including the Commonwealth Chief Medical Officer and the Surgeon General of the Australian Border Force. These doctors were appointed by the minister himself. I feel they need a direct apology. They are doing exactly what they are charged with: assessing the applications for evacuation and the process is working. It is saving lives.

I believe the process has seen 96 evacuations, of which 88 were actually approved by either the Minister for Home Affairs or the Minister for Immigration, Citizenship, Migrant Services and Multicultural Affairs. Only eight times have they overruled the minister, and none of the objections by the minister were actually on national security grounds—not one. Thirteen refugees have been denied evacuation by the medical panel. It is working. Not one refugee here for treatment has had an injunction applied to stop them going back, as the Minister for Home Affairs would have us believe—more lies.

But all of these people do desperately need resettlement—and not back to Manus Island or Nauru. The government can and must prioritise resettlement options. This government can and must act immediately to take up offers from New Zealand. They can and must support the medical evacuation of all refugees who need treatment in Australia with their families, and they can and must support refugees and people seeking asylum when they are here in our community amongst us. They can and must ensure dignity, respect and safety for everyone we are responsible for. They are basic human rights. Thank you.

Shayne Neumann (Blair, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Veterans' Affairs and Defence Personnel) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Even the title of the Migration Amendment (Repairing Medical Transfers) Bill 2019—'repairing medical transfers'—is a misnomer. It's a disgraceful abuse of the name of the bill. I think Australians understand that our country can be strong on borders but still treat people with humanity and decency. That's why the last parliament passed legislation to help sick refugees and asylum seekers who are currently on Nauru and Manus Island to receive urgent medical care. The bill was needed because prime ministers and ministers for immigration and border protection and for home affairs have let people languish in indefinite detention on Manus Island and Nauru for six years. This government is now in its third term, and still we have no answer to indefinite detention on Manus Island and Nauru from this government.

We support—and I said it repeatedly as the then shadow minister for immigration and border protection—offshore processing, turnbacks when safe to do so, and regional resettlement. This government is running a desperate and shrill scare campaign, as they've done again and again since the days of Tampa. Again and again they've spread baseless lies about Labor's position on border protection and demonised people for political gain. For example, the ridiculous decision to reopen the Christmas Island detention centre was a hysterical and unhinged response by a desperate government. Our parliament was good enough to approach these matters in a grown-up and I think rational and reasonable way. Labor worked with the crossbench to achieve what is commonly called the medevac legislation.

The next important step this government must undertake is to resettle refugees and asylum seekers who are still languishing on Nauru and Manus. We need safe third-country settlement options. Since February 2013 we've had on the table from New Zealand an offer to take 150 refugees a year from Manus and Nauru. When the Abbott government came to power, they canned that. The Turnbull government didn't take up the offer. The Morrison government hasn't taken up the offer. Imagine if this government had taken up New Zealand's generous and decent offer—150 a year—or negotiated more. We wouldn't have this problem. We wouldn't have this situation where we've got this pernicious legislation that this government is bringing into the House today.

This government will do anything. I mentioned Christmas Island. They were going to spend $1.4 billion on Christmas Island—a $60,000 stunt whereby the Prime Minister flew to Christmas Island for a press conference. Even then, they spend $185 million, according to the budget papers, in relation to Christmas Island, reopening a detention centre they closed, just for political gains, and at the same time cut $300 million from the Home Affairs budget, cutting frontline staff and ICT arrangements. So, that's what they'll do. They've just spent $185 million on a stunt, and they'll cut frontline service delivery. For too long, this government has failed to treat vulnerable people on Manus and Nauru with decency and humanity, providing timely and adequate care. We should not be surprised, because the Liberal Party and the National Party are a party who in 2011 shamefully blocked the Malaysia solution, which would have stopped the boats. After failing this parliament by opposing Labor's legislation, 600 people drowned at sea.

I know Kerryn Phelps, the former member for Wentworth, is not here now, but I pay tribute to her for the work she did with me and with others on this medevac legislation. Before the Wentworth by-election, the Prime Minister said he'd accept New Zealand's offer, and guess what? After the by-election, he ripped it away. Labor recalibrated its position to enter into negotiations with the government about the people who are subject to this bill, but the Prime Minister straightaway ripped it away for political purposes. This government will do anything to avoid dealing with the real issue—that is, the resettlement of these people.

This bill that's before the House was opposed by stakeholders. The medevac legislation currently on the statute books is supported by stakeholders. Why? Because I was in the room with them. I met with them time and time again. I met with Kerryn Phelps, the former member for Wentworth. I met with the crossbenchers to negotiate. They picked up Labor's idea of an Independent Health Advice Panel. We negotiated those issues again and again in meeting after meeting I had for weeks, if not months.

Stakeholders support Labor and the crossbencher's position here. They don't want this bill to pass the chamber. The AMA, the Law Council, the Asylum Seeker Resource Centre, Doctors Without Borders, the Refugee Council—I could go on and on—don't want this bill before the chamber passed. Let's be very clear: the medevac legislation this government is seeking to abolish does not apply to new arrivals. It is ring-fenced. Only those people detained on Manus and Nauru currently are covered. The existing cohort and the people who come to Australia, I might add, are also subject to legislation because this government has brought 900 people here. We know this because the Independent Health Advice Panel report on 29 June said there are 348 people on Nauru and 531 in PNG; 879 people on Manus and Nauru are languishing in indefinite detention. We know from that report, which has been tabled in parliament by the Minister for Home Affairs or at his behest, that there are 900 people currently in Australia for medical or psychiatric assessment or treatment, because they can't get it in PNG or Nauru.

What has the government done? When people need that treatment or assessment—often mental health, psychiatric or physical—and when doctors recommend it, what have the government been doing? They have been fighting every step of the way in court case after court case, spending hundreds of thousands of dollars of taxpayer funds—over $300,000 in last year alone. They have been fighting and—guess what?—caving in at the last minute to create the fiction that they're still tough on border protection. They cave in again and again. Sometimes the litigation is not necessary, and they just realise it's necessary to bring the person to Australia—say, the Royal Brisbane Women's Hospital or the PA Hospital in Brisbane, in my home state of Queensland. They're brought here, and the government are costing us. There is no orderly pathway. The government fight tooth and nail.

This government is trying to get rid of a process that is working now, that we know is working because the stakeholders tell us it's working as well. And the boats keep coming. But more people are coming to this country under this government not on boats but with boarding passes. We know boats keep coming because we see that they do. The government leak strategically to favoured journalists and their favoured news outlets the fact that a boat has arrived. This week we've seen a leak. But, of course, this is the cloak of operational secrecy about what's happening in Operation Sovereign Borders that they impose again, and then they leak it for political gain. It's no secret. We saw on the front page of The Australian this week that another boat came. We know boats come. We saw a boat arrive—actually in Australia, I might add—the week that the Minister for Home Affairs challenged the then Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull for the leadership of the Liberal Party and the prime ministership of this country. As I say, through their incompetence, maladministration and political ineptitude they've allowed this issue to continue year after year after year. This is a minister who presides over Cape class patrol boats languishing in dock because they haven't got petrol and they haven't got crews. This is a minister who cuts frontline staff and hundreds of millions of dollars but allows a stunt to cost taxpayers $185 million.

What about the fact that asylum seekers are more likely to come with boarding passes than on boats? Ninety per cent of those who come by plane are found not to be refugees. They stay in Australia until their cases are resolved. We've seen a record 230,000 bridging visas issued in this country, with 27,931 applications made for protection visas in the last year alone and a record 64,362 in the last four years.

We're debating a bill now to try and abolish an orderly, working process for people to get urgent medical treatment. Where are the priorities for this government? Where are they? The medevac bill is working as we always intended it to work. We on the Labor side were ensuring that sick people could get the medical care they needed. We were ensuring that the minister has final discretion over medical transfers on national security, public safety or character grounds. And the minister's discretion is retained. I was absolutely adamant that we weren't going to outsource the minister's discretion to third-party stakeholders or to doctors. That's why we negotiated it in the way we did. The minister still has capacity, in the event of adverse security assessments or serious risk of criminal conduct by these people, to prevent the transfer. When people come to this country as a result of the transfer, they're detained and they get the medical treatment they need. That's what happens for those 900 or so people who've been brought here without the process of the medevac legislation. They're still detained and they get the medical treatment that they need. I've met many of them at detention centres around the country.

The government, under this legislation that they're trying to abolish, has approved about 90 transfers, and 20 cases have been referred to the Independent Health Advice Panel. Of those 20, the panel has upheld the minister's decision not to transfer the individual on 13 occasions and overturned the minister's decision not to transfer on seven occasions. So this independent panel, appointed by the Minister for Home Affairs I might add—the minister owes them an apology for the way he demonises them—is made up of the Commonwealth Chief Medical Officer, the Department of Home Affairs Chief Medical Officer and six others, including a nominee of the AMA, the Royal Australian and New Zealand College of Psychiatrists and the Royal Australasian College of Physicians and an expert in paediatric health. They're doing their job, and the medevac legislation is working.

The medivac legislation empowers the minister to consider national security grounds. This government claims all the time that it's being tough on crime and expelling people from the country on character grounds—on the basis of serious criminality. The legislation makes reference to a definition of 'security' as 'the protection of Australia's territorial and border integrity from serious threats'. Those opposite claim that's the case when they punt people out of the country, but when it comes to legislation that's been negotiated by Labor and the crossbench it's not relevant. The inconsistency of this government when it come to that is rank. When people come to this country, whether it's through the medevac legislation or as a result of having to instigate proceedings in court or because the government simply gives in because the person's mistreatment has been so egregious that they need psychiatric or medical care, they're immediately required by law to be detained in Australia.

The minister only allows them to not be detained—if I can put it like that—and to be released into the community if he feels it's in the public interest to do so. And he should be allowed to do it if they're no risk to the public. So the minister has that incredible power to protect the Australian public, protect their territorial and border integrity from serious threats and protect them under the migration power and the character test of serious risk of criminality.

What do we know about these people? The minister demonises them and makes out that somehow, under this legislation, there was going to be a flood of murderers, rapists and paedophiles in this country. But we know all about these people, and that's what Malcolm Turnbull, the then Prime Minister of this country, said to Donald Trump, the President of the United States. Before these people were put on Manus and Nauru, a memorandum of understanding was signed with the governments of PNG and Nauru and security checks were undertaken in relation to these people. There would be no people in detention we would know more about.

This government should withdraw this legislation and listen to the stakeholders. It's a disgrace and a despicable move by the Minister for Home Affairs to institute the practices he wants to undertake in relation to the abolition of this legislation. The government should hang their heads in shame for this legislation being before the chamber.

Steve Georganas (Adelaide, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I too rise to oppose this bill. Looking at the title of this particular bill that we're debating, the Migration Amendment (Repairing Medical Transfers) Bill 2019, I have to say that this legislation was repaired in the last parliament by what was moved in this House. It was changed to make it humane and to give the medical attention that was required to people who were in Nauru and on Manus Island. It was for them to be able to receive that medical attention, which is the humane thing to do. These people are in custody; they're in detention. They're our responsibility. When someone is sick, when someone needs a doctor and when someone is seeking medical attention, it is the humane and right thing to do to give those people the medical attention that they require.

Here we have, again, a government that is using refugees as a political football. We know this because their track record has been such ever since they came into government and when they were in government previously. When you look at the history and the track record of this government—you don't have to go that far back—you will remember the children overboard and how that event was manipulated for the political benefit of the government. This amendment here today and these topics that we're discussing are exactly the same. This is an issue that this government is seeking to use to manipulate and to play politics with. That is wrong. I've stood up in this place many times, as many of my colleagues have, to say that it's wrong.

We have people who need medical attention. They are our responsibility while they are being detained. They need the help of medical treatment. This shows, again, how cruel this government can be. There are no security risks. There are no border challenges. This has nothing to do with watering down our border protection. It has nothing to do with refugee policies and changing the way that we resettle people. This has simply to do with giving medical attention to people that require it. It is inhumane and it is cruel.

We have a government that's meant to look after people. Here they are basically denying people the medical attention that they require. Many of these people on Manus and Nauru are seeking refugee status. The majority will be found to be genuine refugees and will be resettled here in Australia. But we have a government that's playing politics again. We know that the bill was passed in this House not long ago to ensure that people were getting that attention they required. It had nothing to do with watering down our refugee policy. It had nothing to do with our border protection. It was simply a measure to ensure that people get one of the human rights that are required by people all over the world.

The government has used this, once again, to play politics with. It has been the trend all along by this government. For many, many years, and in the previous coalition government that existed from 1996 right through to 2007, it has been their trend. This is no different. This is absolutely no different. The government wants to refuse people medical attention, and this includes women and children and people who have been sitting and languishing in these places for many years. Our objective is that the medevac bill is necessary and it's been working. It's been working very well. We argued that, if the government had legitimate proposals to improve the operations, let's see them, let's hear about them. Where are the government members to stand up and defend what it put up today? Where are they to prosecute it and argue why this is needed? I see no government members on the list of speakers—none whatsoever. That's because they can't argue it. There is no argument and there are no points that they can make.

How can Australians believe the government when they routinely manipulate this issue? They misrepresent and mischaracterise the truth for political gain. We have a minister and a government that constantly cry wolf when it comes to this issue—constantly—because they have nothing else to offer the Australian public. All they have is the scare tactics and the divisive politics—dividing our community and dividing the public out there on this particular issue. The reality, as I said earlier—and every other speaker on this side has said this—is that this issue has nothing to do with watering down our border protection or watering down the settlement processes in place for refugees. This is simply a measure to ensure that people who require medical attention, and that includes women and children, are given that attention as quickly as possible. We saw cases on Nauru and Manus where people actually died because they didn't get that attention. It was reported in the papers. We saw people, for months, fighting in the courts. In the end, most of the time it has been found that they had to receive that attention.

Since the medevac laws were enacted, only seven patients have been transferred to Australia without the approval of the immigration minister, David Coleman. The minister didn't reject these cases on security or character concerns but on medical grounds. The individuals were only transferred to Australia after being assessed by an expert panel of doctors that the minister got to choose. This once again highlights the failure of the minister and the government to do their job. It's mismanagement of basic legislative tasks and mismanagement of the department.

The government oversaw $300 million of Australian Border Force budget blowouts, resulting in the Australian Border Force fleet being ordered to stop the patrols, as we all heard, when medevac came in, to save money—it's just ridiculous—and $7 million was spent on a strategic review of the Department of Home Affairs. We're not even allowed to see what that strategic review was about, yet $7 million was spent on it. We won't go into the failure of the managed offshore contracts, which we all read about in the papers and saw in the media. This is a bill that has been put in place by the government to divide the community and prevent people from getting the medical attention they require. They are out there basically misrepresenting and telling the Australian public something that isn't true. We've heard this time and time again. When it comes to this particular issue, all we have seen is divisive politics without any purpose and without any processes in place; it's just to play politics. I think it's about time—and I've said this many times—that we stopped playing politics with human beings, with refugees. We've been doing it for far too long, we've been doing it for the wrong reasons in this place, and it's about time that we stopped doing this. I fear that this isn't the end of it and that we will see many, many nasty, inhumane proposals by this government over the next three years. When they have nothing to offer for the betterment of Australia and for the betterment of the future of the next generation, they will just be manipulative with refugees, migration and the issues that we've constantly seen for many years.

I fear for the way we're going in this nation. This has to stop, because the way that we've been treating refugees is wrong. We should start looking at being a humane nation, with a government that looks after people and ensures that we keep our border protection. But, at the same time, when people need medical attention they should get medical attention.

Susan Templeman (Macquarie, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise to speak against any repeal of the Migration Amendment (Repairing Medical Transfers) Bill 2019, known as the medevac legislation. As was intended, the legislation that we passed earlier this year has ensured that sick people in detention on Manus Island, in PNG, and Nauru get the medical care they need. This was our objective, given that the offshore facilities set up six years ago as temporary offshore regional processing centres have become places of ongoing limbo, of indefinite detention, for too many people, not providing adequate high-level health services for sick people who are in our care.

This is a problem of the current government's own making. They've been in charge now for six years and have failed to help these vulnerable people. Before there's a howl of outrage from those opposite—who seem to have missed the compassion gene in their DNA for this particular group of people and, sadly, for many others—let's get some facts straight. The government has approved approximately 90 transfers to Australia on medical grounds, and 20 cases have been referred to the Independent Health Advice Panel, or IHAP. Of the 20 cases referred to the IHAP, the panel has upheld the minister's decision not to transfer the individual on 13 occasions and overturned the minister's decision not to transfer on seven occasions. So, that is seven times that someone has been refused by the minister but overturned by the independent panel. This is a decision made by an independent panel of doctors that the minister himself chose. This panel includes some of Australia's best doctors, including the Commonwealth Chief Medical Officer and the Surgeon-General of the Australian Border Force.

There's one other important point to make about these seven cases. The existing legislation that we worked hard to bring about ensured that the minister had final discretion over medical transfers on national security, public safety or character grounds. So, these seven people whom the minister objected to were not objected to for any of those reasons. That tells me that medevac is necessary, and it's working. It tells me that the minister's claim that 'two doctors from Nimbin' can force the government to bring people from Manus Island or Nauru to Australia is simply not the case. It tells me that the minister's claims that '1,000 people would flood Australia' through medevac is also not the case. If there are legitimate proposals to improve the operation of medevac, then Minister Dutton should put those amendments forward rather than simply trying to repeal the entire legislation. The government has not built a case for repealing this legislation. What is the case is that this bill has allowed people who desperately need care to get the medical treatment they require. It's a human right, and one this government has failed to deliver for so long.

Last Saturday the Hawkesbury branch of Rural Australians for Refugees held a vigil for the people on Manus Island and Nauru for whom medical care came too late. I thank them for doing that, and I thank those who attended for recognising the lives of people who've died and for mourning their deaths. These are people who, in their attempts to flee from war or torture or death, found themselves in detention. They're people like Hamid Khazaei, a man in his early 20s who died from a skin infection that turned into septicaemia in August 2014. The Queensland coroner investigating the death found that doctors on the island had urged his immediate transfer to Australia, but this was first ignored, including by the Department of Immigration bureaucrats who didn't read their emails for up to 13 hours, and then it was rejected by the department. After further pleading from the doctors trying to treat him, approval was finally granted—two days after the initial request—to move Hamid, by now semiconscious and septic. But the department ordered that he be moved not to Australia but to Port Moresby's Pacific International Hospital. There he was, unfortunately, misdiagnosed, treated with broken equipment and left unattended as he grew more and more critically ill. He suffered a series of cardiac arrests. By the time he was transported to Brisbane's Mater Hospital he was profoundly brain damaged.

Queensland Coroner Terry Ryan, in handing down his findings, said that Hamid's death was preventable and recommended that health care on the offshore islands be properly funded and run and be under the control of doctors or that asylum seekers and refugees be moved to Australia. That was in 2014. There was no action by this government.

The Independent Health Advice Panel tells us that the majority of medical consultations even now on Nauru are for mental health problems. In its first assessment of health facilities on Nauru the Independent Health Advice Panel found that there is no access to high-quality inpatient psychiatric care and that patients with severe mental illness are at a higher risk of suicide and should be transferred to a hospital with appropriate inpatient psychiatric care.

One of those who killed themselves last year was 26-year-old Fariborz Karami. Fariborz was a Kurdish Iranian asylum seeker. He was the 12th person to die within an Australian offshore immigration detention centre since 2012. At the time—and now—there were serious concerns about his 12-year-old brother too. Both his brother and his mother had pleaded for medical help for him, as he declined in the months leading up to his death. We don't live in a country where life is cheap. These young men—people the age of my son—deserve a chance for a future.

I want to mention the conditions that medevac patients find themselves in, as reported recently in the media. From what I have seen and read recently in The Guardian it is clear that we are still missing some humanity in how we're treating some people. Many of them are still effectively in a prison. There are reports of hotel rooms in Brisbane being used while others are in detention centres between Brisbane and Adelaide, but the conditions are not necessarily conducive to someone being adequately treated for a serious psychiatric condition. I urge the government to deliver, no matter where the treatment occurs, high-quality health care, as we are required to.

I also refer to comments by the Minister for Health in question time yesterday. He talked about mental health. He talked about the priority it was not just for this government but for this parliament. I ask that the minister apply those same principles to people who are in our care. We are responsible for people, and their mental health is something that we can make a difference to.

I think above all else, after six years of inaction, this government has to take up the renewed offer from the New Zealand Prime Minister, Jacinda Ardern, to resettle 150 people currently in offshore detention. It's a deal that has been open to the government for years, and not a move has been made to take it. It would allow more people to be resettled and to rebuild their lives, as the US agreement does—and that must also be completed as planned. The governor of Manus Island, Charlie Benjamin, is also urging Australia to help resettle refugees to a third country. This is something everyone wants to see. I welcome comments by some members opposite, like the member for Monash, who recognises that Australia can't continue indefinite detention and who is urging his own government to finish resettling detainees. It is good to hear that sentiment coming from the other side of the House.

In case someone tries to take my words out of context, I reiterate that Labor's position on border protection is clear: we do support strong borders. Our policy and my advocacy for these measures don't change any of that. You can have strong borders and you can show humanity and compassion for refugees and asylum seekers. They are not in conflict with each other. I wish that this government would remember that.

Rebekha Sharkie (Mayo, Centre Alliance) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The parliament has already dealt with this issue. The medevac laws are working. They provide a medical solution to a medical problem, and those medical problems are faced by asylum seekers and people found to be genuine refugees and who are under Australia's duty of care. They put medical professionals rather than politicians at the centre of decision-making but with an appropriate veto power of the minister. The minister has used this power, I believe, on just a few occasions. There have been approximately 90 transfers, overwhelmingly for serious mental health issues. We know people have lost their lives on Manus and Nauru. We know that people have taken their lives on Manus and Nauru, and I remind this House that these people are under the care and responsibility of Australia.

The government's rhetoric that the passing of the medevac bill would bring hordes of boats to our shores was proven to be false, and I don't think anyone in this chamber would argue with that. It was completely false, because the bill is ring fenced around just those asylum seekers and people found to be genuine refugees who are currently on Manus and Nauru. There is no pull factor for people from other destinations. The government knew this but continued to—I would say unashamedly—play to the fears of some in our community. They even went through the incredibly extensive media stunt of briefly opening Christmas Island for the cameras, only to quietly close it again. It was an offensive display and, I believe, one of the lowest points in politics this year. It was shameful. So I say again that the medevac laws are working and Centre Alliance will not buy into attempts at playing politics with people's lives. We will remain steadfast in backing a medical solution to a medical problem, with the appropriate safeguards there for the minister.

Now, I respect that many people in this place feel comfortable talking about their faith. I would say to every person in this House who wants to repeal this legislation and who calls themselves a Christian, as indeed I do, to go and re-read Matthew 25:31-46. There is no need for me to quote the entire piece of scripture in this chamber, but Matthew 25 makes it very clear that Christians should see everyone as Christ in the flesh. In the New Testament, stranger and neighbour are in fact synonymous. The golden rule of 'love your neighbour as yourself' refers not just to the people you know—your neighbours—but also to those you do not know. And I'm sure I do not need to remind every person who follows Christ that Christ too was a refugee.

If the government is successful in repealing this legislation, it will cause much harm—needless harm, unnecessary harm. It is quite simply a wicked thing that we are doing in this place. It is unnecessary. And I will therefore, in the strongest possible terms, oppose this bill, as will my Centre Alliance colleagues in another place.

Sharon Claydon (Newcastle, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise today to oppose in the strongest terms possible the government's Migration Amendment (Repairing Medical Transfers) Bill 2019. This is indeed the Morrison government's shameful attempt to repeal humanitarian legislation that allows for people in PNG and Nauru to receive the appropriate medical care on the advice of doctors. The very fact that we need to legislate to force this government to fulfil its basic duty of care to vulnerable asylum seekers is deeply saddening. The idea that the government would choose to frame this legislation, which has the sole purpose of giving sick people the care they need, as some sort of dangerous and radical heresy is astounding. The decision of those opposite to oppose the medevac legislation tells you everything you need to know about the character of this government. Those opposite looked inside and found that, even if they marshalled their combined compassion and ethical integrity, they still couldn't stretch to allowing desperately sick people to get the medical attention they need and deserve. Instead they chose the path of stoking fear and division over fulfilling their moral responsibility. They chose rank electioneering over meeting Australia's duty of care to vulnerable asylum seekers.

The government has put forward any number of arguments now against the legislation that was passed by this parliament last term, but none of them have been proven to have any merit whatsoever. We haven't seen the boats restart; we haven't seen rapists, murderers and other criminals arriving on our shores; and we haven't seen our hospitals buckling under the crippling weight of caring for thousands of new patients. What we have seen, however, is that vulnerable asylum seekers now have an avenue and an orderly process by which they can access the care they so desperately need.

This whole sorry episode has been a continuation of this government's cruel and opportunistic agenda when it comes to the treatment of some of the most vulnerable people on the planet. The fact that the government is now doubling-down and again attempting to use lies and misinformation for political gain at the expense of asylum seekers just reinforces how morally bereft they really are.

The Minister for Home Affairs has argued that there's no need for the medevac legislation. This is blatantly untrue. For too long the Abbott, Turnbull and now Morrison governments have failed to look after vulnerable people in regional processing centres. For too long these people haven't been getting the care they need or they've being kept waiting for months or years for it.

Manus Island and Nauru were originally set up as regional transit processing centres. The fact that they have become places of horrific, indefinite detention under this government is to our great national shame. Some of the most vulnerable people on the planet have been forced to live in limbo for years with no pathway to resolution. Labor has long urged the government to take up New Zealand's offers of resettling refugees there. But the government has refused, instead choosing to keep these poor people languishing in detention indefinitely. The sense of hopelessness that they must feel is unimaginable, and the government's failure to leave no stone unturned in finding a solution for six years is unforgivable.

At this point, I want to pay tribute to the staunch advocacy of the many grandmothers against detention in my electorate. This extraordinarily committed group of mostly women have been holding a weekly vigil in Newcastle for the innocent people who have been caught up in this seemingly endless cycle of trauma for more than two years now. This week they held an anniversary vigil to mourn the last six years of this indefinite detention. To those who participated, I thank you for your humanity, your compassion and your advocacy.

As I mentioned earlier, there is a dire and undeniable need for the medevac legislation. In 2016, the UNHCR found that 88 per cent of the people on Manus Island were suffering from depression, anxiety and/or post-traumatic stress disorder. Then, last year, Medecins Sans Frontieres put out its extremely depressing and distressing report entitled Indefinite Despair. This report found that nearly one in three of the asylum seekers they treated in Nauru had suicidal thoughts and nearly one in three attempted suicide. This included children as young as nine.

The facilities at the regional processing facilities are grossly inadequate to handle this crisis. This is nothing short of government sanctioned neglect, and it cannot go on. That's exactly what medevac is about, and it's supported by the Australian Medical Association, the Royal Australian College of General Practitioners, the Law Council and the Asylum Seeker Resource Centre to name just a notable few.

Before this legislation passed earlier this year, it took legal action for this government to be convinced to fulfil its duty of care. Indeed, I understand that every litigated case resulted in a medical transfer to Australia, and that has been more than 50 cases now. With today's legislation, the government isn't proposing amendments or improvements to the medevac process; no, it wants to axe it entirely. And that means a return to the flawed and compromised medical transfer system that has failed asylum seekers again and again and again. The determination of this government to see vulnerable asylum seekers again plunged into a situation where there is no easy process to seek appropriate medical care is unconscionable. Why hasn't a single government member put their name down to stand up and explain to the chamber today why sick people shouldn't get the care they need—the care that Australia has a responsibility to provide?

As I mentioned earlier, there has been a lot of misinformation about this bill, and, shamefully, a lot of it has been coming from the government. What does the original bill actually do? Basically, it provides an avenue by which two independent Australian doctors can recommend that an asylum seeker needing urgent medical attention can be transferred temporarily to Australia. Before the doctors make their determination, they must be sure that the asylum seeker cannot get the treatment they need on Nauru or Manus. The bill also provides other safeguards, built into the legislation, for the protection of Australia and Australians.

There are three reasons the Minister for Home Affairs can refuse a transfer. He can refuse if he doesn't believe it's necessary. He can refuse if he believes the transfer would pose harm to Australia's security. He can also reject a transfer if he believes, on character grounds on the basis of the person's criminal record, that it would expose the Australian community to a serious risk of criminal conduct. If the minister thinks that it's not necessary for the individual's health then the case goes to the Independent Health Advice Panel for review. There are plenty of opportunities for the minister responsible to reject these transfers if any one of those three criteria are met.

Any reasonable, compassionate person can see there's nothing controversial about the medevac legislation. Indeed, Labor went to great lengths to introduce responsible safeguards at the time. First, we ensured the minister could deny a transfer on national security grounds or in the case of serious criminality. Second, we extended the time frames to refuse the transfer to make the process more workable and flexible. Third, we ring fenced the legislation so it could only apply to a set number of people in regional processing, thereby removing any incentive for people to risk their lives at sea.

There can be absolutely no justification for the government to overturn this legislation on national security or any other grounds. And yet, as I mentioned, the government has fabricated any number of spurious claims for its own rank political reasons. I don't wish to articulate all of those today, because we simply won't have time. But we do not have a system in crisis here. There is no risk to our borders and there is no invitation for thousands of undocumented boat arrivals, as the government might have us believe. No. What we have is a humane and compassionate process that allows Australia to fulfil its duty of care, and the Prime Minister knows it.

No-one has seriously bought the government's misrepresentations of this benign humanitarian process, much though the government might like for that to be the case. It is shocking that this government's crude and callous politicisation and shameless pointscoring continues in this area of policy. It is indeed rank political pointscoring and popularism that is the only threat posed to our national security in this whole sorry episode. I think the member for Mayo articulated well the shameful trajectory that we have taken to get to this point where the Morrison Liberal government now seeks to overturn a perfectly workable, humane and compassionate piece of legislation to bring some redress to what is a horrific and shameful chapter in our national history.

That members opposite on the government benches continue to pursue this attack in this chamber is to their great shame. They bring great discredit on this parliament and on the thoroughly democratic processes that we all took part in in the last term of parliament to ensure that there was some relief for those people who have been left stranded in indefinite detention, for more than six years now, on Manus and Nauru. It is unconscionable. It cannot continue. The government must step aside.

Kevin Hogan (Page, National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The debate is interrupted in accordance with standing order 43. The debate may be resumed at a later hour.