Sarah Hanson-Young (SA, Australian Greens) Share this | Hansard source

I rise to speak to the disallowance motion before us that has been put forward by the coalition. This, of course, is an attempt to prevent a better system of community support for asylum seekers while their applications are being processed. The idea of this disallowance motion is to stop this better process from being implemented. I would like to state that, perhaps unsurprisingly, the Greens do not support the coalition’s attempt to take us back to a system in which asylum seekers are denied basic access to services such as health and welfare support. In fact, the Greens have been at the forefront of pushing and lobbying for the removal of the 45-day rule, so there is no way that we would support the coalition’s motion. What we see before us today is another attempt by the coalition to mount a scare campaign—that Australia is sending a message to people-smugglers that we are going soft on people-smuggling. I do not know how far from the truth the coalition can be when talking about the basic rights of desperate human beings seeking our protection.

We are talking about the most vulnerable people—people who have fled persecution in search of a better life for themselves and their families. Yet the coalition, through this disallowance motion, are seeking to prolong the unacceptable, undeserved hardship of those in the most need of support and assistance. For the past 12 years we have had a system that has meant for asylum seekers who have not applied for a protection visa within a 45-day period after their arrival in Australia the denial of work rights, welfare support and access to Medicare whilst waiting for their visa application to be processed. The fact is that there are many legitimate reasons why an asylum seeker may not lodge a protection claim within 45 days of arrival in Australia, such as being given the wrong information by family and friends, having limited English skills or lacking an understanding of Australia’s immigration rules and processes. The coalition are attempting a return to a system where asylum seekers are dependent on charities for basic survival—a system we do not have to, and should not want to, return to.

This draconian policy, introduced by the coalition to ‘prevent extensive abuse of the refugee processing regime and limit the making of vexatious claims’ has resulted in many asylum seekers living in conditions of extreme destitution, with social isolation a common occurrence. This has meant that their basic mental and physical health has been impacted upon. Many key refugee and an asylum seeker advocates have highlighted the serious effects on the mental and physical state of asylum seekers who are unable to support themselves due to the current imposition of the 45-day rule. The imposition of this rule has meant the deterioration in health of asylum seekers and a complete dependence on charities, churches and community groups for basic day-to-day living requirements while their application is being processed.

When this policy was introduced the Howard government simply accepted that other people would carry the can, that other people would offer the support and assistance that these vulnerable human beings needed, and that, for some reason, it was not the role of the government, who had signed up to the UN refugee convention. The Australian Human Rights Commission, in evidence to the Joint Standing Committee on Migration’s inquiry into Australia’s immigration system, stated:

... the [current] conditions and restrictions attached to some bridging visas may significantly impact on the ability of asylum seekers and refugees to exercise their basic human rights, including the right to work, the right to social security, the right to an adequate standard of living and the right to the highest attainable standard of health.

Is this really a policy that we want to retain? Is this really the type of immigration policy we should be proud of? I think not.

Statistics prove that there is a higher visa grant rate—that is, around 36 per cent—among asylum seekers who have applied after the 45 days than those that have applied within the 45-day limit, which is at 20 per cent. This clearly puts at rest the argument from the opposition that there is some link between the time that a person lodges the protection visa application and the merit of their claim. That argument is clearly false.

Last year the joint standing committee also heard from the Hotham Mission’s asylum seeker project. The Hotham Mission gave the committee an example of a client that has been affected by the imposition of the arbitrary 45-day rule. According to the Hotham Mission, their client, who has a master’s in social work, was not aware of the 45-day rule when he arrived here. So clearly it was not a deterrent. He has subsequently been denied the right to work for three years. The mission said:

His mental health has deteriorated because he frankly has nothing to do and he is living on $33 a week.

This is despite the fact that he is willing to work, willing to be a participant in his local community.

He has recently been linked into mental health services and has been deemed unable to work due to his mental health issues. If he even does get a visa now he will be a greater cost to the community than he would have been if he had been allowed to work.

So is this really a cost-effective policy in terms of monetary cost or social and human impact? Clearly it is not.

While the Asylum Seekers Assistance Scheme can provide some financial assistance, having no permission to work and being reliant on welfare and other support networks that may or may not be easily accessible does cause substantial alienation and psychological problems for those asylum seekers awaiting their visa resolution. Why would the coalition want to put more hardship and stress on a group of individuals that have fled dangerous and traumatic circumstances in their home country simply in search of a better life? It beggars belief that we are being told by the coalition that these people should not be able to go and get a job, work, sustain themselves, prove that they actually want to start a new life and participate in the community. We need to be looking far beyond the ignorance that is currently being spewed from some of the members of the coalition.

Placing punitive work, health and welfare restrictions on those seeking our protection is an abhorrent policy, and we as elected parliamentarians must not allow it to continue any longer. I commend the Minister for Immigration and Citizenship—this is the second time today that I have commended the minister—on moving to a more humane approach. In this aspect he has stayed true to Labor’s 2007 election promise, where they clearly stated that they:

... recognise the arbitrary 45-day-rule results in legitimate asylum seekers on bridging visas being unnecessarily denied the right to work while their claim is being processed.

So good on the government for actually standing by at least one of their election promises.

After the Senate today voted historically to overturn the appalling policy of detention debts, the coalition still have the gall to come in here and argue that this rule should not be overturned here. They are clearly out of touch with what the Australian community thinks is acceptable, humane and fair. It is time for them to step back and perhaps rethink where their party is sitting on these issues, because they clearly are not in touch with the Australian public. It just highlights over and over that there is a lot of cleaning up to do in the coalition ranks. This disallowance motion is just another example of the regressive immigration stance that the coalition continues to advocate.

We have moved beyond the days when people turned a blind eye to locking children in detention, to vulnerable people sewing their lips together in the middle of the desert. We have moved beyond that. Let’s keep moving forward. Let’s keep moving towards becoming a country with a reputation that we should be proud of. We have now abolished detention debts—fantastic. Let’s not go back to a place where we think that vulnerable people should be left to beg for the support of charitable organisations because the government does not want to take the responsibility that has been clearly outlined in our obligations under the refugee convention.

I should note that none of the unfair, inhumane and punitive policies on asylum seekers that have been implemented—such as the 45-day rule, the temporary protection visa regime or even detention debts—has ever been shown to be an effective deterrent to people seeking asylum. Why is that? Because when people are desperate for freedom and protection of their families it does not matter what is written on the government’s website or whether the Australian government has overturned or accepted a disallowable motion of a particular policy. Desperate, vulnerable people will always seek protection and freedom for themselves and their families. And it is something that we, as Australian citizens and as parliamentarians of a country that advocates for fairness and justice, have a responsibility to uphold.

What happened to the Australian fair go? It clearly disappeared—it was dissolved—during the 12 years of the Howard government. Let’s not go back there. Let’s move forward. Let’s ensure that we become the compassionate, humane nation that we desperately want to be.

So, the entire basis of the coalition’s argument that we are seeing an ‘influx’ of ‘illegal entrants’ due to the removal of these policies is clearly redundant. What should be noted, however, is that the existence of these punitive polices has been not only a blight on Australia’s international human rights reputation but also a clear breach, as I have pointed out, of our international human rights obligations—a claim that is supported by organisations such as the UN Human Rights Committee, the UNHCR and the Australian Human Rights Commission.

The Greens, as I said right at the beginning, have been advocating for years for this unfair regime to be removed, and I hope that the Senate will see sense, as it did earlier today, and quash the attempt of the opposition to continue to keep this oppressive 45-day rule regime. I would like to stress, as I did at the beginning of my contribution, that the Greens do not, and never will, accept any attempts to turn back the clock to the dark days when we locked children in detention and threw away the key, to the dark days when we thought it was okay for the person in the highest office of the land, the Prime Minister, to demonise the world’s most vulnerable people. The Greens will not allow that to happen. We must get rid of this 45-day rule, and there is absolutely no way we will be supporting the coalition’s scare campaign and voting for this motion. We will absolutely not do that.