Anne Urquhart (Tasmania, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

I rise to speak on today's matter of public importance, on people smuggler deterrents, and in doing so will highlight the difference between the asylum seeker policies of this side of the Senate and those policies of that side of the Senate. I seek to immediately draw the Senate's attention to a murky shadow in this Senate on 23 November 2011. During question time on that day Senator Cash was asking Senator Kim Carr, who was then the Minister representing Minister Bowen in this chamber, about the Labor government's policies in this area. During the course of Senator Carr's answer, Senator Cash interjected to say that this is 'the gift that keeps on giving'. That is the premise of their policy on this humanitarian issue. It is to keep up the division, keep up the opposition to trying to assist the most desperate people who want to come to Australia to make a better life for their family. Question time continued with Senator Carr retorting:

Senator Cash has said that this is 'the gift that keeps on giving'. We could not get a clearer policy position from the Liberal Party, which wants people to get on these leaky boats and to drown at sea. This is the Liberal Party policy writ large—'the gift that keeps on giving'.

Senator Cash responded that she was not claiming that boats sinking at sea was the gift that keeps on giving for the Liberal Party but that it was the Labor Party's policy that was the infamous gift that was oh so worthy of throwing into public discourse. Regardless of Senator Cash's clarification, the fact that seven months on the Liberal Party continues to seek to get political mileage out of this humanitarian issue is, quite frankly, puerile.

I refer the Senate to the United Nations High Commission for Refugees 2001 report on global trends. The report notes that by the end of 2011 there were 42½ million forcibly displaced persons worldwide. That is, a group of people equivalent to more than two times the population of Australia was forcibly displaced worldwide. Australians are proud of our nation's record of resettling people seeking refuge from persecution and strife. As a result of our long history of protecting refugees, Australia currently ranks in the top three resettlement countries worldwide. Since the first refugees arrived in Australia just after the Second World War, more than 75,000 refugees have created a new home in Australia. As this government has always said, the composition of Australians and the asylum-seeking case load will change depending on factors in asylum seekers' home countries. The UNHCR report notes that of the 42½ million people, over 15 million were refugees, over 26 million were internally displaced persons and almost one million were asylum seekers. Notably, women and girls represented 49 per cent of people of concern to UNHCR, constituting 48 per cent of refugees, and children below 18 years of age of age represented 46 per cent of refugees and 34 per cent of asylum seekers. This represents an increase from 2010 to 2011 of 44 per cent and 31 per cent respectively.

As in 2010, Afghan and Iraqi refugees accounted for 42 per cent of all refugees under UNHCR's responsibility in 2011. With 2.7 million refugees, located in 79 different asylum countries, Afghanistan remained the leading country of origin of refugees in 2011. On average, one out of four refugees in the world originated from Afghanistan. For our region of the Asia-Pacific the UNHCR reports that, at the end of 2011, there were some 3.6 million refugees, accounting for some 35 per cent of all refugees.

The Gillard Labor government has agreed to fund a UNHCR project on mapping, review and assessment of the protection situation and treatment of unaccompanied and separated children who have moved irregularly into or within South-East Asia. The project totals around $140,000 and will seek to detail arrangements for the protection and treatment of unaccompanied and separated children who arrive irregularly in countries in the region. It will examine existing systems for identifying, registering and referring such children.

I turn to an area of this government's immigration policy that saw real results for asylum seekers and real results for the host community. Although the Pontville Immigration Detention Centre near Hobart was decommissioned on 3 March this year, it was a shining light in Australia's immigration detention network. The positive feedback from the Tasmanian community about the Pontville centre, and specifically the benefits it provided to the local community, must be noted in this debate. And it must also be noted that the overwhelmingly positive feedback from the local community on the Pontville centre and the benefits it provided is in stark contrast to Senator Abetz's claims—he is obviously suffering from the same bout of relentless negativity as Tony Abbott. As part of prudent planning the department has retained the site as a contingency centre. It is standard procedure to provide maintenance at contingency sites and to put basic security arrangements in place to protect assets. The government kept its promise to close Pontville after six months and there are no plans to reopen the centre at this stage.

Over the six months Pontville was open, Tasmanians opened their hearts to men seeking asylum at the centre in southern Tasmania. Shirley Williams, a member of the Bridgewater Brighton branch of the Labor Party and a member of the Brighton Knitting Club, together with other wonderful people in her community, started knitting beanies and other clothing to keep the men warm. Shirley and her friends recognised that the cold climate of the Jordan Valley would be quite a shock to the mainly Afghani asylum seekers. They then spent their own time knitting beanies and other clothing of all shapes and colours for the men in the centre. Shirley and a number of women went further, visiting the centre with knitting needles in hand, prepared to teach the men how to supplement the clothes they had been provided. They were surprised and pleased to discover that the Hazara occupants of the centre were already skilled at knitting, many having made their livelihoods with similar skills in making and weaving carpets. In the regular visits to follow, the men and women swapped skills at the same time as they swapped stories. What a tremendous display of multiculturalism in action—people of totally different backgrounds and experiences bonding over the interests and activities that they share, each teaching the other a new ability and a new empathy.

I also want to place on record my support for the work of Emily Conolan, who harnessed the enthusiasm of the Tasmanian community and established the Tasmanian Asylum Seekers Support Group. Shortly after announcing the purpose of the group, Emily was overwhelmed by the number of people who wanted to be part of a constructive engagement with Australia's humanitarian immigration program. Over 150 volunteers visited asylum seekers at Pontville on a regular basis while the centre was operational. Some worked one-on-one with asylum seekers to provide direct company and support. Each of those people deserves thanks, not just for their compassion but also for their preparedness to look past the anxiety that builds from confronting the unexpected, the barriers, the physical walls and the cultural differences that too often prevent us from genuinely engaging with others.

Despite attempts at fearmongering and whipping up moral panic by Senator Abetz, the Pontville Immigration Detention Centre was embraced by Tasmanians, so much so that in the months leading up to the centre's decommissioning the people of southern Tasmania, including the Mayor of Brighton, Tony Foster; the Tasmanian government, including Premier Lara Giddings; support organisations; and locals were advocating for the centre to remain open. These people recognised that the influx of migrants to Tasmania has traditionally been a tremendous positive for our community—from those who travelled between Poatina, Longford and Ouse in the mid-20th century, building our world famous hydroelectric dams, to the Hmong community, whose delicious fresh produce is snapped up by Tasmanians and tourists alike every Saturday at the Salamanca Market. We are definitely a state that welcomes migrants, a state that opens our hearts to migrants.

During the years of coalition government from 1996 to 2007 Australia's immigration detention regime had the effect of systematically crushing the hope of refugees that they would ever have the chance to begin a new life. Under the Howard government, families with young children were kept behind razor wire for years on end. Some were released into the community through the horrible 'stick' policy known as temporary protection visas, a policy under which genuine refugees were required to constantly reapply to remain in Australia or be forced to return to the country in which they had suffered persecution. Temporary protection visas did not work in Australia, with the overwhelming majority of people on them ending up as permanent Australian residents—that is hardly a deterrent. And if the coalition are so sure of temporary protection visas, why did they reject an independent inquiry into their effectiveness? We know that more than 95 per cent of temporary protection visas holders went on to get a permanent visa to live in Australia.

The harsh conditions of temporary protection visas prevented family reunions but did not stop boats arriving. Temporary protection visas were introduced by the Howard government in October 1999 to deter boat arrivals by denying people found to be refugees the right to stay permanently in Australia. They did not stop boats arriving: there were almost 4,000 boat arrivals that year. During the next two financial years there were almost 8½ thousand boat arrivals. Of the almost 10,000 people who were granted temporary protection visas, 95 per cent were subsequently granted a permanent visa by the time the scheme was abolished. This could hardly be perceived to be a deterrent. The harsh conditions attached to temporary protection visas prevented people from being reunited with their families. From 1999 to 2001 the proportion of women and children among Iraqi and Afghan unauthorised boat arrivals more than tripled. Following the introduction of temporary protection visas, the proportion of women and children who arrived by boat increased from 25 per cent to over 40 per cent. Temporary protection visas were harsh and punitive and did not work as a deterrent. Furthermore, under the Howard government's so-called Pacific solution, other refugees were sent to detention on Nauru, a tiny island where some stayed for up to three years with little human contact.

For every refugee who has overcome incredible odds to build a new life, there is a person whose hope has been consumed by tragedy or a journey to shelter that is just too far. Worst of all is when the promise on which their hope rested turns out to be as insecure as the lives they left behind. It is no surprise that many refugees, who were already suffering trauma from fleeing a crisis and enduring a prolonged ordeal, simply could not cope with such gruelling stress. In such conditions, even the most resolute and naturally positive person falls into a spiral of despair. In these conditions, that hope of a better life for your family can degenerate into severe mental disorders. The evidence is clear that length of confinement is associated with progressive deterioration in mental state.

Similarly, the uncertainty of temporary-protection-visa status was the greatest single contributor to post-traumatic stress disorder amongst refugees. The effects of such trauma are profound and enduring. Refugees held in detention for only a short time have far better settlement outcomes than those in prolonged detention.

I am pleased that under the Labor government the parameters for mandatory detention have been dramatically recast. No longer does the horrible 'stick policy' of temporary protection visas persecute some of the most disadvantaged people in the world with fear and uncertainty. Now temporary protection visas are gone and the government is expanding the number of low-risk and vulnerable families and children being housed in community based accommodation rather than in detention centres. Today, children are no longer held in detention centres, and around 1,600 people, mainly vulnerable families, are in the community. By next year, one-third of asylum seekers will be issued bridging visas to live and work in the community while their claims are assessed, and another 20 per cent will be in community detention.

All the while, the opposition's 'turn back the boats' policy is in tatters. Indonesia does not want a bar of it. The Navy and Border Protection say it is a dangerous risk to Australian lives, and all the experts say it is a dud. The coalition continues to shamelessly spruik a policy that the experts say is a dud, that our own Navy says is dangerous and risks lives, that the UN's refugee chief believes breaches the refugee convention and that has been found in Europe to be a breach of human rights.

The coalition's foreign affairs spokesperson, Ms Julie Bishop, was so desperate that she went to Jakarta to plead for some sort of hearing on their disgraceful policy. She met with the deputy chairman of Indonesia's parliament, who said that the opposition's policy was unfair on Indonesia, and he accused Ms Bishop of being arrogant in explaining the coalition's position. He told the ABC on 3 May this year: 'In my opinion, that view is a view that is solely focused on Australia's perspective, without considering Indonesia at all as the country that experiences the negative impacts of the illegal immigrant issue.' This is just the latest declaration from Indonesia that they do not want a bar of the opposition's reckless and arrogant tow-back policy. The repeated and clear message from Indonesia is that they would not agree to towing back any boats.

We do not see any policy as 'a gift that keeps on giving'. Rather we are committed to working through issues with fairness, equity and justice at the fore of our decision making.