Stirling Griff (SA, Centre Alliance) Share this | Hansard source

At the outset, I indicate that Centre Alliance supports the main objective of this bill, the Migration Amendment (Family Violence and Other Measures) Bill 2016, to combat violence and abuse in the sponsored family visa program. We have waited a very, very, very long time to debate this important piece of legislation. It's been well over two years since this bill was introduced, and this is the second incarnation after the first version lapsed with the previous parliament. Its delay shows that this government does not rate family violence high enough on its agenda.

This bill addresses an oversight in the current law where there is very little, if any, focus on the character of a sponsor or the responsibilities that are attached to sponsorship. The sponsorship assessment and visa application are currently lumped together, which this bill seeks to separate. This bill will ensure character checks of the sponsor are conducted before the visa application can be made and that the findings are shared with the person they are sponsoring, so, importantly, they are aware of what they're getting into. At the moment sponsors are required to agree to undertakings of financial support and accommodation for up to two years. But those undertakings, unbelievably, are not enforceable and there are also no penalties whatsoever for noncompliance.

The problem with this approach from a family violence perspective is self-evident. There is no question that newly arrived migrants are among the most vulnerable people in our community. They are heavily reliant on their sponsor, are less likely to have an established support network of family and friends and are less likely to know where or even how to seek assistance if things go wrong in their private life. In many instances, their grasp of the English language may also be quite limited, which further compounds their isolation.

There is a particular powerlessness that comes with being a victim of domestic abuse in a new country. Can you imagine wanting help but not knowing what services exist or who to turn to? Imagine having dependants—the decision to seek help might become even more difficult. How can you be confident that authorities will respond to your situation in the way you need and won't take your children away from you? Even if you're brave enough to reach out, you have a very real worry that, if you leave your abusive sponsor, you risk being sent back to your home country. This bill, covered with regulations introduced last year, seeks to circumvent this situation by requiring approval of sponsors. There are requirements for police checks; providing newly arrived family members with information about essential services and emergency contacts; statutory obligations on sponsors; and penalties for failing to provide agreed support.

We recognise that there have been questions about whether this bill strikes the right balance. The brief Legal and Constitutional Affairs Legislation Committee inquiry into this bill, held more than two years ago, unearthed some important considerations. It's fair to say that the handful of stakeholders that provided evidence during the very much short-lived inquiry either opposed the bill or supported the government's policy objectives but expressed concerns about how those objectives were being addressed in this bill. The main area of concern that they centred on were visa processing delays; the separation of family units; issues of privacy; concern about procedural fairness and the government interfering with these families in ways it wouldn't domestically; and the perception that visa applicants are being punished for the conduct of their sponsors. There is also the possibility that a spousal refusal alone will not necessarily result in the end of an abusive relationship but rather an application for a different type of visa. While my colleagues and I are concerned about the issues that have been raised by stakeholders, it is our position that these need to be weighed against the policy intent of the bill and the effectiveness of the measures being proposed.

In terms of safeguards, it's important to bear in mind that the minister will have the discretion to refuse sponsorship applications in limited circumstances only. Those circumstances will include cases where the sponsor has convictions for sexual abuse or violence against children. This type of offending is especially heinous, and visa applicants ought to be entitled to know if their sponsors have offended. We note that, even where the sponsor has a criminal conviction, a decision by the minister to refuse or approve sponsorship would take into account a range of factors. These include the length of the relationship with the visa applicant, the type of offending by the prospective sponsor, how recently the offending occurred, the relevance of the offending to the family relationship and any mitigating circumstances. Applicants would also be entitled to natural justice and have access to a merits review of any refusal by the Administrative Appeals Tribunal.

It is also important to bear in mind that the bill does not seek to remove the family violence exception from the current act. The bill takes those existing protections one step further and provides additional preventative measures. According to the then Department of Immigration and Border Protection, in 2016-17, 540 partner visa applicants sought to remain in Australia under family violence provisions. My office knows of one such case involving a woman who moved to a remote country town in South Australia with her partner, who she met online. From the moment she arrived in Australia, her partner sought to exercise power and control over her, and the woman became completely isolated. The marriage was extremely short lived and ended when the injuries that this woman sustained at her husband's hands resulted in her being airlifted out of town for emergency medical treatment. She was forced to live in a refuge and struggled to come to terms with the fact that she'd left behind a happy life in her home country, surrounded by loved ones including her only son and grandchild, only to fall victim to family violence in a foreign land.

We know that in the majority of cases women are the victims of family violence. We also know that in Australia at least one woman is killed every week as a result of such violence. According to KPMG, who undertook a study for the Department of Social Services, the cost to the Australian economy of violence against women and their children is estimated to be well in excess of $22 billion a year—a staggering number, particularly when you consider that family violence is severely underreported by victims. And that's just violence against women. Men are also victims. One in three people who experience violence from a current partner are male, and males are two to three times more likely to never tell anybody about the violence. Males are also excluded from government antiviolence programs despite making up a significant proportion of victims of family and sexual violence. As we know, children are also victims. But, even when they are not themselves assaulted or abused, they suffer severe trauma just from witnessing domestic violence—seeing a beloved parent be abused and feeling powerless to act.

The long-term impact on the victims of family violence, whether they are women, men or children, is extremely profound. If this bill results in one less case, it is very much worth supporting. Indeed, it is incumbent upon us to do more to protect vulnerable individuals. Whether or not this bill strikes the right balance between protecting vulnerable people, on the one hand, and overcoming the concerns that have been raised by stakeholders, on the other, remains to be seen.

There is a very real possibility that the bill will only capture the tip of the iceberg in terms of family violence because the bill only addresses those sponsors who have convictions for the offences outlined earlier. It does not address those individuals who have a history of violence with multiple partners but don't have any convictions. We know that this area of law is very problematic, especially for women, who are often pressured into not pursuing charges against their intimate partner.

It is for this reason that I propose to move an amendment to review the operation of the bill 18 months after its introduction. Specifically, the review will consider the extent to which the new provisions strengthen the integrity of the family visa program and improve the management of family violence in the delivery of the family visa program. If the concerns that have been raised by stakeholders do eventuate, that at least will provide an opportunity to consider further changes to the family visa program where appropriate.

Lastly, there is some suggestion that the family violence exception is difficult to establish. When this bill was first introduced, my office raised the issue with the minister's policy advisers, who indicated that four out of five family violence claims are accepted by the department. Based on the advice provided, it would appear that, in practice, family violence applicants are given the benefit of any doubt. Only a very small proportion of the claims made are rejected, and this is done on the advice of an independent expert. This is an issue that I will continue to keep an eye on and raise as part of the review into this bill in the future.

I will also briefly note that the government has used this bill as an opportunity to make a completely unrelated amendment to introduce a new class of temporary parent visa. This visa will allow parents to stay in Australia for five years at a time, to be renewed only once, as long as they hold private health insurance while here and their sponsor agrees to pay all health and aged-care costs. We are prepared to support this amendment on the grounds that members of the community who have faced long delays in sponsoring parents are interested in having more options for parent visas. However, I should caution that in supporting this amendment we do not want to see the provisions that make this visa possible, such as the extension of the debt recovery function to family sponsors, exploited for other visa classes such as partner visas and child visas. We would also expect that the government will maintain annual places in the existing parent visa classes.