Richard Di Natale (Victoria, Australian Greens) Share this | Hansard source

Should people who are sick be able to access health treatment? It's a simple question. Yes or no? That is the simple proposition that goes to the heart of what the Senate is debating right now. That is the simple question at the heart of the Migration Amendment (Repairing Medical Transfers) Bill 2019. Should an innocent person who is sick and requires medical care get access to that medical care? That's what we are debating in this chamber right now. Of course, the government's focused intent on destroying the lives of people seeking asylum has reached such a bizarre crescendo that we are debating whether people should receive medical care or be forced to endure ongoing pain and suffering while a politician or a bureaucrat decides their fate. That's what we are debating. In effect, what we have now are Australia's own political prisoners. That's what these people have become.

This parliament has, over recent months, not risen to the level that many people expect of it. Yet what we had a short while ago was a positive outcome for people who are seeking asylum—the parliament coming together and achieving a small change, but a positive change nonetheless. We had the Greens, the opposition and members of the crossbench come together, put aside political differences and recognise that it's time this parliament acted with conscience. The call was loud and clear. The outcome was absolutely decisive. The parliament decided that when people are critically ill it is our duty as Australians to provide them with medical care. It is a sign of how low this debate has sunk that we should even have to ask ourselves that question; but that was the question before the parliament, and the answer that we gave the Australian people was a resounding yes.

Before the medevac laws were introduced people were forced to go to court to get the medical care they urgently needed. They had to endure court decisions at all hours of the day and night to try and secure a medical evacuation. They had to have a judgement, not by a doctor but by somebody not qualified to make that judgement, about whether that person should access medical care. It was an unfair system. It was too slow. While justice delayed is justice denied, so too health care delayed is health care denied. People who need urgent medical care need urgent medical care, not medical care that has to be given at the whim of somebody not qualified to make that decision. No-one should have to rely on the court system to get proper medical care. This is not a question for politicians or judges or bureaucrats. Most decent Australians understand that this is a decision that should be left to medically trained and qualified doctors. That's all the medevac laws do—no more and no less. They put the decision about whether someone needs medical care in the hands of health professionals who are trained and qualified to make that assessment. That's all they do. They put doctors, not politicians, at the heart of making those critical decisions.

We know that the medevac laws have worked. Rather than the fear campaign that we've seen from the likes of Minister Dutton, we've seen that people's lives have been saved because people are getting the medical care they need. You only need to look at what's happening to the refugees on Manus and Nauru to know how critical that decision was. The health systems are absolutely dire. You've got groups like the Australian Medical Association—a group of doctors; not prone to hyperbole—who described the pre-medevac process as tortuous. There were long periods of delay. It lacked appropriate oversight. Furthermore, an independent health assessment in June found that a staggering 97 per cent of people in detention and processing have been diagnosed with a health condition. A further 91 per cent were diagnosed with a mental health issue alongside those with physical health conditions—conditions like severe post-traumatic stress disorder, depression and so on. Of course, these figures exclude the people who have already taken their own lives because of the hopeless and desperate situation this government has put them in.

What lies at the heart of the government's response to these laws is that we should punish an innocent person to send a message to someone else. That is barbaric. It is shameful that in a country like Australia we have a policy based on the premise that we harm the innocent to deter others. That's not what a decent country does. So we must as a priority move all those people seeking asylum off Manus and Nauru to permanent resettlement. We have had that long-held position. We don't believe that indefinite detention is ever an appropriate response, but, in the meantime, we have the opportunity to provide people with health care when they need it, to provide live-saving treatment.

Let's remember who these people are. They are people who have broken no law and committed no crime. They are people who have come to this country fleeing war, persecution and violence, who have come seeking protection. We owe them protection, because to provide protection is a sign of strength, not weakness. We have that responsibility, yet we find ourselves in a situation where there's a very live possibility right now that, rather than treating people as people and recognising their humanity, we may repeal these very modest but effective life-saving laws.

I know the vote on this is going to be close. It's going to come down to possibly one or two votes. I want to take the opportunity to remind people in this place that they are making a very, very grave decision. The fate of innocent people hangs on the result of this vote. The lives of innocent people depend on how people vote on these medevac laws. How can we call ourselves the country of a fair go, a country that treats people like equals, if we not only turn a blind eye to their suffering but, through laws like this, actively encourage their suffering—if we prevent people from getting the care they need?

We saw a Senate report into this legislation. What's missing from that Senate report is any mention of the current intolerable situation that refugees and asylum seekers face, even after they've been transferred to Australia. This is a law that provides people with the health care that they need, but it does not provide people with the certainty they need to know they can go on and live a good and decent life. The day before the report of the Senate on this piece of legislation was released, a 32-year-old Afghan doctor, Sayed Mirwais Rohani, died in Brisbane. He was the victim of an apparent suicide. Rohani had come to Australia for medical treatment two years ago. After spending four years in detention on Manus Island, that was his fate. After his death, a former roommate posted this on Facebook: 'We shared the same pain for a long time, long enough to destroy someone's life.' Rohani's death was at least the 13th among refugees held in offshore detention on Manus or Nauru—13 deaths on our watch, on this government's watch. The lives of thirteen innocent people ended prematurely at the hands of a government too callous to recognise that our duty is to offer people the health care that they need when they need it, and to treat our fellow human beings as people. I just ask that every single senator in this place reflect on that. Reflect on the 13 lives lost; reflect on what this very modest piece of legislation is trying to achieve. Let that sit on every senator's conscience as we vote on this bill.