Senator Andrew Bartlett
Saturday, June 18, 2005
 
We wont Get Fooled Again? - Some Comments on the Migration Detention changes.
The fact that the Prime Minister announced his changes to migration detention and the processing of refugee claims at 4.30pm on a Friday afternoon should have been enough to make anyone immediately sceptical.

However, from the media coverage I have seen to date it appears that reporters from the Parliamentary Press Gallery have been happy to talk it up as a major and positive change without worrying about examining the detail to assess what it is likely to mean, or talk with anyone who might actually know.

As usual, a lot of the media comment is on who wins or loses the politics of it, rather than what the detail of the policy will actually mean (apart from those articles that just repeat the Prime Minister’s misleading assurances.)

Before I say anything else, it has to be emphasised that nothing that was announced yesterday affects in any way the 45 asylum seekers who have been in detention on Nauru for the past three and a half years. They are completely outside the reach of Australia’s laws.

The political pressure that has been building on the Government over many months to make changes has really been due to the large and growing number of people throughout the community, across the social spectrum, who have recognised gross injustices and pressed for this to be acknowledged and for meaningful change to occur.

The efforts of Petro Georgiou and his Liberal supporters, or people like myself and others have only gained traction because of that community pressure. That is why this is such an important moment. If the majority of people who have been concerned about this issue believe that it has now been satisfactorily addressed, they will ease off the pressure and the Prime Minister and all his backbenchers can breathe easier and stop having to avoid all those awkward questions from their constituents about how such cruelty and injustice can be justified.

Personally, I am amazed at how limited the changes are, how misleading the portrayal of the changes have been and how even more power has been given to a Minister and Department that has been shown to be highly dysfunctional. I am irritated but not surprised at how absurdly positive the portrayal of these changes has been in the mainstream media.

It has to be remembered that Petro Georgiou's Bills were a compromise to begin with - reflecting numerous Parliamentary Committee and other reports over many years - which still left many problem areas untouched.

I am not intending to be critical of Petro Georgiou or his brave and disappointingly small number of Liberal supporters. They obviously feel that what the Prime Minister offered was as good as they were going to get and they didn't have sufficient support amongst the other Libs to push it further. Pushing the Bills to a vote when they were going to go down might make people like me feel good, but it wouldn’t have changed anything and would have hardened views within the Government. He’s achieved some changes that will help some individuals and that is better than nothing.

Of course Petro, Judy Moylan and the others have to talk it up as much as possible or they'd look pretty dumb and of course John Howard isn’t going to say its minor tinkering that leaves all the power with the Government. These things are totally understandable and totally predictable.

However, that provides all the more reason why the media and the public should be assessing the changes closely, rather than just swallowing it all at 4.30pm on a Friday afternoon.

In simple terms, the reality is that an Act that is full of hundreds of piecemeal, tacked-on 'solutions' to address problem after problem has just got a couple more tacked on. The system is already a chaotic farce and this will make it even more random and unaccountable.

Some people will get visas more quickly and some people will get out of detention (although under what conditions is not really clear yet), but it will all be dependent on the Minister and DIMIA as to who it applies to and who it doesn't.

The notion that the Minister (and no one else) should be making all these decisions about individual cases is ridiculous. Since when is it the role of a Minister to micro-manage the fate of hundreds or thousands of Immigration cases? How can she possibly be expected to have the time or the expertise? AND isn't she also supposed to be Indigenous Affairs Minister in her spare time?

This 'solution' looks to me like it is little more than a new coat put on over the top of the emperor's existing new clothes.

I’ll do more of an assessment of the details when I have a chance. In the meantime, a response from Chilout (the group that has campaigned so hard for children to be out of detention) is here on their website.

The Prime Minister’s statement with all the details that have so far been released is here on his website.

posted by Andrew Bartlett @ Saturday, June 18, 2005 Permalink
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