If you’re a kid in detention, a date is everything
AAP/Nikki Short
Scott Morrison’s release of more children from detention is
selective, and the timing of his announcement has a distinctly political
flavour to it.
The decision applies to about 150 children under ten years old, who
will be out by Christmas, but not to the several hundred more who
arrived from July 19 last year, when Kevin Rudd made his announcement
that all asylum seekers would be sent offshore. To let those out would
undermine the government’s deterrence policy, Morrison says.
There are currently 876 children in detention, including on Nauru.
This is 516 fewer than at the election. At the end of July there were
148 on Christmas Island.
Morrison says the government has progressively released children, and
blames Labor for the slowness, on the grounds fresh arrangements for
bridging visas had to be made. “Labor’s arrangements for bridging visas
were insufficient to protect and support young children.”
The timing is pointed, coming days before Morrison appears at the
Human Rights Commission inquiry into children in immigration detention,
which reports to parliament in mid-September. Morrison says he’s been
working on the plan for months. When he was asked whether this
announcement was about “trying to improve your image before you front
the Human Rights Commission” he replied: “That is a pretty cynical
question”.
Cynical question or not, the minister no doubt wanted to have some
positive news out, though one would imagine, given earlier evidence from
doctors about the bad conditions to which children have been subjected
and the fact there is no release for many, that he might be in for some
stern interrogation when he appears on Friday.
Like most other stages of the asylum debate, the Abbott government is
reliving Howard government experience in relation to children in
detention.
But Howard’s hand on children was forced especially by the moderates
on his backbench. These days, the Liberal moderate voices are silent. At
least the Human Rights Commission inquiry has had some public impact.
While Morrison is trying to manage the politics of children in
detention, he is also at work to finalise an agreement – of which
Australia should be ashamed – that would send people from Nauru to
Cambodia.
Alastair Nicholson, chair of Children’s Rights International and a
former chief justice of the Family Court, who is very familiar with
Cambodia, on Monday made the compelling case against this scheme.
“The concept of Australia sending people who are in need of refuge to
a country like that is almost indescribably bad as policy,” he told the
ABC’s Lateline.
It would be especially bad for unaccompanied minors, he said
(although it is not known whether there would be any of these among the
people sent).
“I don’t believe that asylum seekers or anyone else gets very much
protection from the law in Cambodia … It’s one of the poorest countries
you would find in southeast Asia … It’s just the worst sort of place
from the point of view of sending asylum seekers, and particularly
asylum seekers who don’t have any cultural or other ties to the
country.”
We still know little about the Cambodian arrangement. Morrison’s
claim on Tuesday that “we’ve made no secret of the fact that we’re in
these discussions with Cambodia” is a stretch. The first information
came from the Cambodians, as has most that followed. The Australian
government reportedly pressed (not very successfully) on Cambodian
officialdom a desire for confidentiality.
As Nicholson said: “We’re never told anything about what the
minister’s doing – that’s part of the problem, really. And once it’s
done, there’s very little that can be done about it.”
We have got used to the Morrison style of secrecy.
For example when he kept a boatload of asylum seekers on the ocean
for weeks, refusing to say where they were. His declining to talk about
“on water” matters became a matter for ridicule as well as concern.
The reality of what’s done behind the scenes in border protection policy can be much at odds with the gestures.
Guardian Australia is reporting emails
obtained under freedom of information showing the immigration
department’s efforts to repatriate (voluntarily) Syrians from Manus and
Nauru earlier this year.
This week Morrison said 4400 places would be reserved in the
(existing) refugee program for Syrians and Iraqis. The government wanted
to be seen to be doing something in line with Tony Abbott’s strong
rhetoric about the crisis in Iraq.
A disconnect? One would think so. As there will be between the fates
of children, depending on whether they arrived before or after a
particular date.
POSTCRIPT: It is reported
from PNG that police have charged two men over the murder of Iranian
asylum seeker Reza Barati, killed during the Manus Island riots in
February. The men are said to have worked for G4S, the company that
managed security at the time. One was arrested in July and the other
this week.
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