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Detention and deportation: a continuing scandal: Glenn Nicholls argues for fundamental reforms in the treatment of detainees and deportation legislation.

Article Excerpt
The Cornelia Rau and Vivian Alvarez scandals in 2005 brought intense pressure on the Immigration Department to be more careful in carrying out deportations and incarcerating potential deportees. The department is spending $550 million over five years on upgrading its computer systems and has promised a 'change of culture'. But recent events show that far more fundamental reforms are needed. The department continues to use its formidable deportation powers to offload vulnerable individuals with little regard to their health and welfare; to expel long-term permanent residents deemed to be of bad character; and to undermine the court system. On 12 November 2007 the ABC Lateline program broke the tragic story of Tony Tran, who was illegally detained for over five years, while the Immigration Department attempted to deport his infant son without his knowledge. Later that same week the department was forced to re-examine the cases of over 400 people being held in immigration detention and to release fourteen people who had been detained improperly in the first place.

Mandatory Detention and Deportation

Australia today has one of the highest deportation rates relative to population in the Western world. Over 10,000 people are forced to leave the country each year. Most of them are overstayers who have remained in the country after the expiry of their visas. However, the enforcement system is so indiscriminate and inflexible that it catches others up. The seed of this problem was planted in 1989 when the Labor government introduced a law for the 'mandatory deportation of illegal entrants', a draconian measure to tackle the increasing number of visa overstayers in the country (called 'illegal entrants' after their visas expired). In 1992 mandatory deportation was superseded by a new section of the Migration Act for the mandatory 'removal of unlawful non-citizens'. This new measure was accompanied by the much more controversial--and visible--policy of mandatory detention of asylum seekers arriving without a visa.

Under this mandatory regime, any person in Australia without a valid visa must be detained and, if not granted a visa, deported. Immigration officials must take action against anyone they reasonably suspect of not having a valid visa. This had tragic consequences for Cornelia Rau and Vivian Alvarez, two women who were in poor health and in no position to prove their residence status. The official investigators in these cases, Mick Palmer and Neil Comrie, were critical of the way that the detention and deportation system ticked over in a series of mandatory actions. Officials had become beholden to an 'assumption culture'...

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