Albanese Government condemned for continued attack on migrant and refugee communities
The Human Rights Law Centre has condemned the Albanese Government for jeopardising the freedom and safety of thousands of people in the Australian community, after Labor members of the Senate Legal and Constitutional Affairs Committee confirmed support for the Deportation and Travel Ban Bill following an inquiry that laid bare the extensive harm the proposed laws would cause.
Members of the Committee issued four separate opinions on the Bill, under which people could be jailed for five years for not assisting with their own deportation – no matter how long they have been in Australia or whether they have family here. But the majority report issued by Labor senators recommended the Bill be passed, ignoring overwhelming evidence from multicultural communities, legal experts and people who could be criminalised by the new laws.
Under the proposed new laws, people could be stripped of their refugee status and returned to harm. The laws would also allow the Minister for Immigration extraordinary powers to impose a Trump-style travel ban by preventing visa applications from entire countries of people.
Piumetharshika Kaneshan, Student and member of Refugee WAVE, said:
“I told this Senate Committee about the experiences of my family, and the hundreds of others who have built their lives here in Australia, because I believed that no senator could support laws that would tear families apart or return people to danger. I believed that this Government, who have promised to be different, would understand that a 19-year-old nursing student should not be thrown in jail for refusing to leave her home.
“On behalf of my mother, my sister and everyone else failed by the broken Fast Track system, we will not stop demanding justice. We deserve safe and permanent futures, not prison cells.”
Vashini Jayakumar, childcare worker and campaigner with Home to Bilo, said:
“I am a mother, a childcare worker and a permanent resident of Australia. If this Bill is passed, my husband – the father of our three young children – would be put in jail if he does not agree to leave Australia. This is not right. It is inhuman. It is more trauma for our family, after more than ten years of pain and uncertainty.
“To know that this government wants to force people like my husband out of the country or put him in jail is like entering into a nightmare. But I believe the Australian community will reject what the Government is trying to do to us, just as they rejected Priya and Nades being forced to leave their homes in Biloela. Our community is better than this.”
Ashiq Hussain Bangash, Secretary of the Qaim Foundation, said:
“The Qaim Foundation represents hundreds of young men who have been failed by the ‘fast track’ system, all of whom would be jailed if this Bill is passed into law. Our community is from the north-west of Pakistan, on the border of Afghanistan – our region is no longer safe since the Taliban took control of Afghanistan. The Labor government promised a solution for these young men and their families. Instead, it wants to force them to choose between jail and death. This is a betrayal of our community.”
Sanmati Verma, Acting Legal Director at the Human Rights Law Centre said:
“This Bill is an attack on migrant and refugee communities - and the Albanese Government knows it. It heard as much from hundreds of community members who made submissions to the Senate inquiry into the Bill. It has heard directly from Australian-born children whose parents would be thrown in jail if the Bill passed into law. It has heard from anxious community members who would be separated permanently from family by travel bans. Hundreds of people have spoken in a single voice about this law. The Albanese Government cannot afford to ignore them.”
Media contact:
Thomas Feng
Acting Engagement Director
Human Rights Law Centre
0431 285 275
thomas.feng@hrlc.org.au