Pezzullo messages lay bare the extent of the politicisation of Australia’s migration system

This week’s revelation of secret messages between Home Affairs Secretary Michael Pezzullo and Liberal lobbyist Scott Briggs tell us what we already knew: that, under Pezzullo’s direction, the Department of Home Affairs has grown into a vast, secretive and militarised force exerting extraordinary power over ordinary people seeking to make a home in Australia.

The messages exchanged between Pezzullo and Briggs suggest an equal contempt for migrants, refugees, the Australian public and parliamentary processes. But however scandalous those messages might be, Pezzullo’s animus and political ambitions were already on display in the Department that he built over nearly a decade.

Pezzullo led and shaped ‘Operation Sovereign Borders’ – a multi-agency military operation with the singular purpose of repelling people seeking safety in Australia. He oversaw the expansion of a vast network of privatised detention facilities, both in Australia and ‘offshore’ in Nauru and Papua New Guinea. He resisted and rebuffed independent oversight and criticism of those facilities, even as people died from medical neglect and in cycles of violence. In 2015, he was instrumental in the creation of the Australian Border Force – the militarised wing of the Department, armed with an array of coercive powers. In 2019, he assisted the government of the day to dismantle Medevac processes which guaranteed independent medical advice and evacuations to people held in Nauru or Manus Island. And in 2020, he defended government efforts to search for, seize and ban items like mobile phones in detention centres, depriving people in detention of a critical lifeline.

It will take more than an investigation to dismantle this legacy. To achieve that, we need to start by dismantling the political consensus that allows migrants and refugees to be criminalised, punished and treated as ‘security threats,’ purely for political and private gain.