This article examines developments in Australian border policing policy since the election of a Labor government in November 2007. It argues that despite the formal cessation of the ‘Pacific Solution’, there are fundamental continuities in policy that ensure systemic human rights abuses by the Australian state against unauthorised refugees. In particular, attempts by the Labor government to forge a ‘regional solution’ have increased the risks of travel for unauthorised refugees, exacerbated abuses within Australian and regional detention facilities and diminished the long-term prospects of resettlement for this cohort. Inevitably, this has laid the basis for a revised version of the Pacific Solution.
United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), Asylum Levels and Trends in Industrialized Countries 2011, available at: http://www.unhcr.org/4e9beaa19.html (accessed 1 June 2012).
2.
Ibid., pp. 15–16.
3.
Ibid., pp. 20, 25–6.
4.
The UNHCR data apply to Australia and New Zealand. However, as New Zealand’s intake averages only about 300 per year and has been stable for the past six years, the trend for both countries is defined by the Australian experience; see ibid., p. 8.
UNHCR, Asylum Claims in Industrialized Countries up Sharply in 2011, available at: http://www.unhcr.org/4f7063116.html (accessed 1 June 2012).
7.
For example, funding for the immigration department’s Offshore Asylum Seeker Management Program is estimated at $1.05 billion for 2011–2012 alone; see SpinksH.KarlsenE.BrewN.HarrisM.WattD., Australian Government Spending on Irregular Maritime Arrivals and Counter People-smuggling Activity (Canberra, Parliamentary Library, 2011).
8.
One of the ‘four pillars’ of the coalition’s platform in the 2010 federal election.
9.
See GrewcockM., Border Crimes: Australia’s war on illicit migrants (Sydney, Institute of Criminology Press, 2009); and S. Pickering, State Crime and Refugees (Sydney, Federation Press, 2005).
10.
See Grewcock, ibid., pp. 196–24; also Joint Select Committee on Australia’s Immigration Detention Network, Final Report (Canberra, Senate Printing Unit, 2012), pp. 103–39.
11.
Grewcock, ibid., pp. 152–95.
12.
Minister for Immigration and Citizenship, Media Release (13May2008).
13.
Minister for Immigration and Citizenship, speech at Australian National University (29July2008).
14.
For background on mandatory detention, see Grewcock, op. cit.; and Joint Select Committee on Australia’s Immigration Detention Network, op. cit.
15.
Minister for Immigration and Citizenship, speech, op. cit.
16.
There are three secure detention sites on Christmas Island: the new centre at NWP, the construction camp initially used to house the workers who built the centre and a former mineworkers’ compound at Phosphate Hill that was initially used as a detention centre by the coalition government.
Minister for Immigration and Citizenship, speech, op. cit.
24.
Minister for Immigration and Citizenship, Media Release (9April2010).
25.
Ibid.
26.
M61/2010 and M69/2010 v Commonwealth of Australia [2010] HCA 41.
27.
Joint Select Committee on Australia’s Immigration Detention Network, op. cit., pp. 146–7.
28.
Commonwealth Ombudsman, Inquiry into Suicide and Self-harm in Immigration Detention, available at: http://www.ombudsman.gov.au/media-releases/show/189 (accessed 1 June 2012). Shortly after making this announcement, the ombudsman resigned. As a consequence, the inquiry is currently on hold.
Joint Select Committee on the Christmas Island Tragedy of 15 December 2010, Report (Canberra, Parliament House, 2011); and State coroner of Western Australia, op. cit.
42.
Minister for Immigration and Citizenship, speech, op. cit.
Memorandum of Understanding between the Government of the Independent State of Papua New Guinea and the Government of Australia, Relating to the Transfer and Assessment of Persons in Papua New Guinea, and Related Issues, available at: http://www.minister.immi.gov.au/media/media-releases/_pdf/20110819-aust-png-mou.pdf (accessed 1 June 2012).
48.
Spinks et al., op. cit., p. 18.
49.
Interview with refugee advocate Mark Goudkamp (7June2012).
Video and audio recordings of interviews conducted by Mark Goudkamp with the escapees and other detainee witnesses in April 2012 (in author’s possession).
Refugee advocates Ian Rintoul and Saradha Nathan, private communication (5June2012).
64.
Senate Legal and Constitutional Affairs Committee, Supplementary Budget Estimates hearing (19 October 2010), Answer to Question on Notice 41.
65.
Connell and Farrell, op. cit.; also JeganB., ‘Reneging on our promise’, Drum Unleashed, Australian Broadcasting Commission (12 August 2010), available at: http://www.abc.net.au/unleashed/35874.html (accessed 1 June 2012).
66.
Rintoul and Nathan, op. cit.
67.
Minister for Immigration and Citzenship, Media Release (15October2010).
68.
Refugee Action Collective (Victoria), Media Release (6May2012).
NathanS.Visiting 254 Tamil Asylum Seekers Who Have Been on Board Boat in Merak, Indonesia since 11 October 2009 (in author’s possession); and interview with Saradha Nathan (25 March 2011).
71.
Nathan, Visiting, ibid.
72.
Nathan, interview, op. cit.; interview with Ian Rintoul (23June2011).
73.
Rintoul, ibid.
74.
Nathan, Visiting, op. cit.
75.
Nathan, interview, op. cit. The Australian government has said it is unable to confirm what happened to the refugees on board the Jaya Lestari; see Senate Legal and Constitutional Affairs Committee, Supplementary Budget Estimates hearing (19 October 2010), Answer to Question on Notice 59.
This section draws on a longer book chapter; see GrewcockM., ‘State crime and people smuggling’, in CarringtonK. and others, eds, Crime, Justice and Social Democracy: international perspectives (Basingstoke, Palgrave Macmillan, 2012).
98.
Cited in GriffithsE., ‘People smugglers should rot in hell: Rudd’, PM, ABC Radio National (17 April 2009), transcript available at: http://www.abc.net.au/pm/content/2008/s2546098.htm (accessed 1 June 2012).
This terminology has become particularly popular since 2010; see, for example, the interview with the immigration minister cited in Note 88 above.
101.
See, for example, United Nations Convention on Transnational Organized Crime 2000 and its associated Protocol Against the Smuggling of Migrants by Land, Sea and Air.
102.
Compare s233A Migration Act 1958 with Article 3, Protocol Against the Smuggling of Migrants by Land, Sea and Air, Supplementing the United Nations Convention Against Transnational Organized Crime 2000, which at least requires there be a material benefit.
103.
Deterring People Smuggling Bill 2011.
104.
S233B Migration Act1958.
105.
S233C Migration Act1958.
106.
Senate Standing Committee on Legal and Constitutional Affairs, Estimates hearing (26 May 2011), Answer to Question on Notice 61.
Senate Standing Committee on Legal and Constitutional Affairs, Estimates hearing (22 February 2011), Answer to Question on Notice 25. It should be noted that one of the most significant challenges facing researchers in this area is the absence of systematic data.
A highly publicised example of this approach was provided by the Australian Broadcasting Commission’s 4 Corners programme, broadcast on 4 June 2012, available at: http://www.abc.net.au/4corners/stories/2012/05/31/3515475.htm (accessed 10 June 2012).
115.
KellyJ.People Smugglers: saviours or criminals? A report on 16 convicted people smugglers in Australia between 2001–2006 (Sydney, Australian Lawyers for Human Rights, 2010); SchloenhardtA.Migrant Smuggling and Organized Crime in Australia, research paper, University of Queensland Migrant Smuggling Working Group, available at: www.law.uq.edu.au/migrantsmuggling (accessed 7 March 2012); R.de Crespigny, The People Smuggler (Camberwell, Penguin-Viking, 2012).
The government plans to introduce this regime through amendments contained in the Migration Legislation Amendment (Offshore Processing and Other Measures) Bill 2011; see discussion related to Note 94 above.
