The caged walkways of the detention centre.
The argument over Australian’s illegal immigration policy hots up as the Federal Opposition immigration spokesman Senator Steve Fielding likened the Christmas Island Detention Centre to a motel.
Senator Fielding accused Australia of being a soft touch to those who wanted to “jump the immigration queue”. He also controversially said that refugees get better treatment than most Australian citizens.
“Detainees on the island get good accommodation, great food, phone and internet access and then within three months get a gold pass to live in Australia.”
However Amnesty International’s findings just last year give a different picture of the detention centre, especially the ‘construction camp facility’ which, at the time of their report, held 68 children. “The ‘construction camp’ consists mostly of metal, concrete and gravel, with small claustrophobic bedrooms.” They noted in their report.
The Australian Human Rights Commission also visited the detention centre in July of last year and agreed that children should not be held in the centre, quoting the Migration Act of 1995 which states that children should only be held in the centre as a last resort. The Commission found that 20% of children had been detained on the island for 6 months or more. Its report also stated that detainees have limited access to healthcare, counselling and legal advice.
Inside the construction camp.
Also, contrary to what Senator Smith stated, the Commisson noted that phone calls are monitored, the mobile phone network is limited and internet connection is slow. Whilst the majority of detainees had been processed within 3 months, the Commission found that 114 detainees had been there for longer and 15 had been detained for six months or more, including one 17 year old boy.
It was estimated that Australia would take on 13,750 refugees through its humanitarian program in 2009/10, that’s an increase of 250 for the previous year. However Australia by no means tops the polls in asylum figures, in 2008 the US received 49,000 asylum seekers, Canada 36,900 and the UK 30,500.
Meanwhile Liberal Leader Tony Abbott used his Australia Day speech to tackle the thorny issue of immigration and suggested that whilst he had no opposition for legitimate migrants to boost Australia’s population, he supports strict restrictions to deter so-called ‘boat people’ from arriving in Australia.
“There is, I suspect, an anxiety that the great prize of Australian citizenship is insufficiently appreciated and given away too lightly.”
He also expressed concerns about border security and terrorism commenting: “Still, in a world where crime and terrorism are international in scope and where every developed country’s social security system is under pressure, a policy of benign indifference to new arrivals would defy common sense.”
A recent poll suggests that the Australian public are also concerned about immigration levels with 66% of those polled thinking that the Federal Government should cap immigration rates. However the poll, undertaken by Galaxy, only quizzed 1000 residents nationwide – hardly representative of the Australian public then.
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