published in The Age, Comment, December 14, 2014
by Alastair Nicholson
It is time for all Australians to recognise that stopping the boats is not the answer to the refugee problem.
The issue of refugees is a global one deserving better than the shallow policies developed by successive Australian governments. History will not be any kinder to present Australians than to those of former eras in respect of their racist policies towards Aboriginal and Asian people.
Australian attitudes are curious since most of us, with the exception of the first Australians, are descended from refugees of one sort or another.
Unfortunately, most politicians think that stopping the boats resolves the matter.
The government's latest legislation makes superficial concessions that hide an outrageous scheme that shuts out the rule of law, confers worrying powers on the Immigration Minister, unilaterally amends the Refugee Convention and trashes Australia's former reputation as a good international citizen. Its passage was achieved by Scott Morrison using refugee children as hostages, offering a trivial increase in the number of humanitarian refugees accepted by Australia and making minor changes while leaving most asylum seekers in limbo with temporary protection visas or so-called safe haven visas.
At the end of 2013 an estimated 52 million people around the world were displaced, representing the greatest disruption of peoples since World War II. Overall, 50 percent of these refugees are children.
The World Today with Eleanor Hall, Friday 28 November 2014, ABC News Radio, Australian Broadcasting Corporation
NICK GRIMM: Pressure is growing on the Immigration Minister Scott Morrison to release all children from immigration detention centres immediately.
In a rare foray into domestic politics overnight, the office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) in Jakarta criticised Australia's detention of child asylum seekers, describing it as harmful and a breach of international law and the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child.
It comes in a week when a group of prominent Australians launched a social media campaign urging an immediate end to the policy of detaining children.
But the Minister for Immigration and Border Protection says the number of children in detention has been reducing since the Government was elected and there are now almost 50 per cent fewer children across all immigration detention centres.
Further in a statement, the Minister says he will be able to get the remaining children out of detention in Australia when his migration and maritime powers bill, which is currently before the Parliament, is passed.
At the moment, there are more than 700 children in immigration detention facilities in Australia and offshore.
Now that figure appals the former chief justice of the Family Court of Australia, now the chairman of Children's Rights International, Alastair Nicholson.
Dear family, friends and colleagues,
As many of you know I recently spent a week on Christmas Island and a week on Nauru as a psychiatrist employed by IHMS to see asylum seekers in detention. I found the experience on Nauru particularly disturbing, prompting me to write the attached letter to the Prime Minister and the Leader of the Opposition.
See: Letter to the Prime Minister and the Leader of the Opposition.
We have posted some of our past video presentations and will add others as they are produced. We will also link to additional video presentations that promote or advance the rights of the child, juvenile justice and general human rights in the interest of public information and education.
'We're Better Than This' is a movement that has grown from a decision by ordinary Australians to do something about the extraordinary cruelty of our Government towards the hundreds of innocent children in detention/deterrence camps.
the sound track though iTunes or Google Play ($1.69) to help fund the campaign.
a letter to your MP to excess your concern about the situation of children in detention..
Organisations representing millions of compassionate Australians have come together for the first time, to coordinate their expertise, experience and efforts to address the harmful impacts of immigration detention on children and their families.
Wednesday, September 17, 2014. Leading children's, international development, human rights and refugee organisations from Australia, across the Asia-Pacific and internationally are calling on Australia's leadership to release all children and their families from immigration detention.
Read More .... New Alliance Commits to Immediate Release of all Children in Immigration Detention