[Note by LE: We invited thefrollickingmole, a contributor at The Tizona Group, to write a post for us about his experiences as a officer at a detention centre after the discussion he initiated on the Marcus Einfeld thread.]
I was a detention officer from around 1998 through to 2002 at Port Hedland. This coincided with the largest influx of boat people seen since the Vietnam era.
When I was in training we had the first and second boatloads of Afghanis arrive. The majority of the center’s occupants were Chinese with a wide variety of others. The numbers held at that time as somewhere around 300, possibly less.
Part way through our training we saw a breakout of some detainees due for deportation. They overpowered 2 officers and tied them up. Quite stressful for the officers involved, and rather sobering for us involved in training. (6 weeks training from memory).
We were the last training group (30 or so) to run for the next year and a half, when detainees (usually referred to as residents by staff) rose to over 900 at times.
By the time I left 4 years later there were about 5 left from my training group; the rest had burnt out or quit.
The image most people have of the centers is of the big fences. When I started, the fencing consisted of 2 sets of chain link fencing topped with 3 strand barbed wire, not much different to tennis court fencing; this was upgraded after a number of breakouts and a couple of mass walkouts. In addition there was no internal fencing at all and no restrictions on detainees’ movements (although we did keep single men out of the family blocks as much as possible).
The increase in fencing was as a result of incidents, not a ratcheting up of pressure on detainees. In particular internal fencing was implemented to limit the speed at which incidents could escalate, however it did add to the prison atmosphere later arrivals disliked.
I was a terrible officer and rather clueless for my first year on the job. Some people learnt quicker, others never did. Great mounts of time are spent de-escalating incidents, often between detainees. Unfortunately racism isn’t only a “white” problem, as many groups considered others “unclean” or open to abuse. We started by assigning people rooms, but in the end it was much easier to allow then to pick their own. Iranians in particular had an unreasoning hatred of our Africans.
Here’s a few details which I’ve never seen touched on by the media. A couple were kept quiet for obvious reasons.
Departure lounge
There was one particular section of the centre known as the “departure lounge”. It was for people who had been screened out of the refugee system by advice received from Australia’s intelligence community. They were specifically excluded from making any claims at all. This was a depressing block to work in; the detainees weren’t allowed any contact with the outside at all beyond their exercise yard, no TV, no radio, nothing.
Officers weren’t told the reasons these people had been singled out, however there is one group I am fairly certain about. That was a unit of about 15 Afghanis. It was fairly obvious they were a military unit. My guess after spending quite some time with them was they scored big on an operation (they were anti-Taliban) and decided that was their opportunity to leave the fighting behind. So I didn’t consider them a terrorist threat at all. The departure lounge was depressing as no-one, detainees or staff knew what was being done with these blokes. One of the hangings I attended (unsuccessful) was in this block, and another detainee nearly starved himself to death (it was fortunate I checked his paperwork and followed up as he had caused himself internal injuries he was that far along) in this block.
I believe it was another officer who went semi public/contacted a lawyer, for these chaps and eventually got changes to happen. I thought at the time he had been irresponsible, however now I believe it was the right thing to do.
The block (Juliet) was visited by politicians shortly after who made a big fuss about it, but it was an officer operating under his own conscience who got the change happening. When I left I believe nearly every resident who had been in Juliet had either been successful in their asylum claim, or deported.
Another area not reported to the best of my knowledge was the boatload of Indonesian Christians we received. This occurred during the time of the heightened tensions between Indonesia and Australia over East Timor’s independence. A small group of officers were assigned to look after them in ‘India’ block in an attempt to keep it as quiet as possible. From memory the majority were from Aceh, a hot spot for Muslim/Christian violence. Not one word leaked out to the media, and to the best of my knowledge all were resettled as quietly as possible. It may have led to a small war if Australia had been seen to be accepting these people and destabilizing Indonesia at the same time we were assisting in separating East Timor from Indonesia.
Another weakness of the Australian system is its appeal as a source of funding for some rather nasty organizations. A case in point was the Sri Lankan Tamils. Almost without exception they were young men, sent by the Tamil Tigers military to provide funding for further operations. Pretty well every one of them was hard working, friendly and quite nice blokes so this is not a slur on them personally. However the Tamil movement paid for, and sent them over as an investment. These boys were expected to send funds back to the Tamil movement, and if they had any second thoughts, their families were effectively hostages. That’s a downside to immigration protection I haven’t seen acknowledged by any refugee advocate, though many profess to be well informed. The doing of a good deed (offering protection) has been helping fund a guerrilla movement which causes much suffering.
Visitors
Another topic harped on by the media. In general visitors were allowed for 4 hours a day at PH. However if we were short staffed (deliberately by upper management) it became extremely difficult to manage. If a security incident occurred (called a CERT 1) visitors would be bundled out with little explanation. In addition many visitors were turned away because detainees didn’t want to see them. The detainee would then claim he hadn’t been told they were there, thus generating a bit more drama and (hopefully) publicity.
I will touch on the conduct of certain of the visitors. Nearly every group of uni ladies that visited ended up screwing a detainee in the visitor’s yard. You weren’t ‘fooling the man’. We just left you at it as long as you were reasonably subtle about it. I still think you were naive and stupid, but that’s all. In addition smuggling drugs in is so extraordinarily stupid I shouldn’t have to mention it, but it still happened.
The media
I’m singling out the ABC for odium on this issue. There is a group calling themselves “project safecom” which is basically one crank and a website. The ABC used this man as a source of stories with regard to detention issues, printing and reporting any allegation he cared to make. This allowed them the luxury of a ‘cut out’ so when stories were unreliable it was the source’s fault not theirs.
They were never reporters but advocates. They saw fit to send up a media crew to cover a protest by 15 individuals, but never panned the camera back to show how few were there. If we had a riot, the ABC was the first organization to be called. When we finally obtained the ability to switch off the phones remotely, residents just phoned before the riot started instead.
I will never believe any story by the ABC any longer; it’s damaged goods for me. I’ve been present at incidents reported on the ABC and it’s been 99% lies or propaganda.
Families
There were two types of families, those who genuinely loved and protected their children, and those who used them. The vast majority of parents looked after their kids, and detainees did the right thing by them as well. However there was a small minority that sought to use their kids as tools.
One family in particular was involved in a major riot. During this riot one of our pregnant female officers was struck, and lost her child, shattering her mentally. Mum was breaking up pavers, the 2 younger kids were running them forward, and dad and the 2 oldest boys were throwing them. A nice day’s outing.
The active rioters were rounded up and placed in lockdown. That was when the manipulation and using of the kids started. The parents refused to allow the kids to be separated and placed with another family, therefore keeping the whole family in lockdown. Management were left with the option of either releasing them as a group or keeping them locked down as a group. Management chose to keep them locked down, for which they were criticized by pollies again.
This same family was involved in multiple incidents, usually by dad sending the kids off to smash/damage things. That was a challenge to deal with, and I was amused to note the same family receiving a lot of “poor victim” coverage in a book which was released.
Another incident was the witnessed molestation of a small girl. The father refused to lay charges, and it was my strong belief he was pimping her out. As the family refused to lay charges the matter was dropped.
Internal discipline inside Port Hedland
I have had the advantage of seeing very good management and some of the worst.
However when I was seeing the good management, I didn’t realize how effective it was till it was gone. In fact I thought it was unjust and overly harsh, but it saved massive amounts of suffering, both by officers and detainees.
The standard response for an act of violence or vandalism was a week in the “chokey”. Chokey was a small constantly lit high security room located near the control room. Residents in chokey weren’t allowed visitors, phone calls (except lawyers), and spent the remaining 23 hours out of 24 in the room. It was unpleasant; detainees hated it.
It didn’t matter if the window breaking (the most common damage) was in response to bad news, a justified complaint or malicious, a week in chokey was the response. That’s why I originally thought it was overly harsh.
Boy was I wrong. We lost the 2 managers who had enforced this discipline and replaced them with a revolving door of clowns and fuckwits. They tried appeasement to control the troublemakers.
Some examples: A group of Iranian thugs decided they wanted to pinch the TVs from the common rooms (2 in each block) and place them in their own. This left the detainees behaving responsibly with no TVs. Management let them keep them and brought more each time they were stolen/broken.
Fire alarms were deliberately disabled as they went off when people smoked in their rooms. Toothpaste was squirted into sensors and the sensors were torn from ceilings. Nothing was done.
Windows were smashed regularly. This led to the central air con for the block being unable to cool the block effectively, causing discomfort to detainees. Nothing was done, other than to ask the detainee why they had done it, and what they could be given so it didn’t happen again.
All this culminated in a fairly obvious way. Detainees who were well-behaved got less than troublemakers. I actually had reasonable detainees apologize to me for what they had done or were about to do, as they learnt that the only way to get something was to act negatively. We went from having random incidents occasionally with individuals, to having large scale vandalism and violence by hundreds of detainees at a time.
Management taught them to act like that.
Australasian Correctional Management was the worst organized/run company in Australia. However I will accuse the LMHU of being firmly in bed with them to the detriment of employees.
We raised a large log of claims which we attempted to place before the LMHU. They refused to assist as they didn’t have one of their people near Port Hedland. They had many paying members but refused to assist us. We contacted the AWU who successfully fought and won our log of claims in the Industrial Relations Commission. The commissioner was absolutely scathing of ACM’s conduct and made a number of orders.
The LMHU sued to have this overturned as the AWU wasn’t our official union. They won and never followed up the log of claims, many of which would have seen improvements for both staff and detainees.
Staff behaviour
Staff behaviour was generally good. Port Hedland was run and staffed by detention officers, with a completely different culture from prisons. Bad officers were weeded out pretty quick, with only a few “care bears” (soft officers) the only cause for concern.
I know of at least one escape facilitated by a female “care bear” officer who had allowed herself to be seduced by a male detainee. In addition to that we had one kitchen staff member and a male officer who both quit, then carried on relationships with detainees they had become attracted to. I consider that appropriate (in that the staff members quite before they entered into a relationship).
None of the people I went through training with were thugs. There were few at PH, and again they were weeded out/forced out pretty quickly.
However, a couple of the sites to which I was seconded were extremely badly staffed. ACM got permission to use prison staff as detention officers (Ruddock’s biggest mistake). 90% of them were absolutely terrible at dealing with detainees without treating them like criminals. We managed to keep long term detainees quiet and (reasonably) content for years at a time. Due to the piggish, arrogant and at times brutal mistreatment of detainees at prison-staffed centers, they had major riots and disturbances within 6 months.
A little example: I was seconded to Curtin detention centre for 6 weeks. I saw men crying in the dirt due to lack of support from staff/management. On one occasion I was manning the gate when a delegation approached me. There was a man who spoke English well, and one of the older well-respected men in the compound. The interpreter explained the older man had only received some paperwork a day ago and it had to be sent off today. I asked permission to look, and saw it was an application for his appeal, which had been sent the day before, despite his lawyer having had it for over 2 weeks. His lawyer should have been shot for this. I asked the (prisons) supervisor for relief while I got this sorted and sent. It was refused.
I explained that by spending 5 minutes sorting this I would save a large amount of trouble later on, as the old fellow was well liked and respected. Again I was refused.
I eventually told him to get fucked and went and sent the fax myself, only to have him front up and take a swing at me that night at the guard’s quarters. However, I saw no better example of their mindset, they’d rather fuck someone around and cause a great deal of grief for detainees (and officers, when the riot started) than do the right thing and defuse the situation.
Finally, what do I think of the directions of the Immigration debate?
This will shock many, but Ruddock did the most humane thing in the world.
- He stopped the boats.
- He stopped more SIEVXs.
- He stopped the trafficking of people by criminal gangs.
- He stopped people being thrown overboard mid-voyage (not kids, this was murders)
- He stopped the criteria for refugee protection being who could pay a smuggler.
I sent a submission to the new immigration minister when it was called for last year, offering advice and answers to any questions he and his staff might have on immigration detention issues. I received back a terse reply along the lines of “your experiences are out of date and irrelevant and won’t be considered.”
I have great confidence the new minister has already signaled to smugglers that their business is back open. When this leads to deaths, it will be as a result of people who are acting with the best of intentions to prevent a number of smaller evils (mandatory detention) which are easily visible, while not being aware of the much greater evils they are helping facilitate.
The single greatest stopper of the boats wasn’t the excision of parts of Australia or the Pacific Solution. It was the introduction of the temporary protection visa. Mr Sidotis’ Evans’ first action as immigration minister was to reverse that decision. In addition he has overturned a couple of other minor deterrents the only function of which was to prevent failed asylum seekers from re-entering Australia on a legal visa and re-applying.
I can only pray he can sleep when the next SEIVX comes to grief. There is a direct line between doing what appears to be right, and causing the deaths of people.
If anyone has specific questions about incidents/rumors they’d like clarification on please put them in comments. My memory is a little hazy on many items, but I will do my best to answer as truthfully as I can.
[LE: minor update - "inappropriate" replaced by "appropriate" and clarification re relationships between detainees and staff members.
Second update: Name of minister corrected in response to Andrew Bartlett's comments.]
113 Comments
That was a tough read.
Very, very interesting read.
It depends if you think leaving legitimate refugees at the mercy of their home countries to suffer is “humane”. The boats coming in were largely inhumane because of what we did to people when they arrived.
Well, it depends what caused SIEV X and whether our response was adequate (or indeed, deliberately inadequate), which is a rather controversial topic.
I can’t help but think this is flat out untrue. I have several personal friends who were female uni students at the time who made the trek up to Baxter in South Australia repeatedly who would never “screw a detainee in the visitor’s yard”. They were compassionate people attempting, however symbolically, to help others in distress.
Paul
I’d counter you first point by replying , do you think those with money should be able to buy their way into asylum? Most of the people we got were able bodied young men, not women and children.
I’m assuming you are aluding to the conspiracy theory that SievX was deliberately sunk by the Australian government? Or that Austarlain navy personnel deliberately didn’t pick up survivors? If so then there really isn’t much to be said.
I’m talking about Port Hedland. Jeans the first day, long flowing skirts and sitting on the chaps lap grinding away. I probably should have been a little more cautious and said “at least SOME out of every group”, apologies if it was a little unclear. I’m talking about what I witnessed on multiple occasions. You can chose to disbelieve that, but I think you’ll agree there is no candy coating either side of the issue in my article.
Great post Frollickingmole.
It’s noteworthy that your arguments are largely with the very last paragraph of this post Paul. I think your argument is probably wrong here:
The boats coming in were largely inhumane because of what we did to people when they arrived.
Vessels were often unseaworthy, people smugglers extorted huge amounts of cash from would-be immigrants for the service, and offered no medical services, and often very little by way of food or drink.
By contrast, the detention system in Australia may have been an overly bureaucratic/punitive way of treating immigrants, but they cost nothing, and offered in return food, medical services, and shelter.
““your experiences are out of date and irrelevant and won’t be considered.”
I’m disgusted.
The left refuse to learn, most especially once in government.
I apologize that our government dismissed your submission, your experience and your first hand insights.
Timmy – as far as I understand, it’s only free if you get to stay. If you get sent home you also get a bill for the full cost of your stay, which for a family or a single person, over several years, amounts to the sort of six figure account that can never be paid.
No matter?
Well, if they are sent home and want to try returning by one of the conventional means to apply, they first have to pay their bill for being kept in detention. No pay bill, no make application.
My goodness. That’s pretty nasty!
You folks write many interesting and thought-provoking posts on this blog. Please don’t pollute it or insult our intelligence with this sub-Blair rubbish.
To select a few howlers just from the last few lines:
The Minister is not “Mr Sidoti”. The Minister is Senator Chris Evans. Chris Sidoti is a former human rights commissioner from last decade who has never been in Parliament, let alone a Minister.
The notion that the Temporary Protection Visa “stopped the boats” is simply wrong. It is disproven by the simple fact that the number of asylum seekers who arrived by boat INCREASED after TPVs were introduced in 1999.
Of particular significance for those who are now retrospectively trying to paint this policy as being “humane” – (I can’t recall the “humane” component of John Howard’s “we will decide who comes into this country” speech, or his “I don’t want people like that living in Australia” comments) – is that the main impact of the TPV was to massively increase the numbers of women and children on the boats, as the ‘humane’ TPV was specifically aimed at preventing subsequent reunion with spouses and children.
And “failed asylum seekers” can still be prevented from re-entering Australia on ‘legal visas’, by not granting them a visa in the first place. Whole categories of people are already denied visas – ‘illegal visa’ is an oxymoron – just by virtue of profiling of their age, gender and nationality. (try being a single young adult male from Afghanistan applying for a visitor visa and see how far you get) Anyone who was known to have been removed or required to leave Australia after an unsuccessful asylum claim would very rarely be subsequently granted a visa into the country, unless there were exceptional circumstances.
That’s just from correcting (or fisking) one paragraph. I have neither the time nor inclination to correct the multitude of other errors and distortions in the rest of this long winded attempt at baiting the many people who opposed the former government’s policies in this area.
Perhaps the writer’s “hazy memory” is more hazy than they realise.
Caz
You are correct on the bills, and the reason for it being imposed. However as far as I’m aware it is almost unheard of (at least in the time I was there) for the moneys to be actively sought.
It is purely to prevent travel back into Australia on a normal visa.
The most likely source of an airline ticket being a refugee supporter, there is nothing to prevent a rejected asylum seeker from making a second application for protection.
Nor will it prevent a second boat trip over. We had one Bangladesh chap who did that, from memory
Andrew Bartlett
Apologies for getting the minister’s name wrong.
Now would you care to address the substance of the article?
I was told by immigration detainees, at detention centres that if they had known about the TPV they would never have come. You are being a little selective when you state “It is disproven by the simple fact that the number of asylum seekers who arrived by boat INCREASED after TPVs were introduced in 1999.”
This was dure to thousnads of poeple already committed to the trip. I appreciate I can only go on what detainees themselves actually told me at the time. However having it from the horse’s mouth so to speak is more convincing to me.
If you don’t believe it was the introduction of TPV’s then what do you attribute the massive slackening in numbers to?
Yes many people can be screened out for a lot of reasons. However the imosition of the “bill” makes it pretty well impossible to obtain a visa.
I’ll stake my recollections over your bleeding heart bias any day mate. Have you actually read the parts where I’m critical of management or did you just skip straight to outrage?
Engage with the topic, ask specific questions, if you have (as you should have) specific incidents youd like another look at by all means ask.
Andrew, I’m disappointed in you. There’s a real tone of hurt middle-classness oozing from that comment, something that shat me about the anti-detention centre groups at the time and contributed to me voting for Howard in 2004. As you’re probably aware, most libertarians are rather pro-immigration, so for me, being forced to confront the people was a very useful exercise.
2004 taught me that the maintenance of historically high rates of immigration in a welfare state almost inevitably leads to various forms of prejudicial nastiness, and that the prejudice is well-founded. Low skill immigrants hurt the poor (driving down wages) and — by and large — mean that middle class people get cheaper house servants. Low-skill immigrants and their access to welfare are also heavily subsidized by working-class people’s taxes. The process isn’t pretty, and the refusal by many on the anti-detention centre side to acknowledge that those ‘on Howard’s side’ may actually have had arguments — serious economic arguments, since documented by the likes of George Borjas — was utterly infuriating.
Those on the right — if they have any sense — have had to learn to accept the people’s verdict on, say, Workchoices. One may argue with the people as one may argue with one’s spouse, but in the end, one must submit to the fact of being married. It is simply unreasonable to express a desire to ‘elect a new people’. People on the left need to do the same when it comes to mandatory detention, and anti-immigration sentiment generally.
Great post thefrollickingmole. Thanks LE for publishing it.
I read the whole thing, frollickingtroll. I only had to start going back a few paragraphs to find enough errors to make my point.
I’m not surprised you’ll stake your “hazy memory” on “many items” (now known as your “recollections”) over someone who has simply outlined a few facts. You appear to be a person who thinks calling someone else a “bleeding heart” is sufficient to give superiority to your own case.
In any case, seeing you’ve already determined that I’m biased, I doubt there’s much point in engaging further with you.
(and that’s before I read what you write over on the blog you normally inhabit)
For any other readers interested, the ‘bill’ was the charming practice of charging people for the cost of locking them up, often for years, without charge or trial or access to any process to enable them to obtain release.
This was not only given to those who were unsuccessful with their asylum claim – it was also at times served on those who obtained a visa. Successful visa claimants still had to request their bill to be waived and it was done so at the discretion of the government – there was no legal process they could follow to get the debt removed.
On occasions people had bills of over $100 000 to pay for being locked up without charge for years, despite obtaining a visa. This could be used to prevent them from getting a permanent visa or from sponsoring in their family.
It also aplied to anyone who was locked up in immigration detention (always without charge), not just asylum seekers.
For example, Scott Parkin, a US citizen who had his visitor visa cancelled without warning on ASIO advice (which he was prevented from seeing or even being given the gist of), was compulsorily detained. If he wanted to appeal his visa cancellation, he had to do so from detention (even though no charge had been laid or even any allegation made). This not only meant he would stay locked up, but he would be charged thousands of dollars for every week while his case was being considered.
This is only one example among thousands.
Senator Evans has just announced that detention debts will be abolished. However, there is no need to bill asylum seekers, or people like Scott Parkin or anyone else the government doesn’t want back in the country.
Scott Parkin would never have been allowed in while his bill was outstanding, but he will never be allowed back in anyway whilst ever ASIO rule against it (for reasons he won’t be allowed to know or appeal against).
It was always just another way of using our immirgation laws to punish people without having to go through any independent legal processes, not a way of deterring asylum seekers.
I agree with SL – Andrew, I appreciate that you may deeply care about this issue, but does that justify you using slurs like ‘sub-Blair rubbish’, ‘pollute’, and calling the writer of the post a troll? He has an opinion. That’s all. Nothing wrong with that.
Not ONCE in your two comments do you actually engage with the substance of Frollickingmole’s post; you only take issue with his argument at the end. There is PLENTY of valuable and useful material in the rest of the post.
I’m quite happy not to engage with you either Andrew.
Just stay nice and secure in that bubble of self rightousness and black/white view of the world you have.
Here’s a question for you. Do you see ANY downside to the resumption of people trafficking into Australia?
The sheer bloody mindedness of many pro immigrant people has been a source of distress for me. By refusing to ever engage with the ladies and men who were in the greatest position to supply them information and suggest improvements they blunted a tool which could have done a lot of good.
But it’s much simpler to dismiss anything from officers/ex-officers because they must all be evil nazis eh?
“Do you see ANY downside to the resumption of people trafficking into Australia?”
Have you stopped beating your wife?
I have to say, Paul, that I can’t imagine any of my left wing activist female friends who visited detention centres having sex with refugees – they were earnest and very well-intentioned people. Doesn’t mean that it didn’t happen sometimes with some women, I guess.
Personally, I am supportive of the current level of immigration and I am definitely supportive of offering asylum to refugees. I also do not support mandatory detention, particularly for families. I think the new government’s policy of only detaining people who are security risks etc is much better. I just cannot feel comfortable with incarcerating people like that.
That being said, I am always open to an account by someone else with different experiences to myself, and with different views.
It seems the main point of argument is thefrollickingmole’s final para about whether the detention policy was good or bad. I don’t know whether or not a different policy will lead to more asylum seekers coming here.
I do know that, often, people smugglers treat asylum seekers appallingly badly, and put them in leaky tubs that are likely to sink at any moment. I don’t object to asylum seekers per se, but I do object to people being at the mercy of people smugglers (probably risking their lives and being fleeced of their worldly goods into the bargain).
I’m not sure what the right answer is, but I don’t think the matter is totally black and white. There are always shades of grey.
P.S. I also think the practice of billing unsuccessful applicants is pretty nasty – I’d support the abolition of that.
klaus k
I fail to see why that question shouldn’t be answered by refugee advocates.
You can seperate the process from the outcomes with a pithy one liner.
I’m normally just a lurker here, but just wanted to say “well done,” TFM. A hard read, as an earlier commenter noted, but a good one, especially for people who are open to hearing both sides of the story.
And to Andrew Barlett in comments above, I’m not rightly sure what you think you’re accomplishing by adopting such a ‘superior,’ condescending, sneering tone, but I found it quite off-putting and am sure others did as well.
Your name sounds vaguely familiar, so I assume you used to be someone, but sneering and snarling at people you obviously consider beneath you is no way to win friends & influence people.
Again, great job Mole. And thanks to SL and LE for giving him a platform from which to speak.
Timmy – yeah, the bill for care & accommodation is a real kicker, costs more to stay in detention for a few years than at the Grand Hyatt.
TFM – indeed, the invoice for services rendered is really just a big sticker stamped “don’t try to come back now, ya hear!”.
Imagine the fear and worry it must bring to those given such invoices though, in addition to being sent back on home.
It is, however, only a minority sent home. Based on the 80/20 rule, my understanding is that at least 80% of refugees, perhaps it’s much higher, do ultimately stay. I’m not sure on the figures, but the success rate is actually much higher than the “horror stories” would have us believe.
Just by the by, there are countries all over the world who host (willingly or not) refugee camps where people wait for years in dire circumstances, often in not much better than squalor, for a country to accept them. Those people are also “locked up”. Refugees / asylum seekers do not get to roam around other countries freely either, even very poor countries. This is not something *special* that Australia imposes on people who arrive on our shores via non-conventional – and yes, illegal – means.
Arriving without a visa IS illegal!
Someone arriving at Tulla without a visa, no matter how upstanding they are and no matter how brief their intended visit, can just as easily find themselves on the next plane back. No visa, no stay! And that’s not splitting hairs!
Australia has a refugee program, just as do so many other countries. Many refugees coming here are granted asylum having spent years in camps in other countries.
I’m afraid I can, having encountered pretty similar behaviour during my stint at the Home Office over here. People do very weird things under stress, or out of a misguided sense of pity, or because they mean well (or ill). Some of it undoubtedly has its origins in a weirdly Rousseauian ‘noble savage’ view of asylum seekers and refugees common among certain elements of the worrying classes, but most of it — I think — is because prisons and barracks often make perfectly sane people go completely bloody ga-ga. And not just the people inside the wire, either.
Caz
it’s not illegal for a refugee applicant to enter Australia without a valid visa. However it is the basis for detention. I’m sure our legal egales on here can explain it better.
But in short it is legal to seek asylum in Australia, this is one of the bones of contention for refugee advocates. Immigration detention is administrative in nature, not criminal.
Caz, one of my dearest friends is a refugee – she and her family spent quite some time waiting in fairly difficult conditions elsewhere before they were accepted here in Australia.
Look, I can understand that if someone is threatened with death or torture in their own country, they want to get out of there quick smart. You can’t be too worried about the legalities in that circumstance. You just run. But that doesn’t apply so well to Australia – it doesn’t border on anywhere and it isn’t near anywhere.
SL – true – I’m always amazed by “nice” middle class women who start writing to brutal murderers and end up marrying them. Strange psychological things going on there…
There is something about this whole story that leaves me uneasy, not sure what it is, (and that’s before I read what you write over on the blog you normally inhabit) (Bartlett), any chance of the name of that blog?
Lang Mack
The link to the other blog is at the top of the post.
Nothing hidden or sinister about it!
If you are looking for the posts on Port Hedland just look in the comments section of the Einfeld post. I have 3 linked there.
Lang Mack, I think the blog to which Andrew Bartlett is referring is the group blog Tizona, which is a kind of hobby blog for a group of us from various sites in America, Australia, Canada and South Korea, a way to let off steam and keep in touch with each other.
(Sorry, Mole – didn’t mean to step on your comment; slow typist)
Andrew Bartlett is a self-righeous prick. Who knew?
I found it extremely interesting, thought provoking and valuable, even if it doesn’t necessarily change my position on mandatory detention. And I’d suggest that if you viewed it as simply partisan “sub-blair” rubbish, well, don’t adjust your set, the problem is in your head.
You don’t have to agree with anything TFM wrote, but to dismiss it out of hand as unworthy of engagement… Memo to self: Andrew Bartlett less worthy of respect then formerly thought.
Thank you for the information, will read later.
As long as I’ve come out of lurkesville here, I’ll make another comment. I agree wholeheartedly with the snippet I’ve quoted above. One of the great ways in which this blog is so different from many others is that whether I come to the post and comments agreeing or disagreeing with their basic premises, I appreciate the fact that they are almost always so well thought out and so well composed, they always at least make me think and (re)consider my own POV.
Kudos to SL and LE and 99.4% of the regular commenters here for keeping discussions and debates classy.
And to add to my above, when I saw “Second update: Name of minister corrected in response to Andrew Bartlett’s comments.]” at the end of the post, I actually thought – Ooh, Andrew Bartlett has left a comment – that will be sure to add value.
Maybe not.
When Andrew was in parliament, he was one of the few of the political species I had any time for – on his blog he comes across as a compassionate and thoughtful person, although I don’t always agree with his arguments.
I was surprised by the tenor of his comment – but we all have issues which push our buttons. I know I do (eg, anti-Semitism gets me so upset).
Actually, I’m not much of a commenter at other blogs – more of a lurker. I rarely comment unless I have something specific to say.
Wow. What an interesting post. Thanks for sharing your thoughts mole and thanks to SL and LE for letting mole do so.
This is one of a handful of issues where I side with the right rather than the left, and in large part for the reasons cited by SL.
The left has to wake up and face reality, which is this:
- we live in a world where one billion plus people probably have legitimate claims for seeking asylum. Most will simply have to stay put as the free world cannot realistically be expected to accommodate so many refugees,
- the people who arrive in places like Australia by boat are almost always much better off than 90% of the countrymen they leave behind
- a caring/sharing approach to asylum seekers would cause a tsunami of boat people to head for our shores and many thousands of these people would die at sea
- acceptance of large numbers of asylum seekers would cause a justifiable white working class backlash that would catapult Pauline Hanson or her successor into parliament with a huge following.
As SL notes, it is upper middle class folk who benefit most as they get cheap maids and chauffeurs and a warm inner glow, but it is the unskilled white workers whose wages get driven down, have their kids on the dole and live in violent and dysfunctional ghettos ala the “no go” areas in Paris who pay the price.
On behalf of the housing commission folk I grew up with, I say screw all of you bleeding heart lefties.
Thank you frollickingmole. Excellent post.
I’d have to agree with your assessment of TPVs as a deterrent even if there were some aspects about them I didn’t like and other aspects which later asylum seekers and their advocates tried to milk.
Also agree with this:He stopped the criteria for refugee protection being who could pay a smuggler.
Do you think those with money should be denied the status of refugee if they otherwise qualify?
You are just buying into the Howard-era propaganda that these people are buying their way into our country to take advantage of the things we have all worked so hard for.
Newsflash: you can be persecuted by your government and still have some assets. Amazing, but true. The test for whether or not someone is a legitimate refugee has nothing whatsover to do with whether they are rich, poor, or middle class.
If these people were truly wealthy, why the hell wouldn’t they fly here on a holiday/business trip and then apply for asylum upon arrival?
This was never a left-right issue. Individuals with a bee in their bonnet about the unwashed hordes inundating this fair continent can spin it all they like but the Rudd government got elected on the basis of its promise to change this system which had finally became a stinking international scandal and national embarrasment.
Mandatory detention and all that went with it under Howard was opposed by all the major professional legal organisations in Australia from the Law Council of Australia, to the Victorian Bar Council, the Law Institute of Victoria and Law Society of NSW, etc., from at least 2002 because it was, they unanimously declared and proved, unlawful.
And so it was.
“a caring/sharing approach to asylum seekers would cause a tsunami of boat people to head for our shores and many thousands of these people would die at sea”
.
Of course there’s a massive difference between a caring/sharing approach and harassment and paranoia. Things like Nauru were crazy — was the Nullabor Plain or wherever else not unpleasant enough?
.
I might say too that if policies are set to a level that they are limiting numbers to a few hundred per year, then that’s probably not a bad trade-off between those here and those coming — a few hundred per year is miniscule (no doubt far fewer than Brits over staying visas), and I’m always surprised about how much animosity it generates. This seems like paranoia to me.
.
On this note, there are countries in the world that have hundreds of thousands of refugees, and therefore probably really do have a significant problem. It would be interesting to see what would happen if they harassed them enough such they went elsewhere (no doubt with some ending up in Australia). Would we see them as baddies, or would we think it is all fine too?
We have one of the most restrictive attitudes to refugees in the world.
How do all the other countries mysteriously survive this “tsunami”?
I didn’t understand her to be suggesting that this was a motivation for promoting the relaxation of harsh detention policies.
In any event, it is one of the most offensive and unfounded things in this discussion so far. I know a lot of people who have been active in trying to get Australia to live up to its basic human rights obligations, and not a singel one of them would ever employ a “maid and chauffeur”. In fact, I think you’ll find that demographically people who can afford maids are the same ones who vote conservative no matter what anybody’s policies are.
I would bet my life that the company which employs Chinese nationals for outrageously low wages to work cleaning the food court across from my work, for example, is filled with nasty little hard right middle management types who view humans as economic units to be exploited for profit.
I should add that I have some first hand experience of this in the Federal Court. I have no doubt that many genuine refugees are sent home to imprisonment, or worse, (particularly those going to China) because (a) our system is rigged to make it extremely hard for them to put their case for asylum in any kind of sensible way and (b) the Court’s hands were so effectively tied by the restrictive laws put in place to stop judicial review of the merits of claims.
I actually had to sit through the extremely upsetting spectacle of senior members of the judiciary trying to get illiterate Chinese peasants to put submissions to them about jurisdictional error and other complex areas of administrative law. The judges did their damndest to help them understand what was being asked of them, but how can someone who can’t even read possibly deal with such things? Most competent lawyers I know don’t understand jurisdictional error. These people would end up crying in frustration and anger, begging the court not to send them home.
I don’t care what you say about the broader policy issues, knowingly sending someone back to a country like China to face what is quite possibly torture and state-sponsored murder is disgusting and inhumane.
The thing is — as I said above — we don’t border on to any country. We’re not a natural flow on destination from anywhere. This means that if someone comes here, they must have made a special and particular effort to do so.
I’ve heard people say: why don’t the refugees just stay in Indonesia instead? why do they have to come here? From a pragmatic point of view, if we just sat on our hands and let refugees pile up in neighbouring countries, this can cause political instability and pressure on our neighbours. There’s also the moral argument – why should we have to escape the burden of refugees because of fortuitous geological happenstance? (ie, we’re nowhere near anyone else)
That being said, I’m still worried about the whole people smuggling aspect. I know the fact that I published a post like this has probably shocked my left wing friends, but the valid point made by TFM is that unscrupulous people smugglers risk the lives of asylum seekers — precisely because we are so hard to get to!
The thing I want to consider is whether there are better ways of reducing people smuggling other than mandatory detention.
Paul
The Federal court review of every rejected case is almost purely to see if the Immigration department followed its own guidelines before application for deportation is allowed to commence. The most they can generally do is send the case back for review/re-assessment if they arent satisfied the department ticked every box they were supposed to.
Just out of interest do people believe the immigration officers assigned to these cases were acting out of malice when they rejected individuals cases?
Secondly given the high number of successful applicants (I believe the figure normaly using UN criteria is 70%) somewhere over 90%, what proof is there a concerted effort was made to reject those who did arrive?
And in addition I believe melaleuca may have been better off saying “ditch diggers and meatworkers”, low level jobs in general.
“You are just buying into the Howard-era propaganda that these people are buying their way into our country to take advantage of the things we have all worked so hard for.”
No incorrect, the only reason Australia has a refugee intake is if the public at large has some confidence it is orderly, and the applicants are the most “deserving” (millions are only a few 10s’ of thousands are taken). By effectively allowing people to self-select based on their ability to pay the system comes into question. People become uneasy and support for the orderly system suffers.
Have any refugee advocates met a detainee they considered unworthy of protection?
That is one of the worst things about the legal system. Heartbreaking to watch people with no resources struggling like that – and awful when you know that they’ll probably meet a sticky end of one sort or another when they get home. Part of the problem is with the legal system itself and the difficulty people have in affording and accessing legal advice.
As I said on the Einfeld thread, we can’t just accept every asylum seeker’s story at face value either. The thing is that there are some unscrupulous people who might claim they are refugees when they are not. Who was that family who said they were Afghani refugees, but when people went to investigate, the probability was that they were not? And if we take those unscrupulous people, we’ve got less resources to help those who are in genuine need. So we have to work out who is more deserving. Working out ‘desert’ in such circumstances is horrible – whose risk of being tortured and killed is more than another’s?
I do strongly believe that detainees should have been given some advice before their first DIMIA interview.
That was the single most critical part of the process, a stuff up in their timeline there or a missplaced location would cause a lot of greif later on.
Even though it was against the rules Id always tell that to new arrivals, get everything right in your head for the first interview, take notes if you have to.
I honestly dont know who should provide that advice though, most of the lawyers i had exposure to were of the crusader types, who quite frankly were more interested in damaging/making unworkable, the immigration process, not improving it.
A lot was made of DIMIAS seige mentality during the enquiries, but quite frankly that was justified. There wouldnt be another organisation with more resources being thrown at it, legal, media or NGO’s in Australia.
And a number of those lawyers engaged in some very unethical behaviour in their fight for what they saw as a “greater good”.
Paul says:
“In any event, it is one of the most offensive and unfounded things in this discussion so far. I know a lot of people who have been active in trying to get Australia to live up to its basic human rights obligations, and not a singel one of them would ever employ a “maid and chauffeur”.”
Paul, I pointed out who benefits but I don’t think the economic benefit for the upper middle class types is the motivating factor. BTW they may not have a maid or chauffeur but they benefit from cheap unskilled labor when they do the renovations, eat out etc…
Paul says:
“I don’t care what you say about the broader policy issues, knowingly sending someone back to a country like China to face what is quite possibly torture and state-sponsored murder is disgusting and inhumane.”
I suggest you wake up and smell the coffee. Apparently something like 250,000 Vietnamese boat people died after the end of the Vietnam War (1).
If we have a lax refugee policy in respect of China, with its 1.2 billion people, what do you think will happen if a major crisis unfolds in that country? How many people would die as a result of the compassionate but stupid policy you appear to favour?
(1) http://www.vietka.com/DeathCasualty.htm
LE says:
“Who was that family who said they were Afghani refugees, but when people went to investigate, the probability was that they were not?”
It was the Baktiari family. Ken Parish wrote about them here: http://www.onlineopinion.com.au/view.asp?article=1720
Note how all the bleeding heart types believed the Baktiari family were genuine refugees right to the very end.
I strongly, strongly agree with this having worked on these things from the other end of the appeals process. The way the system is rigged, if they don’t put forward the right types of evidence (even orally) at this first interview they are more or less screwed from then on. The initial administrative review gives them a small chance to put further factual material, then it’s off to the FMC to be rejected on legal review, and then to the FCA to be rejected again and finally to the High Court to be rejected on the papers.
Because the access to proper advice at that very early stage is so poor, many of them picked up a few key phrases they had been told would assist them, and parroted them. The unfortunate thing was that I had the strong impression from their other statements that many rejected asylum seekers would have been let in if they’d simply told their own story in a straightforward way – but they had been told they had to ‘game’ the system and got rejected as a result.
This reasoning holds no water unless we accept that they would have had a life worth living in Vietnam. Given the consequences for those who had opposed the Communists – as discussed in the page you helpfully link to – they might nevertheless have made the better choice by taking the risk and leaving. In addition, do you really think that if you are that scared and desperate to escape that you give a shit what Australia’s refugee policy is?
SL’s attribution of the notion of “Noble Savage” to Rousseau is completely spurious. Rousseau never spoke of the Noble Savage.
Rather than being an invention of the Enlightenment, this concept in fact originated with its opposite, or the backlash to it, if you like: racist 19th century British anthropology in the service of brutal colonialism.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2001/apr/15/socialsciences.highereducation
What Rousseau did contribute to human thought that is relevant in the discussion of refugee law and which is of immense value today is the concept of compassion and the educative role it can and must play in a truly democratic, humane and civilised society in helping develop law and social policy which encourages the broader citizenry to identify with the travails of others in need and support government actions aimed at ameliorating the needs of such people, not punishing and victimising them further or effectively sentencing them to death or major harm as did Howard’s criminal imprisonment policy.
In this sense Rousseau did indeed thankfully influence “the worrying classes” – a new term to me, a little imprecise to say the least, but I guess we get SL’s drift.
TFM this is why I felt uneasy with your excellent story ““your experiences are out of date and irrelevant and won’t be considered.”.
), that this lot won’t touch, to quote my favoured Dictionary, A. Bierce ,”Politics ,a strife of interests masquerading as a contest of principals”.The whole lot are feckless.
As you put it, as the ‘man on the ground’ so to speak,it leaves a huge number of questions to be asked of the previous Government and Administration and also questions to the incumbents as to why such an answer to you, this also ,just offhand, brings to mind the Wheat Board adventure plus numerous others that happened in the Howard years(and they were long years
If we have a lax refugee policy in respect of China, with its 1.2 billion people, what do you think will happen if a major crisis unfolds in that country? How many people would die as a result of the compassionate but stupid policy you appear to favour?
An unfair argument. Real asylum seekers who are having their cases tested now should not have their own lives or well-being threatened because of a hypothetical crisis that may or may not happen in some years from now. We can change the laws then, if we need to.
Just love (not) the misogynist, racist, authoritarian, prurient stuff about “uni ladies” screwing inmates.
Since the “detainees” were not technically prisoners or the centres jails, then why weren’t they afforded the dignity of privacy to screw to their hearts content any other consenting, non-coercive, non-staff adult?
It’s not as if they were given anything else much to do and as we all know screwing is a great sadness, boredom and pain alleviator.
If Australian citizens visiting detainees wanted to screw them and the detainees were happy with this, then why the hell not?
Did any of our guests ever complain about women forcing themselves on them, the thefrollickingmole?
50. Paul
Absolutely correct on every point there. We werent supposed to say anything, not even an outline of the process. Much of the distress felt by detainees was due to a lack of info on the process rather than the first/second rejection.
Detainees would lay out their case for protection at the Court in a manner that would have secured them major consideration for refugee status, without realising that the court was looking at the administrative side of things not the validity of their appeal. Often what was “saved for court” should have been given earlier.
There was a roumor (thats all) that some of the successful applicants interview tapes were being sold in Indonesia.
In addition it was often the sugglers who took /told refugees to dispose of their papers before getting to Australia. One of the fastest applications I saw was a family group who kept their papers. I am guessing the reasoning was it would be easier to mix in non-refugees and maximise their income. Again, not the refugees fault, rather the smugglers.
Two things.
First, a plug for the LDP policy, which has generally struck me as simple and humane. There’s a flat fee for permanent residency as a step to citizenship, which is waived for refugees. You can come to Australia, pay the fee (or have it as a debt) and apply for refugee status. If you’re a genuine refugee the fee will be waived or refunded. If not, pay up please.
For those folks who can afford to pay a people smuggler, this would be safer and guaranteed, one way or the other, to get you into Australia.
Secondly, I worked for a politician during the year of most immigration strife. DIMIA, along with Centrelink, really did have the most intense siege mentality. I once had a person come in who was an Australian citizen by immigration. He’d worked hard and wanted to bring his sister and wife to Australia, but had been knocked back. He’d then been bounced back and forth between DIMIA and the Migration Review Tribunal for two years. Basically they’d put him in the too-hard basket.
A few phonecalls prefaced with “My name is Jacaques, I’m calling on behalf of …, the Member for …” sorted it out. MRT had written a letter to DIMIA saying they’d incorrectly assessed the claim and should start over. DIMIA never got it, it didn’t matter why. The phonecalls got the MRT to resend the letter and I got a DIMIA shinybum to call me back when it was received and logged.
I was a pretty useless electorate officer as such things go, but I reckon that such episodes of fighting bureaucratic inertia were the most satisfying parts of the job.
Paul says:
“This reasoning holds no water unless we accept that they would have had a life worth living in Vietnam. ”
My partner is VN and I think I may have a greater insight into the situation than yourself. Most of the boat people were merchants and their families. I’m yet to meet a single boat person who was from a working class or peasant background. While these folk did it tough after the Communists took over, they were still generally better off than the peasants and workers. Almost all the VN boat people were economic refugees rather than genuine political refugees.
TimT says:
“An unfair argument … We can change the laws then, if we need to.”
I suggest you inform yourself about what is currently happening in China. 20-40 million workers in the cities have just lost their jobs and are now heading back to unemployment and poverty in the countryside owing to the GFC.
Posey
The item about the visitors was put in as an example of what went on. If it offends you then stiff shit really.
I dont know why that one minor detail in the whole post has attracted more commentary than any other. I guess its just discomfort at others actions.
The detainees knew the ladies were easy pickings after the first meeting, it was just the girls playing out their “resistance” fantasies that were deluding themselves they were doing something special.
Officers knew it, detainees knew it, as i said as long as they were discreet it wasnt an issue.
Why not rooms?
Dont be so silly.
Can you imagine the media latching onto that??
Although at one stage (as acting activities officer) I did raise the possibility of escorted trips to the local brothel for the detainees. That was knocked back.
I know this is a bit of a sick joke, but there is a certain truth to it and was first told to me by a Franciscan nun who’d observed it in her prison work. The reason why many women are sexually and romantically attracted to men in prisons is because they know where these men will be at all times and because they can therefore pretty much count on their fidelity and gratitude.
57 Jacques Chester
And lets not forget it is a government department. That means a lot of stuff ups at various stages.
We had one detention officer who waited 3 years to bring in his Indonesian wife. So incompitence can strike anyone.
I like the idea of a refundable bond, it would give a degree of certainty. The place the system has the most trouble is in removing those found not to be deserving of protection.
Posey
Thats probably as close to the reason as you can get I think.
thefrollinkmole, for all your protestations it is clear you did view the “detainees” as prisoners and some sort of uncharged criminals.
Why shouldn’t they have had privacy for sex? Since when has consensual sex been illegal for non-prisoner adults?
Im sorry but my job wasnt to act a facilitator for a bunch of damp knickered bints.
And again please engage with the arguement rather than play the man on this one.
I know I should be out bayoneting babies or kicking kittens based on my (old) job, you will just have to deal with the dissapointment Im not.
You are putting words in my mouth, TFM.
On another matter, you mentioned a log of claims put forward by Port Hedland staff that was ignored by the union which you said would if met have improved conditions for prisoners as well as staff.
What were the claims relating to detainees?
“damp knickered bints”. I find that offensive and I believe it is a British derogatory to describe females.
That being said, it’s interesting that women (to accept your statement) can do this, now if men (from without)offered their services as “comfort men” to women in this situation, what would the reaction(and the blind eye) have been?did this ever happen?.
Maybe that is why the interest has been aroused.(And probably a small sense of lack of parity).
PoseyMost of the improvements would have been related to the removal from the centres of known troublemakers. Realistic staffing levels to have allowed many more off site escorts/activities. More phones for detainees ( a lot of strife between detainees over the phones, with only 3 lines for 900 people whodblame them?).
Much bigger budget for both education and activities. The daily budget per detainee was (from memory) a pitiful $1,30 per person per day.
A ban on smoking inside the blocks.
The refurbishment and reopening of at least one, possibly 2 accomodation blocks to relieve overcrowding.
Thats a few.
As I mention above it was in my opinion a terribly run company, DIMIA failed in its oversight. I personaly saw some of the billable items sent to DIMIA head office as a supervisor, they regularly billed for at least 5 staff per shift more than were on.
In my opinion 90% of the trouble we had at Port hedland could be traced directly back to less than a dozen standover men and troublemakers. If they had been removed the centre would not have had the gradual ratcheting up of security and “us Vs them” it had towards the end of my time there. I also cant emphasise enough the amout of intimidation a group like this used on other detainees.
Lang Mack
To the best of my knowledge no. We did have a couple of minor outbreaks of prostitution by a bout 2 ladies in 4 years, thats probably the closest we came to it.
However there were rumors (I never went there so I cant confirm) that some officers at Woomera traded favours for sex with female detainees. I shouldnt have to add but if that was the case those officers were scum.
Heres the AWU sites coverage of our actions, the first links to a summary (brief) of our claims.
http://awu.net.au/national/news/1045725905_23208.html
This one is a source page for the AWU regarding our action.
http://awu.net.au/cgi-bin/search/search.pl?searchstring=acm
Hope that helps.
Your correspondent is playing fast and loose with the facts with regard to project safecom. The group had a significant number of members during the main phase of the protests against the former Govts detentition regime. “One crank and a website” is straight out of the bullshit file. BTW I wasn’t a member but my wife was. Try and get your facts straight.
In fact, as is shown in the link, this was the extent of the union members’ concerns about conditions at Port Hedland in the 2002 staff industrial campaign.
And as you can see the claims/demands had bugger all to do with the fundamental denial of human rights of the prisoners or of any concerns whatsoever about the need for significant improvements to their immediate circumstances and long-term prospects.
http://awu.net.au/national/news/1045725905_23208.html
“There is PLENTY of valuable and useful material in the rest of the post.”
That’s if you think overblow rhetoric and heresay are useful.
TFM: Fact is you were used, quite happily it seems, and your only quibbles even today are about management “appeasers”, “care bears” and “damp knickered bints” who all had in common that they felt more than a touch queasy about placing women and children alone for one week in your affectionately named “chokey” – i.e. solitary confinement Gitmo style.
Posey,
You appear to be getting rather bloody minded.
“Overloaded bathroom facilities; repairs not carried out when reported” = “The refurbishment and reopening of at least one, possibly 2 accomodation blocks to relieve overcrowding.”
“Extremely poor fire fighting training of staff and too few fire drills and smoke detector inspections” = The actualy physical safety of detainees.
“Detainees classified as At Risk are not always being observed according to Port Hedland detention centre protocol; management plans inadequate and suffer from staff shortages” = Not enough staff to watch people threatening self harm.
“Escorts of detainees be done with a minimum agreed number of officers” = When we didnt have enough officers many outside escorts (beach, shopping etc) were cancelled.
It seems you expected us to dismantle the system according to your idea of human rights.
The issues on the AWU website are the issues they could confidently take to the IRC. The actual log of claims (if I can find it on the net Ill post it) was much longer.
Yes, because no non-Vietnamese could know anything about Vietnam, could they? Despite my racial handicap I think I should point to this example, from “The Vietnam War” by Andrew A Wiest:
So, yeah. Murder, torture, brainwashing and imprisonment for up to 20 years. Sounds like a bit more than “doing it tough”. And you think these people were economic refugees.
Absolutely right. The notion that these people were “illegals” is one of the most shameful things about the Howard-era policy and spin, and is why the present situation is infinitely more compassionate and dignified for all concerned. At least real criminals get proper access to courts and lawyers…
Did it never occur to you that you could help “dismantle the system”? Seriously.
There is a long, noble tradition, and I have direct experience of this, in Australia, in the manufacturing industry, of workers challenging management about the very raison d’etre of their operation and of putting forward detailed plans for a totally different way of organising and even of productive outputs that meet humanitarian and social needs rather than undermine and trash them.
Posey
That happened exactly once. The whole family were kept together. The parents used their children to try and escape any sanction for kicking off a riot.
You seem to take great umbrage at the use of the word detainee or resident. its not a belittling term, it is exactly how we were to address the people at the centre.
You must be smoking something good to have read through my post and think thats the only quibbles I had. As I said I didn’t care about the moistened bints, neither did the detainees.
For you to turn around and say I must care a lot about it is silly.
Management “appeasers” saw us go from minor individual incidents to mass violence and thugs ruling over decent detainees.
For example. Management gave control of job allocation (the only money some detainees could make) to a hard core group of thugs after they began to regularly smash up the mess if they werent on it.
Think about that. Think about what that would do to any detainee who they thought wasnt “in line” with them.
Ok, it appears we are now playing the man and not the issue.
If you have specifics to bring up do so. It appears some here are upset I dont share their world view, tough.
Just like its tough for me to see the new minister undo what I condsider to be the lesser of 2 evils.
I haven’t expected to change any refugee supporters minds on the issue. For 99% of people the mind is already made up. However I did think both sides of the debate might feel challenged/and take some comfort from some of what I posted.
What I posted is MORE unflattering of the detention system than flattering, yet somehow because it doesn’t paint it as simple as black/white I must be …”view the “detainees” as prisoners and some sort of uncharged criminals.”
Sorry if it wasnt as simple as you thought.
http://www.marxist.com/lucas-aerospace-plan.htm
In the 1980s, this example inspired workers in many countries in many industries facing mass lay-offs or wholesale privatisation to come up with alternative socially necessary production plans. I worked for one such place, in the western suburbs of Melbourne around this time as a female process worker in a federal government defence support factory with a very strong shop stewards’ committee with links to and support from the local community and tertiary institution staff and activists.
Oh, ok, it was the Government Ammunition Factory, Footscray. We were a sort of an enfant terrible job lot along with the shop stewards’ committee and workers of Williamstown Naval Dockyards and the Commonwealth Ordinance Factory Maribyrnong.
Of course, we all got royally screwed in the end. But what one brief shining moment it was.
Oh, wow. And what exactly stopped all those energised workers organisning collectives to produce their socially responsible products? Aparently they needed the authority of the state to make it happen. Though how they expected the state to enforce their utopia when they had stopped manufacturing the small arms is beyond me. But that is the visionary for you, no practicality.
If you want an alternative model, look at Bendigo Bank and the community owned branches putting resources back into their local communities. It is a for-profit model, with market discipline, but the bulk of the profits are used to support community ventures.
Marxism just won’t cut it. Never did. 200 million dead to a attest to it and all. But to use my brand new favourite quote “What’s one more body in the foundation of utopia?”
I guess that’s pretty much off topic.
We had our industrial action and were completely vindicated by the IRC.
Then the union that was supposed to look after us overturned it on a demarcation issue, despite refusing to represent us in the first place.
That tore the heart out of most of the officers who were agitating for changes, most quit.
There was a lot of subverting going on, just not the major sort you were after.
eg: http://tizona.wordpress.com/2008/05/21/port-hedland-stories-again/
Thats the sort of things we could get away with. If you ever meet a detainee from PH ask them about “officer carpet”.
I managed to get many of the rooms carpeted for nothing as well.
Did it never occur to you that you could help “dismantle the system”? Seriously.
In all fairness, from TFM’s point of view , he did try to bring some justice to a situation (his statements), what must be understood is that in a position as he held, and for some time, that he was a tenured controller of these people and as such while he held that position he was obligated to carry out his duties.
The question of ethics seems to have been made available while carrying out his duties in the terms of his employment. Asking about activist action is not fair and I think inconsiderate.
I have mentioned a couple of things that he may well have more gentle with, however, walk in his shoes, and possibly background (and that is not a slight) and accept that the story is from the person who was there, was obligated to his employment, and has made an effort to present his view on here. (That shows a certain faith),
Before anyone states ‘well why did you do that type of work?and only get to talk now?’
Have a look at yourself.
We had our industrial action and were completely vindicated by the IRC.
Then the union that was supposed to look after us overturned it on a demarcation issue, despite refusing to represent us in the first place.
That tore the heart out of most of the officers who were agitating for changes, most quit.
There was a lot of subverting going on, just not the major sort you were after.
eg: http://tizona.wordpress.com/2008/05/21/port-hedland-stories-again/
Thats the sort of things we could get away with. If you ever meet a detainee from PH ask them about “officer carpet”.
I managed to get many of the rooms carpeted for nothing as well.
Heres one of the worst cases i dealt with at PH.
http://tizona.wordpress.com/2008/05/10/a-true-story-and-a-sad-one/
Sorry – have been dealing with kids all afternoon – my son is very cranky after injections…
I couldn’t agree more, Lang. As I’ve mentioned before, I used to repossess houses for various lenders, which isn’t the kind of work which gives you a warm inner glow about yourself. But I consoled myself with the thought that lenders were probably better off dealing with someone like me than some real hard-arse who didn’t give a damn. Some said that I was the first person they’d spoken to since the mortgage issues had arisen who treated them like a human being – that has to count for something.
Well yes in the end we did need the authority of the state to make it happen, TIm, or if not, some equal power. For despite our detailed plans, the means of production, the land, the site, all of it was owned by the state (really powerless taxpayers). Even though the skilled labour, the size of the workforce and the machinery and equipment which encompassed (for that time) every type of industrial and engineering skill along with a substantial design and manufacturing infrastructure that could have been converted and used to produce many totally different, socially useful things, other than bullets and warships, in the end a bunch of factory workers just didn’t have the power, or the support, necessary to do that. That was no reflection on us. At least we tried.
All these sites were privatised shortly after the height of this creative grassroots activity, which originated I must say not from union bureaucracies, but from self-organised workers on the shop floor.
The Stalinist references are a complete non sequitur and just dumb and insulting.
I should say also – the main point of TFM’s post is what to do about people smuggling. What suggestions do people have to deal with that? I thought Jacques’ suggestion was a good one.
This is all getting a bit heated, and like LE, I’ve had other things to do this morning. I’ve just had to delete two people from the comments calling her right to hold a practicing certificate into question on the basis of publishing TFM’s post (which I didn’t read as particularly one way or the other, but more as a melancholy comment on what happens when we don’t monitor the institutions we build, especially state institutions).
May I remind punters of my three fundamental truths:
1. Public policy is hard.
2. To every complex problem there is always a simple solution, and it is always wrong.
3. It is never black and white.
It seems that discovering that some people have way weird sexual proclivities has set the cat among the pigeons. Newsflash: most of the human race has way weird sexual proclivities, it’s just religion/culture/the man teaches us to keep it under control. However, there have always been contexts where the rules evaporate pretty suddenly, and I can say from my own criminal law experience that prisons (and prison-like environments) are one of them. Such is life, we have hangups. So be it.
“But I consoled myself with the thought that lenders were probably better off dealing with someone like me”
Ah yes, I acted on behalf of an institution, Bank, where the (now, then) single lady asked me if I could obtain her some grace, a week. I rang the, at the cost of the lady, of course, Bank and they said from the comfort of distance that divorces these people from reality, that they don’t have to face, the Order was immediate and to act.
She asked me to come back in an hour and left me the names of her children to contact, I thought that was to collect her.
She shot herself. I found her.
Years ago, my life was changed, never again will I present myself in such a position.
She was calm and collected and now I know why.
Also makes me question the ‘justice’ that is often accepted as acceptable by well gatherers.
I should say also – the main point of TFM’s post is what to do about people smuggling.
Yes, I apologize.
Oh Lang, that’s terrible. Brings tears to my eyes. I was always terrified one of my debtors would do that.
I think that institutions do forget that these are people’s lives they are dealing with. The thing is that you can get hardened by some of the people you deal with. I had one debtor who instituted an elaborate charade that she was suffering from a terminal illness, and masqueraded as three different people on the phone. In the end, we uncovered it. But it didn’t change the fact that the next time I came across a debtor who said they had a terminal illness, I would still act with compassion.
No probs Lang.
“So, yeah. Murder, torture, brainwashing and imprisonment for up to 20 years. Sounds like a bit more than “doing it tough”. And you think these people were economic refugees.”
May I suggest you stop emoting and start thinking. A month or so ago one of my partner’s uncles died. His death may have been hastened by the fact he was crippled and unhealthy due to chronic malnutrition suffered during years of internment in a Communist reeducation camp. The thing is, once he was freed from the camp he was by definition no longer suffering political persecution. All he had to do was shut up and keep his head down.
Of course I’m very happy to have my VN partner and many VN friends and relatives, but the insight I have gained by doing so is that the political refugee thing is often little more than booga booga.
I fail to see the problem with the post.
It is consistent with everything that has been published by former detention officers.
Thanks for clarification on legal aspect. I hadn’t thought that through with regard to seeking asylum per se. (That is, it’s not illegal to seek asylum, as opposed to my misguided throw away thought about visas.)
Posey #60 – sheesh, that’s a bit sad, isn’t it, although I almost wish it was the whole truth.
I suspect other, equally psychologically demented reasons … the bad boy thing … being “special”, as in the “only “woman who really “understands” him … the romance of it all, perpetual yearning (well, you can stay pretty hot about someone if you’ve never seen them naked and don’t know how they perform, etc) … the essential fantasy nature of the entire relationship. I think there’s a basket of pretty screwy reasons.
I have zero reason to disbelieve TFM. I was a bit surprised, but that’s only because I’d never thought about it, no reason to.
SL – I have a very dear friend who left home in a leaky boat at the age of 13, on his own, followed by three years in a refugee camp in another country, before gaining asylum in Oz. Twenty one years later he is still trying to get his family out of his country of origin. He has not seen them in all that time. “Family reunion” is another area of heartache and insurmountable legislation for many refugees – it’s certainly not the simple and inevitable process that the public believe. But, that’s a whole other topic.
No, having to shut up and keep one’s head down is exactly what political persecution is. Whether you are actually in an internment camp or merely have the threat or memory of it hanging over you is a secondary question.
On watching television of the “camps” my first sympathy was always to the people doing the “detaining” rather than the detained.
At least the detained had community, if not the best.
Some lessons here are surely that there were people who did a dirty job with some empathy for there fellow humans, I thank them.
Glad it was you and not me!
I have a friend who once worked for a bank, in “collections”. I wondered how someone could do such a n agonising thing?
He explained it was better him than others he new. His empathy was rewarded with the sack, desspite of a record of success at recovering debt.
being guilty of empathy must be soul destroying. This always having in mind he collected from some unprincipled people. he also copt it from unprincipled people!
fluff4
fluff4
“No, having to shut up and keep one’s head down is exactly what political persecution is. Whether you are actually in an internment camp or merely have the threat or memory of it hanging over you is a secondary question.”
Oh for God’s sake. Based on your definition at least 2 billion people would be eligible to claim refugee status as politically persecuted persons- certainly everyone in China would be eligible.
Yes, probably. Maybe we should stop pretending they are not a horrible totalitarian regime and trading with them like they are our best buddies, and start calling a spade a spade?
Of course the real solution to refugee problems is to resolve the underlying problems which cause people to flee in search of a better life.
You can’t stop illegal immigration. All the border controls possible will not stop people trying, many successfully, entering any country in the world and remaining undetected for long periods of time. With all its armed guards, wire fences and attack dogs the US isn’t able to prevent huge numbers of illegal immigrants entering and residing there permanently.
Since even the most draconian border protection will never stop illegal immigration, refugees and asylum seekers – and yes the number is sure to increase in all developed countries – how to deal humanely with this constant known, the movement of people from one place to another thought to offer more opportunities, is the key question; not policy aimed at at stopping it at all costs and punishing those who attempt it. We saw the horrific results of that approach under Howard’s watch.
“Maybe we should stop pretending they are not a horrible totalitarian regime and trading with them like they are our best buddies, and start calling a spade a spade?”
Once again you emote rather than think seriously. If we stopped trading with them hundreds of millions of Chinese would be financially ruined and mass starvation would occur. We would then have a failed state with a huge nuclear arsenal. Everybody would lose.
Your problem is that you subscribe to the cartoonish notion that every global problem has a neat solution and that we in the West are both morally obliged and capable of delivering the solution, if only we were nice enough to try.
I’d prefer to see Australia fix the shithole in its backyard, namely indigenous disadvantage, before trying to save the world.
Spirited debate, it had to drift, the outstanding thing is that mostly civility was carried out.
Then again ,that is the expected.
Kudos for posting this ladies and yes Mr Bartlett’s posts were nasty.We must engage everyone in this debate and sometime we have to listen to things we don’t want to hear.As you were.
OT Helen do you need a care package
Oh well, for the record, I’m with Andrew B. Everything he said was right on the money, and he was only scratching the surface.
So many speculations, prejudices and cozy generalisations; Newspeak (“staff” called the detainees “residents” – obviously not Permanent Residents); hollow “I was the nice guard” stuff, which is immaterial to the main issue; “firm but fair” cheers for the tough boss (actually he was just firm).
Other apparent insights of TFM:
Not all detainees were saints (doh!); people behave badly in detention (it’s sooo stressful for the staff); and cheers for Phil Ruddock on behalf of Fortress Australia, though I don’t see much in TFM’s experience of the camps which particularly qualifies him to offer first-hand conclusions about that.
I don’t blame LE and SL for allowing TFM’s post, and it is an interesting document, but I certainly don’t think much of it. My questions/comments at the foot of the Einfeld comment thread remain pertinent, imho.
Thanks for the post TFM.
Paul, that’s an interesting observation. Maybe Mr Rudd wears a blindfold when he enters negotiations with the Chinese. Mr Rudd berates us for spewing pollutants into the air but he then adopts a sotto voce approach when it comes to Chinese pollution. Maybe theirs is a mild, less harmful type.
What amazes me about refugees, both genuine and non-genuine, and asylum shoppers is the lack of standards they have to meet compared to the locals. Most of them arrive on our shores without any paperwork and if their application to stay is successful they are eligible for welfare. Welfare recipients are given about 21 days to open a bank account in order to receive payments. How does one open a bank account without any paperwork (I think you have to score 100 points…driver licence, passport etc)? At some of the detention centres a new arrival can have his arse in a dentist’s chair in a matter of days after arrival. There is no upper limit on the dental treatment he or she may receive. A TPI pensioner can only receive one dental crown (about $645) per calendar year. Our once embarrassing White Australia Policy, heavily associated with racism, would seem to be the goal of some of the detainees so how can we rid ourselves of the racism tag when we are importing racists? Why can’t we run a case in court relying merely on our say-so? If you go to court on a substantial matter you will be asked to provide evidence…proof. Unless your name is Einfeld no judge is just going to accept your word. We had one high court case dealing with two homosexual Sri Lankans who feared violence from other villagers if they were sent home. Proof? They said so, so it must be true. Contrast that with an incident of violence that happened very recently. The CCTV footage is required along with eye witness accounts if the matter is to go forward. Why not get someone to stand up in court and point to the villains and say ‘they did it’? Why should standards of evidence be so malleable?
In conclusion, what are we to make of the 200 poor sods currently living at Woomera? The locals are subjected to the harshness and isolation in that ‘hot desert location.’ True, there is no razor wire but the sheer isolation acts as their razor wire. Why no concern for their welfare?
Hi Tal (and sorry about the OT for everyone else), let me know when you arrive in Blighty and we’ll catch up. I’m in Scotland from April 8 for a couple of weeks, but otherwise am in Oxford. You can get most Aussie things here now, but some nice Aussie honey wouldn’t go astray — honey here has no taste.
marcellous
Considering you post on the Einfeld thread took the well worn route of “detention center officers = Nazis” I shouldn’t worry to much about replying to you. You have made you camp in the morally pure, but not taking a hard decision area.
Hers a “nasty officer story for you then since only devoting about 1/2 of my article pointing out errors and problems weren’t enough for you.
In my 4 years at PH I used a baton exactly once.
I was in well over 20 incidents where we kitted up and stood around as people threw rocks at us. I call that rather restrained.
I never used a closed hand on a detainee, all efforts at control of violent/ property damaging people were aimed at restraining with the least damage to either myself or the detainee.
And just out of interest what group name do you think officers should have used for detainees? Residents was chosen as the least judgmental, even failed applicants were still called the same general term.
I have spent thousands of hours talking with detainees, there were blokes Id have let out in a minute and there are others who were released who will make bad residents of Australia.
Heres a use of force I authorized as shift boss one night shift.
Resident a had received a notification his initial application had been turned down, he took this badly and was placed under suicide watch (still in the compound but to be sighted by an officer every 1/2 hour).
He became more distressed as the night progressed and a small group of his friends indicated to me they were sure he would attempt self harm before the morning.
I asked a how he was and he indicated he wanted to die and we should leave him alone to do so.
I brought him up to the control room along with another detainee “b” a friend of his with good English.
I asked a to stay overnight in an observation room as we were concerned for his safety. He agreed. I asked a to change into the suicide smock (a one piece tear proof garment) which he refused to do. This led to over 4 hours of talking to a via b interpreting to try to get him to change. This was necessary as it was not unknown for detainees to hide the blades of razors in their everyday clothing.
After spending the 4 hours trying to get this done peacefully I called center management and asked to use force, as I was concerned the detainee was a serious risk to himself.
Permission was given and myself and 2 other officers used force to remove a’s clothing.
It was done not out of bloody mindedness but because I was seriously concerned this bloke would self harm. I dealt with large numbers of detainees who were on watch, that’s the only man (while I was shifty)
I was ever concerned enough about to take those steps.
Why did I take the job? It was just a job, then after a while you stay to help look after your workmates. You can also waste a lot of time trying to get changes made to improve things.
Why bring up the reader? The “caring classes” endless tying to hype immigration detention into a modern day Belsen is frankly ludicrous.
People were held in administrative detention until they were either found to be refugees, and released, or found NOT TO BE REFUGEES and held for deportation.
To conflate that to the Nazis is beneath contempt.
Crushed!
Frollicker, thanks for sharing these experiences. This is by far the most informative piece I’ve ever read on detention centres. It’s disturbing to see that our policies on these things are influenced by both media and policy makers who seem to neck and neck as to who is the most incompetent.
Frollicker
Great post. Confronting and bracing, and bloody necessary reading.
But I had to have a really long bath after reading Andrew Bartlett’s bile, especially when it is recalled that the ALP built the concentration camps due to Luvvies like Bartlett, and their continual Stuff-White-People-Like tanties kept Howard in power for 372 years.
Thanks Andrew.
There’s a confusing typo: “(in that the staff members quite [sic] before they entered into a relationship).”
Thanks for an interesting read. I urge you to put your name to it and have it published mainstream.
Thanks, a great read and consistent with my experience of immigration in several countries around the world.
It would be funny watching some peoples’ knees jerking if the topic were less serious.
I also agree with the LDP policy in this area, with some minor modifications.
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[...] are way, way late to this discussion but a link from kae has alerted us to this sensational article by a former immigration detention officer at Port Hedland in north western Australia. It is [...]