Socialist Alliance opposes refugee detention centre at Pontville, calls for community-based processing and housing of refugees.
15 April 2011
The Hobart branch of the Socialist Alliance was angered to hear of the plans to build a refugee detention camp in Pontville , Tasmania because we oppose mandatory detention of refugees. We call on the federal government to use community-based processing and settlement alternatives that respect human rights. “We want to welcome refugees into the state and into our communities, not see them locked up behind barbed wire”, said Jenny Forward, Socialist Alliance’s refugee spokesperson.
“Mandatory detention is inhumane and breaches fundamental human rights. The treatment of asylum seekers in this country has been shameful and we do not want our state to continue this legacy. The detention process has resulted in the intensification of trauma and irreparable mental health issues. Furthermore the entrustment of the detention centres to a privatised company, Serco, shamelessly prioritises corporate profit over human lives”, Forward said.
The suicide of Mohammed Asif Atay in Curtin detention centre on March 28 was the sixth known refugee to die in detention in the past seven months. Victoria Martin-Iverson from the Refugee Rights Action Network (RRAN) in Perth said she was told there was a suicide attempt every day at the Christmas Island detention centre.
Socialist Alliance is pleased to hear that there are plans to house women and children in the community, but we call on the government to also treat the 400 men who will be imprisoned at Pontville in the same way. “They do not need to be kept under 24 hour guard while their applications are assessed. The Kosovo refugees were not locked up in this way – they were free to come and go at will - so neither should these current refugees be locked up,” Forward said.
Refugees are not criminals. Mandatory detention was only brought into effect in Australia in 1994. Australia is the only developed country in the world that detains asylum seekers who arrive without a valid visa. "Understandably some in the Tasmanian community resent that $15 million will be spent on preparing the detention centre at Pontville when many public services are facing cut backs. The Asylum Seeker Resource Centre states that it is widely recognised by the UNHCR, an Australian parliamentary enquiry into the cost of detention centres and DIAC that community arrangements are far more cost effective than a detention centre," Forward said.
“We support the protests that will be held by refugee advocates at the Curtin, Villawood and Maribyrnong detention centres over the Easter weekend to call for an end to mandatory detention. In summary, we would welcome a project for housing new migrants and refugees in Tasmania but we oppose the building of yet another refugee detention camp”, Forward said.
