LIVES will be saved as the result of yesterday’s decision by the High Court to dismiss a challenge to Australia’s offshore asylum seeker detention centres policy.
In finding the Australian Government has a legal right to operate the centres on Nauru and Manus Island, the court has prevented what could have been a return to the failed policies of Labor governments.
Under Labor, 51,000 asylum seekers arrived by sea, including 8400 children.
Not only was the policy a failure as thousands of asylum seekers, including women and children, were kept in detention in Australia, at least 1200 lives were lost at sea in rickety boats.
The people smugglers’ business collapsed when the Abbott government brought in its Sovereign Borders policy. The boats stopped coming and the Labor Party under Opposition Leader Bill Shorten came to accept that stopping the boats saved lives and Labor would follow a similar policy in government.
Legal activists have since challenged the policy of sending asylum seekers to offshore detention centres and yesterday’s decision by the High Court centred on a Bangladeshi woman who was sent to Nauru, but suffered pregnancy issues for which she was treated in Australia, where her baby was born.
While there may be other cases brought before the courts, the decision makes it unlikely they will succeed. This is an emotionally charged issue but it cannot be denied that no lives have been lost by drowning since the boats stopped coming.
Australia is a compassionate country that respects its obligations under the UN Convention on Refugees and the success of its policy in turning back the people smugglers’ boats must be measured against the appalling loss as asylum seekers try to reach European countries by boat.
While to some the Australian Government’s policy seems harsh, it has saved hundreds of lives based on the drownings when boats arrived on a daily basis. Many also sank on the way.
A majority of the High Court found the current government arrangements were valid under the Constitution, with Justice Michelle Gordon, its most recent appointment, the sole dissenting voice.
A group of 267 asylum seekers, including 54 children and 37 babies, currently in Australia may be sent back to Nauru following the High Court ruling.
One of the children facing return to Nauru is a five-year-old boy alleged to have been raped at the detention centre; however, Immigration Minister Peter Dutton says he will take any concerns from doctors about the boy’s welfare into consideration.
The most vocal of opponents to offshore detention are the Greens, but they have no policy. It is one thing for Greens politicians to wring their hands, but another to offer no solution to a complex humanitarian problem.
Australia has warned asylum seekers that if they try to get to Australia on a people smuggler’s boat, they will not be allowed to settle here under any circumstances.
The policy is the right one. It works. It has saved countless lives and will continue to do so. Source: Herald Sun
