Sarah Stephen
At its height between 1999 and 2001, the immigration detention business was very lucrative, with up to 3000 asylum seekers imprisoned at one time. But the current operator, Global Solutions Ltd (GSL), is facing lean times.
Since 2001, three detention centres have been closed and, as of April 9, there were only 970 people in detention. Maximum capacity is currently 2355, and this will increase by 800 when the new centre on Christmas Island is completed.
"With all those beds empty, taxpayers may well ask how the government is going to get its $300 million worth from GSL's three-year contract and what lies ahead for the company when its contract expires in 2007", wrote Julie Macken in the March 30 Australian Financial Review. "A key to GSL's future will be how successfully the government beefs up the hunt for visa overstayers, and how extensively GSL detention facilities are used as a staging post for criminals facing deportation... If numbers of detainees continue to fall and people are moved in and out quickly, it stands to reason that the next contract may not be as profitable for GSL as the current one."
The detention of a number of school-age children and their parents in the past few months matches a pattern of increasing raids and round-ups of visa overstayers and unauthorised workers, with at least 283 people being detained over the last three months.
There are many cases of unnecessary detention of asylum seekers who have been living in the general community and following all the rules. An example is the Kumar family, living and working in Dubbo while waiting for their asylum claim to be processed.
Navindra Kumar moved to Australia from Fiji on a student visa in 2001, before applying for a protection visa because the coup in Fiji in 2000 that ousted prime minister Mahendra Chaudhry had led to a state of persecution of people of Indian origin.
Navindra and Angeline Kumar have three children: Jocelyn, 14, Alvin, 12 (both of whom were attending Dubbo College South Campus), and two-year-old Justin, who was born at Dubbo Base Hospital.
On March 4, the Kumar house was raided by immigration officials who insisted that the whole family needed to come with them on the five-hour drive to Sydney to have their visas renewed. "They said they were taking us to get a bridging visa in Parramatta", Navindra told Dubbo's local newspaper, the March 23 Dubbo Daily Liberal. "But they lied to us."
The family's incarceration has taken its toll on 14-year-old Chloe Singh, a close friend of Jocelyn's, and Jocelyn's other friends at Dubbo College South Campus. "I was used to going to a meeting spot and meeting up with her and our friends", Singh told the April 6 Daily Liberal. "But every time I step foot in school I break down in tears."
Singh started a petition campaign in the local community, and within two weeks had 500 signatures. "I feel really proud of my community and really happy they're willing to support the family", she said.
The immigration department has since told the Kumar family that their previous bridging visa had lapsed, but Navindra Kumar insists they were not informed that their visa, which was issued in October 2003, had expired. "We've had no notification or warning", he told the Daily Liberal. "There was no expiry date on the visa."
The family faced the Migration Review Tribunal on March 21 and were told they would need to apply to the Federal Court for a new visa. Jocelyn and Alvin have been forbidden from attending the high school across the road from the Villawood detention centre.
Is this a case of a family being unnecessarily detained simply to fill empty beds in a detention centre?
From Green Left Weekly, April 20, 2005.
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