Transcript

LEIGH SALES, PRESENTER: The Gillard Government faces a challenge this week to get its offshore processing policy through the Lower House of the Parliament. If it can't, it'll be the first time since 1929 that a Federal Government has lost a vote in the House of Representatives.

If the impasse continues, asylum seeker boat arrivals may escalate, and as Peter McCutcheon reports, that would place Australia's already-strained system of mandatory onshore detention under even greater pressure.

PETER MCCUTCHEON, REPORTER: Desperation and mandatory detention have been an explosive mix. Riots this year on Christmas Island and at Villawood in Sydney showed the system at its very worst.

But Immigration detention doesn't always have to be this way.

This is an alternative. The Hotham Mission in Melbourne is one of a growing number of non-government organisations that handle asylum seekers in so-called community detention.

CAZ COLEMAN, ASYLUM CONSULTANT: We expect that we could expand community detention further than what it currently is.

PETER MCCUTCHEON: It's difficult to predict the consequences of Australia stopping all offshore processing of asylum seekers, but one thing is certain: Australia faces new challenges as to how it processes refugee claims onshore.

LOUISE NEWMAN, PSYCHIATRIST: What's been very concerning is that the whole debate about onshore or offshore processing has really focused on the politics of deterrence rather than looking at the pragmatics of what we're to do with the people who do arrive here.

PETER MCCUTCHEON: One of the key elements of Australia's border control system was introduced in 1992. Mandatory detention of asylum seekers arriving by boat was a Keating Government initiative with the express purpose of deterrence.

GERRY HAND, IMMIGRATION MINISTER (archive footage, 1992): Now this puts it all beyond doubt, very clear, that if you come here and wanna come to Australia, you'll have to enter in a proper way.

PETER MCCUTCHEON: Nearly a decade later, another deterrent was introduced by the Howard Government, the so-called Pacific Solution, involving processing of refugee claims offshore. But with a parliamentary deadlock, processing offshore may be off the agenda.

CHRIS BOWEN, IMMIGRATION MINISTER (Last month): Clearly, if you don't have that, then, yes, you are removing the disincentive to come to Australia by boat.

CHRIS UHLMANN: And then would mandatory have to be reconsidered?

CHRIS BOWEN: Well, look, I'm not gonna get into those hypotheticals yet.

PETER MCCUTCHEON: But many in the refugee sector do want to get into hypotheticals.

LOUISE NEWMAN: I would very much hope that we could turn this around and use it as an opportunity for a radical rethink of the policy of mandatory detention.

PETER MCCUTCHEON: Child psychiatrist Dr Louise Newnan is the convenor of the Alliance of Health Professionals for asylum seekers and also sits on an Immigration Department advisory panel.

LOUISE NEWMAN: We have a very difficult situation within detention with people self-harming, increasing levels of distress, we've had five suicides since September of last year, we have increasing levels of psychiatric disorder, we have great difficulties in providing mental health and health services.

PETER MCCUTCHEON: The Commonwealth Ombudsman Allan Asher recently announced an inquiry into these issues and has questioned the efficiency of remote detention centres.

ALLAN ASHER, COMMONWEALTH OMBUDSMAN: The problem of detention in some of the very remote high-security, high-cost areas comes at a very, very high price. The price of a financial one to Australian taxpayers and the provision of services, being able to resupply, say, Christmas Island and providing staff up there and interpreter services, mental health issues and all of those are just exacerbated when they're way, way away from urban centres.

PETER MCCUTCHEON: In a recent submission to a parliamentary inquiry Mr Asher recommended greater use of what he called less restrictive options for detention.

ALLAN ASHER: The whole notion of detention is a much broader concept than most people realise.

PETER MCCUTCHEON: And indeed the Gillard Government did announce an expansion of a softer form of detention, residents' determination or community detention, late last year.

CAZ COLEMAN: It basically means those people must remain in that place that they are designated, that house, if you like, but otherwise they have freedom of movement in the community.

PETER MCCUTCHEON: This program was first introduced by the Howard Government in 2005, but over the past 11 months it's gone from a few dozen to more than a thousand vulnerable people and unaccompanied minors.

ALLAN ASHER: We say that it is a good policy and it's being implemented well and having good results.

CAZ COLEMAN: It's been a significant challenge to increase that number over a short period of time, and the Australian Red Cross who's been the key contractor in that role, has done an excellent job in a very short period of time.

PETER MCCUTCHEON: Caz Coleman is an asylum policy consultant who also sits on an advisory panel to the Immigration Minister. She believes the community detention program can be expanded, although there are limits.

CAZ COLEMAN: It's difficult to tell at this stage how much further it could expand without a detrimental effect on the program, or, for instance, a detrimental effect on others, low-income families, perhaps the homelessness. --

PETER MCCUTCHEON: There are nearly 6,000 people in Immigration detention in Australia at the moment. The Immigration Department expects there could well be an increase in boat arrivals in the short term at least. But whatever happens, there is already considerable pressure to change Immigration detention on Australian soil.

LOUISE NEWMAN: If we assume that there might be some increase, and I think it would be very foolish to actually put numbers on this at the moment, if there were to be an influx of boat arrivals, then we do need and we will have a pressing need to review the length of time that people might need to spend in a detention facility and really ramp up and look in a practical way at what alternatives to detention centres there are in the community.

LEIGH SALES: And the vote in the House of Representatives on offshore processing is expected on Thursday, if all goes according to plan.