The federal government's offshore detention policy, an expedient extension of that of its Labor predecessor, not only falls far short of humanitarian and international legal standards, but of the basic financial rectitude that ought to underpin the expenditure of taxpayers' money.
The damaging and unending internment on Nauru and on Papua New Guinea's Manus Island of hundreds of vulnerable people fleeing persecution and worse is, in other words, not only immoral, but a cavalier misuse of billions of dollars of scarce public funds.
We know this because the people's financial watchdog, the Commonwealth auditor, in recent days released a report showing breaches by the government and its bureaucrats of fundamental rules governing spending.
This compounds the sheer fiscal stupidity of a policy that costs taxpayers $500,000 a year to keep a refugee – and as many as 90 per cent of the relatively small number of asylum seekers who have arrived by boat in recent years are proven to be genuine refugees – in these cruel offshore camps, as against $12,000 to process a person onshore in the community.
The Australian National Audit Office's damning assessment is that the Immigration Department has "fallen well short" of expected standards in its management of contracts for detention facilities on Manus Island and Nauru. While we do not claim corruption has occurred, the degree of ineptitude and/or recklessness uncovered creates a fertile environment for dishonesty and a lack of probity.
The debacle beggars belief. The report found that of $2.3 billion paid over 40 months, $1.1 billion was approved without appropriate authorisation.
A further $1.1 billion was paid with "no departmental record" of who had authorised the transfers. The watchdog concluded the contracts' lack of effective guidelines and management mechanisms stemmed in part from the "great haste" with which the detention centres were established in 2012-13.
The Department of Immigration and Border Protection even failed to inform the Australian government's self-managed insurance fund, Comcover, about a new $75 million facility in Nauru – so the building was not insured when it burnt down in a riot in 2013, within weeks of being commissioned.
It gets worse. The audit office delivered a similarly shocking report back in September, identifying "serious and persistent deficiencies" in the department's procurement of garrison support and welfare services for the centres.
With risible understatement, the feckless department is now acknowledging on its website that "its decision-making processes in this complex and rapidly evolving environment may not have been adequately documented". Quite. And adding irony to injury, the audit itself cost taxpayers $1.5 million.
There were 871 people detained on Manus Island and 383 on Nauru at the end of November. More live now in the struggling Nauruan community. They should all be brought to Australia, where they can be processed quickly and safely.
In any case, Papua New Guinea's highest court almost a year ago declared the Manus Island centre unconstitutional, so the situation is unsustainable. The refugee issue is difficult and complex; were there a ready solution it would have been implemented long ago.
Preventing people from perishing at sea is a noble aim. Well-resourced regional processing centres should be set up, removing the incentive to get on boats. The situation will be mitigated, but not solved, should incoming US President Donald Trump uphold an agreement for his nation to accept some of the refugees. But our government must shut these disgraceful centres.
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