Government claims it is leading the way in releasing children from detention … In fact, the Abbott government held children in detention more than six times longer than Labor … Release only speeded-up after senators blackmailed to pass amendments to the Migration Act … A look at the HRC’s disturbing findings 

Prof. Gillian Triggs and the Human Rights Commission have attracted thunderbolts aplenty, but in the process relatively little has actually been written about the report into the “Forgotten Children” in immigration detention.  

The report had been with the attorney general since November 11 last year and he chose to wait to the last possible day before he was required to table it (Feb 11). 

Former and present immigration ministers, Scott Morrison and Peter Dutton, have now claimed the report is “out of date”. 

In November 2014 the government was trying to secure the passage of amendments to the Migration Act and the Maritime Powers Act – amendments which changed the definition of refugee and gave the minister extraordinary powers to hold, to refoule, to decide the outcome of asylum applications and, in the process, to shred Australia’s international obligations.  

The bargaining chip used by minister Morrison was that children in detention on Christmas Island, and there were about 110 of them, would be granted TPVs if the legislation got through the senate. This is why the last hold-out senator, Ricky Muir from the Motoring Enthusiasts Party, voted for the amendments. 

Muir said it was a choice between a “bad decision and a worse decision”. The minister was using the children as pawns, when he could have removed them from detention on bridging visas at any time after taking over the portfolio in September 2013. 

On Monday (Feb. 16) Malcolm Turnbull appeared on the ABC’s Q&A and claimed that the Coalition has been morally virtuous players, dedicated to the release of children from immigration detention.  

Those figures are incorrect, because they do not account for 119 children in detention on Nauru. 

The department of immigration says the the number of children still in detention is 252. Presumably that includes the mainland and Christmas Island. There are no children at the moment on Manus Island as that camp is for adult males. 

You can see the department of immigration’s figures here:  

When the HRC commenced its investigation five months after the election of the Abbott government, there were about 1,106 children in Australia’s immigration detention system. 

Nine months after the Abbott government took office the figures looked like this:

• 775 children were held in locked immigration detention facilities in Australian territories;
• 208 children were held in Nauru;
• 54 children were unaccompanied; 
• 128 babies were born and living inside detention centres;
• 304 children held in Christmas Island, as of the 31 of March 2014, were subject to be shipped to Nauru.

The report found as of June 30 last year the average length of time spent by a child in immigration detention was 350 days. A year earlier that figure had been 72 days. 

At the time the report went to the government in November the average length of time children were being held in detention had blown out to 438 days (over 14 months). 

Under the Coalition, contrary to Turnbull’s heroic claim on Q&A about the Coalition’s humane policies, Scott Morrison in fact had been consciously lengthening the time children were being detained.

On average they were being held six times longer than the lowest period of detention under Labor. 

The release from onshore detention centres and Christmas Island only geared-up in earnest after the blackmail amendments to the Migration Act were passed in December last year. 

Here’s what happened. In October 2014 there were 726 children in immigration detention; November it went down to 711 and by the end of December it had reduced to 555. A 24 percent reduction in three months. 

Over the same period the average number of days children were held increased from 426 days to 438 days. 

Even when the children were transferred to the community they were on temporary protection visas and can sent back to where they came from whenever the government chooses. 

The government is not reporting the release of any children from Nauru, probably because there are none. Indeed, children who are moved to Australia for medical treatment are then returned to Nauru for indefinite detention.

It is believed from other sources that some children removed from the mainland and Christmas Island have been shipped to Nauru. The government is not publishing figures relating to the camps on Nauru. 

There was another incentive for the government to speed things up and that was the fact that the HRC’s report was sitting on George Brandis desk and by law had to be released by February 12 at the latest. 

In the three months the report was available to the government, but not to the public, the government shipped out 65 percent of the children held in immigration detention (Nauru excluded). 

The mandatory prolonged detention of children is a violation of international law under The Convention on the Rights of the Child and The International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights.

Many of these “unlawful non-citizens” arriving in Australia have already experienced significant trauma and once in Australia’s care become acutely aware of the negative perceptions existing in the Australian community. 

“We weren’t poor in our country. We weren’t hungry, homeless, jobless and illiterate. We immigrate because we had no freedom.”
(13-year old boy, Nauru Regional Processing Centre, May 2014). 

The commission found that the uncertain future facing asylum seekers is a major cause of despair and depression. This from an unaccompanied 17-year old at Phosphate Hill Detention Centre: 

“My hope finished now. I don’t have any hope. I feel I will die in detention.” 

The report cites an Australian government study that links the time in detention with rates of mental illnesses. 

“Living here is hard. The tension in here and the tension from home. Too much sad[ness] … whenever I call home they ask when I will be released. I tell them Inshalla (God willing) … Many people here are hurting themselves. Boys cutting hands, arms … I was thinking about that.” 
(Unaccompanied child, Christmas Island, March 4, 2014.)

The extent to which children self-harm is a clear measure of mental debilitation. The inquiry found:

• 128 children in detention engaged in actual self-harm. 
• 171 children threatened self-harm.
• Children younger than the age of 10 are being placed on a moderate to high risk watch list.
• This included three attempted hangings and five attempts of self-strangulation, self-inflected cuts, repeated head banging, and consumption of toxic substances such as insect repellent.

The incidence of self-harm is higher among teenagers and unaccompanied children who have no family support.

“I don’t care about a visa any more. I want to finish everything. My life is very difficult. I don’t understand why I am here. I am beginning to feel crazy; my situation is very bad and getting worse. I am alone, no family, nobody here.”
(17-year old unaccompanied child, Melbourne Detention Centre, May 7, 2014.)

The report said that younger children growing-up in detention centres have developmental problems not usually found among children living in the community. They often still wet the bed, suffer from night terrors and are prone to random emotional outbursts.

The parents lose authority and struggle to maintain family cohesion, while children are exposed to parents being undermined and countermanded by the authorities. 

The report also presented case studies of women who had given birth inside detention facilities. They frequently feel they cannot adequately provide for their newborn. Women with severe mental illnesses in these conditions have been unable to form proper attachments with their infants.  

A visitor to the Melbourne Detention Centre said:

“The mothers anguish over their babies but are unable to lift themselves out of the deep depression.”

After a peaceful protest on Christmas Island had gone awry a mother of an 11-month old baby said:

“After they read me my rights again I tried to kill myself. I put a rope around my neck, but a Serco guard caught me before I could finish. He was from the single male camp and said to me, ‘If you want to kill yourself I’ll tell you a better way’.”

Quite apart from mental illness, a high degree of physical violence is prevalent in the camps. The HRC found:

• 57 serious assaults; 
• 233 assaults involving children;
• 33 incidents of reported sexual assault, the majority involving children. 

The inquiry received evidence that the most basic needs are scarce in Nauru. Detainees are forced to take 30-second showers and use overflowing toilets covered in faeces. The lack of water on Nauru is most concerning given the hot conditions.  

Elizabeth Elliott, Professor of Pediatrics and Child Health, who accompanied the inquiry team to Christmas Island in July 2014 said: 

“Young children are vulnerable to a range of infectious diseases and in these overcrowded conditions infections spread quickly.”

The now closed Aqua and Lilac detention centres on Christmas Island shared common bathroom facilities. Parents complained that it was impossible to toilet-train children when four bathrooms were shared between 500 people. The cramped accommodation also meant there was no space for babies to learn to crawl or walk. 

“My child is so scared she can’t play with other children. She can’t play with her own baby sister. She weeps at noise. She still wakes up at 12.00 am – every night at 12 she starts weeping … in detention she would wake up at 12 screaming, the head count would terrify her.”
(Parent of two-year old child, Community Interview, conducted by phone, June 12, 2014.)

There is also a lack of recreational activities and facilities. Parents also reported that when children play outside the camps they are often ostracised by children in the local community.

A mother told the HRC:

“I went with my five year old son to the recreation centre. They frisked us to check we have not stolen toys. It was degrading so we prefer not to go.”  

Dehumanisation is a common theme. A submission from the child rights NGO, ChilOut, said that by way of identification “children in detention respond to their boat ID numbers”.

One unaccompanied 17-year old detained on Christmas Island said, “I feel like a killer when they use my boat number”.  

The children on Christmas Island did not have access to education for over year and need special assistance to catch-up with school work. 

Where there are facilities for studying, the environment is difficult for sustained concentration and application.

“I want to study more; I can’t study when I am living here.”
(14-year old girl, Wickham Point Detention Centre, Darwin, April 11, 2014.)

Even after they are settled in the community the report found children continue to show signs of post-traumatic stress. 

A resettled mother said, referring to her young daughter: 

“She now sleeps with her father because she is very frightened of the police … She can’t believe that she is free. She thinks if she does something wrong, she will go back to detention.” 

Associate Professor of Paediatrics, Karen Zwi reported:

“Many of them will have ongoing mental health issues like anxiety, post-traumatic stress of some description. They may well have developmental delay. I think it’s very hard to address that after the fact.”

Finally, here’s a 13-year old at the Blaydin Detention Centre in Darwin, on April 12, 2014: 

“I left my country. I came to have a better future, not to sit in a prison. If I remain in this prison, I will not have a good future. I came to become a good man in the future to help poor people … I am tired of life. I cannot wait much longer. What will happen to us? What are we guilty of? What have we done to be imprisoned?

I’m just a kid, I haven’t done anything wrong. They are putting me in a jail. We can’t talk with Australian people.”