A bill to allow for asylum seeker on Nauru and Manus Island to be transferred to Australia for medical and psychiatric treatment has passed both Houses. How will it change things for those detained?
Morrison told a news conference cabinet’s national security committee had met early Tuesday to discuss the contingency planning already in train in anticipation of the bill’s passage.
The government will turn up the dial by announcing “contingency plans” against fresh arrivals. Morrison is already moving on to the claim that Shorten couldn’t be trusted to be strong on turnbacks.
The government has suffered a historic defeat in the House of Representatives, with Labor and crossbenchers passing the legislation facilitating medical transfers from Manus and Nauru by 75-74.
Australia’s immigration department doesn’t keep a record of the number of people applying for asylum at airports. This means there is no oversight over the treatment of those seeking protection.
After Shorten was briefed by security officials and with enormous political pressure coming from the government, Labor moved back from its support of the bill as it has come out of the Senate.
Scott Morrison says the government will not shift from outright
opposition to the bill, which is based on a proposal originally coming from independent Kerryn Phelps but subsequently refined.
If the government feels it is on the rack over the amendments, Labor also is in an awkward position, and at least one of the independents finds herself in the spotlight.
A. Naomi Paik, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
Alleged ‘enemy combatants’ held at Guantánamo Bay who went on hunger strikes to protest their indefinite detention were force-fed by the US military. Today, ICE is force-feeding immigrant detainees.
Morrison declares the amendments, based on a proposal from independent Kerryn Phelps, would leave the government powerless to stop the entry of a paedophile, rapist or murderer.
Scott Morrison and David Coleman said: “There are now only four asylum seeker children on Nauru and they have all been approved for departure to the United States of America with their families”.
Behrouz Boochani, an asylum seeker currently detained on Manus Island, has won Australia’s richest literary prize. The win commands the question, ‘what makes an Australian writer?’
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