Michael McGuire: The way refugees are used as political footballs by cardboard hardmen like Peter Dutton is shameful, says Michael McGuire

The way refugees are used as political footballs by cardboard hardmen like Home Affairs Minister Peter Dutton is shameful, writes Michael McGuire.

There is possibly something about being an immigrant to Australia that keeps you wanting to believe in the good of the place, even as the evidence mounts that there is something deeply wrong with crucial aspects of how the place is run and which direction it is going.

As immigrants, we came to Australia in the belief it was a place to build a better life. As the cliche goes, for many immigrants, Australia was the “land of opportunity’’. It’s hard to entirely abandon the sense of optimism, the idea of Australia that you feel when you land for the first time.

For me, that was almost 40 years ago now. Almost 80 per cent of my life has been lived in Australia, so I’m pretty much a local these days. Though some may argue that point.

I’m an immigrant, not a refugee, though we did flee Margaret Thatcher’s Britain in 1981, so there may not be that much difference.

But refugees come to Australia for the same reason my family did all those years ago. To build a better life. To give their children more opportunity, more freedom.

You can argue legalities if you like. We came by plane rather than by boat, after going through all the regular channels. A process much easier if you live in Britain, rather than, say, Sri Lanka, Iraq or Afghanistan.

Of course, neither is there anything illegal about seeking asylum in Australia. It’s a basic human right. Your mode of transport is neither here nor there, despite the Federal Government’s marketing spin that now labels asylum seekers as “illegal maritime arrivals”.

How we treat refugees, often among the poorest, most desperate, vulnerable people on Earth, is a continuing stain on our country. The way refugees are used as political footballs by cardboard hardmen like Home Affairs Minister Peter Dutton, acting Immigration Minister Alan Tudge and Prime Minister Scott Morrison is shameful.

The general silence of the Labor Party on the issue shows a weakness that places politics above humanity.

Family picture from March 2018 when Kopika was four and Tharunicaa two, with their parents Priya and Nades.

Still, at least Opposition Leader Anthony Albanese got it right last year when he said the imprisonment of a family of Tamil asylum seekers on Christmas Island was “publicly funded cruelty’’.

There is no end of terrible stories when it comes to Australia’s treatment of refugees, but the treatment of husband and wife Nades and Priya, their two children, five-year-old Kopika and three-year-old Tharunicaa is still genuinely shocking. Nades and Priya arrived separately in Australia in 2012 and 2013. They are Tamils who faced persecution in Sri Lanka.

Nades, like many young Tamil men, had links to the separatists of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam. According to the UN, Tamils still face persecution in Sri Lanka.

Priya left the country for India after saying her fiance and five men from her village were burned alive during the civil war.

The pair met in Australia, fell in love, moved to the central Queensland town of Biloela, settled in well to the local community and had their two daughters. In March 2018, a day after Priya’s bridging visa expired, the Australian Border Force turned up before dawn, grabbed the family and took them to a Melbourne detention centre. From there, it’s been a long, complicated, painful legal process. The government has attempted to deport the family several times. They were moved last year to Christmas Island, where they are the only asylum seekers in detention. They live in a demountable with one bedroom and one living area.

Guards follow Kopika to the local school. As of October 2019, the government has spent $4.5m keeping the family locked up. The family is only still here because it’s awaiting the outcome of a case that will determine whether Tharunicaa was denied procedural fairness.

Yet Dutton could end it all right now through use of ministerial discretion. The same way he did when he granted tourist visas to European au pairs.

Christmas is upon us. A time for giving, a time for compassion. A time to remember that not long after Jesus was born, he and his family also became refugees.