James Morrow: Labor’s soft touch on our borders has a high cost
The latest round of revelations surrounding Labor’s bungling of the infamous NZYQ High Court decision is terrible timing for a government that had been hoping to keep border security off the radar, writes James Morrow.
Opinion
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With an election likely days away from officially being called, the last thing Prime Minister Anthony Albanese wants is a fight over border security.
Yet that may be what he gets with the latest round of revelations surrounding Labor’s bungling of the infamous NZYQ decision.
When the High Court handed down the NZYQ decision in 2023 forcing the government to release around 280 criminal non-citizens from immigration detention who couldn’t for a variety of reasons be deported, it seemed to confirm the worst about Labor.
Not only did it seem to underline the perception that Labor is always weak on borders, but given the fact the court had telegraphed its thinking well in advance of the judgment giving the government time to come up with a plan (it didn’t) it also suggested that Prime Minister Anthony Albanese was once again passive, reactive, and always getting caught on the back foot.
Two ministers, Clare O’Neil and Andrew Giles, lost their home affairs and immigration portfolios (though why Giles, who got his start in public life arguing on behalf of the Tampa refugees, was ever allowed near a border portfolio remains a mystery).
And now we know even more about the financial – and human – cost of this debacle.
Put aside the $100 million in taxpayer funds the government has spent trying to clean up this mess, or the fact that the released men were all trousering an extra $1000 fortnightly “special benefits payment”, again courtesy of you and me.
Galling, yes, but this is mere sofa change when compared to, for example, the NDIS, which is rorted to a figure many times that.
Instead, the real disaster here is that around 90 members of the NZYQ cohort (remember, too, that the original NZYQ was in prison for child sex crimes) released by the court have been charged with new criminal offences since their release, with at least 17 already copping custodial sentences.
Despite the fact that this NZQY cohort included 14 individuals with pre-existing convictions for murder or attempted murder, the government has apparently filed precisely zero applications for preventive detention.
Instead, we’ve been told that ankle monitors and curfews would do the job.
Clearly not.
Shocking, yes, though not unexpected.
And ultimately terrible timing for a government that had been hoping to keep border security off the radar screen.
Thus far, the upcoming election contest was mostly defined around set piece roles for both Albanese and Peter Dutton, one doling out promises around Medicare and health clinics, the other one pushing for more F-35s.
The re-emergence of this story will only remind voters of Labor’s pattern on the subject at a time when global worries about migration are at an all-time high.
It will also be a reminder that beyond NZYQ, Labor has been far too sympathetic to criminals from overseas, many of whom were allowed to stay in Australia and not be deported despite committing terrible crimes simply because of the “strength, nature and duration of (their) ties to Australia”.
These included criminals such as Emmanuel Saki, whose visa had been cancelled over an “extensive criminal record” that included choking the mother of one of his children.
Yet, following the Albanese government’s advice, Sake was allowed to stay and subsequently was alleged to have murdered a 22 year old in Brisbane.
Others who were allowed to stay because of the government’s (now amended) advice, known as Ministerial Direction 99, included a serial rapist with 25 alleged victims, a kiddie porn offender caught with “some of the worst child abuse material in the world”, and at least one convicted rapist.
In another absurd case, again influenced by Direction 99, a Sudanese migrant with a criminal record including knife crime and car theft was granted the right to stay because he – get this – self identified as an Aboriginal.
Then-immigration minister Giles eventually ditched Direction 99 and tried to tighten up the rules, but the fact that he even issued the directive in the first place is the real worry.
And it is even more concerning as Labor sets up its own replacement for the old Administrative Appeals Tribunal, called the Administrative Review Tribunal.
Although Attorney-General Mark Dreyfus has been at pains to deny political influence, concern remain that the new body will be stacked out with people with Labor connections and, more worryingly, Labor’s soft touch attitudes towards foreign born criminals.
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Originally published as James Morrow: Labor’s soft touch on our borders has a high cost
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