It has been two years since Immigration Minister Andrew Giles assumed his portfolio, and his performance has been the subject of much mention these last seven months. Suffice to say he is a reminder that ministers should not be appointed unless they at least have a passing knowledge of the concept of ministerial responsibility in the Westminster system.
No example better illustrates Giles’s ineptitude than his failure to manage the 149 immigration detainees released into the community following the High Court’s decision in the case of NZYQ in November, which held that immigration detainees could not be held in custody indefinitely if there was no reasonable prospect of their being deported.
On reflection, it was harsh and unfair of me to say Giles botched their release. If anything, he speedily managed the discharge of these criminals and other undesirables, including murderers, rapists, and paedophiles. So speedily in fact that just days after the court’s decision, 27 of them were dumped at a suburban motel in Perth without supervision. What I should have said was that Giles did an excellent job of releasing them quickly but has proved utterly useless at ensuring the community’s safety in the process.
That debacle is of little surprise, given he had no legislative contingency plans for an adverse decision in the NZYQ case, despite the court’s intimating in June that it would overturn its precedent allowing indefinite detaining of dangerous unlawful citizens. That Giles was absent for at least three meetings with senior legal counsel from his department in the lead-up to the court’s decision is a remarkable case of ministerial indifference.
‘Andrew Giles could not be further removed from decision-making in his portfolio even if he were hitched to the Voyager 1 space probe.’
Not that Giles is short of grandiose assurances when it comes to questions about overseeing the released detainees. “What we are working on … is to make sure we leave no stone unturned in managing this cohort,” he declared during a press conference in December, stating no less than seven times that he was doing everything possible to “keep the community safe”.
Five months have passed since then, yet as Perth woman Ninette Simons knows only too well, Giles is still working on his plan to leave no stone unturned. Last month the 73-year-old grandmother and her husband, Philip, 76, were viciously bashed during a home invasion and robbery. Among the three people charged is freed immigration detainee and convicted drug trafficker Majid Jamshidi Doukoshkan.
Two days before the alleged offences, Doukoshkan was bailed after appearing in a Perth court on fresh drug charges. Prior to this, he broke his curfew six times in February. Despite these breaches and repeated warnings about the consequences, a decision was made in March to remove his ankle monitor.
The initial reason provided for that decision is a fascinating yet depressing insight into the ignorance, incompetence, evasiveness and abrogation that characterise this government, particularly in the areas of immigration detention and border protection. Appearing on Channel 7’s Sunrise on Friday, Prime Minister Anthony Albanese blamed the Community Protection Board (CPB) – a body established by his government in December to assist with management of the former detainees – for the decision to remove Doukoshkan’s ankle monitor.
“I think that’s a wrong decision by that board, but they make the decisions,” he said. “They make the decisions independent [of government].”
That claim was interesting to say the least. The CPB is chaired by an Australian Border Force (ABF) assistant commissioner, and half of its members are ABF officers. It is supposed to make recommendations only. If the CPB is making these decisions and determining policy, then what is the point of having an immigration minister, let alone this government?
But that was not the case. Albanese, like Giles and Home Affairs Minister Clare O’Neil, has as much understanding of government administration as the average punter has of Boolean algebra. As Giles’s office confirmed hours after Albanese’s Sunrise appearance, a ministerial delegate had made the decision to remove the ankle monitor.
So how did Giles’s office attempt to explain why the immigration minister had no idea what was going on in his own department? “These decisions are delegated to officials within the department, at arm’s length from politicians,” said a spokeswoman for Giles.
That is one way of putting it. Giles has not only done a splendid job at avoiding making decisions relating to his department but also anything to do with his position. He could not be further removed from decision-making in his portfolio even if he were hitched to the Voyager 1 space probe.
As for keeping the community safe, Giles’s record speaks for itself. As of February, 24 of the 149 detainees released have reoffended. Following this revelation, ABF and Home Affairs announced in March they would release monthly “community protection” reports concerning the released detainees. We have yet to see any of these reports.
Why Giles holds the immigration portfolio is a mystery, even if one leaves aside his record thus far is a shambles. Ideologically and professionally, he is unsuited. He is a former secretary of Victorian Labor’s socialist left faction. As a solicitor, he acted for asylum-seekers on the MV Tampa in 2001. “This involvement, more than anything else,” he declared in parliament in 2014, “led me towards seeking election to this place”.
And guess who moved a motion at the ALP national conference in 2015 to try to prohibit a future Labor government from turning back boats to Indonesia?
“I am unconvinced by their effectiveness,” Giles said at the time. “I regard them as inherently unsafe. In my view, they are clearly contrary to our international obligations. And I don’t say this as a legal nicety, because it goes really to the heart of our protection obligations this question of turning back people who are seeking our help.” It makes you wonder who Albanese will appoint next as immigration minister. Ian Rintoul of the Refugee Action Coalition, perhaps?
Unsurprisingly, Giles has been incommunicado of late. His last media appearance was on May 1. Asked by ABC presenter Samantha Donovan whether he would resign, Giles was unrepentant.
“I’m determined to get on with my job and to work hard at it each and every day,” he said.
On that note, you may remember the Albanese government’s rushed and much-heralded preventative detention legislation that was passed in December in response to the mass release of immigration detainees. It would, according to a joint media release from Giles and O’Neil, “allow a court to order the detention of the most serious offenders where they pose an unacceptable risk of committing serious violent or sexual offences”.
That was five months ago. So how many applications has the government lodged in accordance with that legislation? Answer: none. Getting on with the job and working hard every day, you were saying, Andrew Giles?
More Coverage
Woke frippery giving way to economic realities of life
Labor’s danger is that Middle Australia will conclude the government has lost control of the economy.
Ramping up the cricket action
Konstas’s unorthodox approach will give tragics plenty to debate. Does the ramp shot really belong in Test stroke play? No doubt it was a fitting way to declare his purpose on the biggest stage of all.