Biloela family: Luxury jet lands in Perth with Biloela dad, daughter for family reunion

The father and sister of asylum seeker Tharnicaa Murugappan have landed in Perth ahead of a family reunion.

The father and sister of asylum seeker Tharnicaa Murugappan have landed in Perth ahead of a family reunion.

The luxury private jet chartered by the Department of Home Affairs to bring the pair back to the mainland touched down in Perth at 5.12pm, local time, following the decision by Immigration Minister Alex Hawke to allow the family to enter community detention while they await for various legal challenges to run their course.

Nadesalingam “Nades” Murugappan and daughter Kopika flew out of Christmas Island, where the family has been detained in a camp next to the island rubbish tip since August 2019, on Tuesday afternoon.

They will be reunited with Tharnicaa — who was flown back to Perth last week after falling ill with pneumonia and a blood infection — and mother Priya.

The father and daughter were taken to a private hangar at Perth airport, where border force officials were waiting.

The father and daughter smiled and waved to photographers as they were driven away from the airport.

They are expected to be taken to a house in Perth’s southeastern suburbs.

Nadesalingam “Nades” Murugappan and daughter Kopika prepare to leave Christmas Island on Tuesday.

Private jet

While a scheduled commercial Virgin flight was also scheduled to leave the island on Tuesday afternoon, the government instead chartered a Gulfstream private jet to collect the pair.

The charter company, Revesco Aviation, describes the plane as “a luxurious long-range business jet” featuring seven club seats and a second cabin for sleeping.

“The Gulfstream IV SPs wide cabin is designed to provide you with more all-around comfort, convenience and connectivity; allowing you to stretch your legs as well as your personal productivity and performance,” Revesco’s website says.

“This aircraft is fitted with a plush, wood grained interior, sumptuous adjustable leather recliners and a sound system with multi-screen DVD player.

“Your on board flight attendant, operating out of a full service airline galley, will provide discreet service catering to your personal requirements.”

The Department of Home Affairs last month told senate questions on notice that the cost of keeping the family at Christmas Island had totalled an estimated $6.7 million.

New life in Perth

The Murugappan family is expected to be reunited in Perth on Tuesday night and will be eligible to live in the Perth community while their legal matter continues.

Mr Hawke said the family would reside in suburban Perth through a “community detention placement” while Tharnicaa continues to receive medical treatment and their ongoing legal matter continues.

The family, embraced by the Queensland town of Biloela when they lived there, has been held in Australia’s immigration detention system for more than three years.

The decision to reunite them follows clinical advice from Tharnicaa’s doctors that it was important for her health to have her family with her during her recovery, which is expected to take at least eight weeks after she is well enough to leave hospital.

The family will live in what is termed “community detention”. Arrangements for this have varied in the past and have included a caravan park but community detention usually means living in a Commonwealth-owned house.

The charter flight expected to bring Mr Murugappan and Kopika, 6, to Perth is due to land on the island about noon local time (3pm AEST).

‘Not a pathway to visa’

Mr Hawke said the outcome did not create a pathway to a visa for the family. But he said at a future date he would consider whether to lift the statutory bar which prevented the family from applying for non-refugee visas, where their prior attempts had been rejected.

“Today’s decision releases the family from detention and facilitates ongoing treatment while they pursue ongoing litigation before the Administrative Appeals Tribunal, Federal Court and High Court,” a statement from Mr Hawke said.

“The government’s position on border protection has not changed.

“Anyone who arrives in Australia illegally by boat will not be resettled permanently. Anyone who is found not to be owed protection will be expected to leave Australia.”

Mr Hawke said in making the decision he had balanced “appropriate compassion” for the family’s children held in detention and the government’s commitment to “strong border protection policies”.

He told 2GB radio said community detention in Perth was “an appropriate residence location” for the family.

“Nothing today has given them any pathway to a permanent visa. You have to remember that they have litigated over many years their protection claims,” he said.

“None of those judicial or administrative processes have found that we owe them protection.

“If you are now owed protection, which so far this family has not found to be owed protection by anybody, and you’ve arrived by boat and it’s safe to go home and your country is safe and you don’t have any protection claims, we do require you to go home, you won’t be permanently resettled in Australia.”

Mr Hawke said other people had returned to Sri Lanka since the civil war ended, noting it was “safe to do so.”

“The civil war has been over since 2009,” he said.

Mr Hawke’s statement came after Federal Treasurer Josh Frydenberg confirmed the family would “very shortly” be released from detention and reunited on Australian shores.

“I can confirm that the reports that the family will be reunited in Australia are correct,” the Treasurer told Sky News on Tuesday. An announcement disclosing the details will be made later in the day, he added.

“The family will be reunited in Australia and I’ll leave the details to the (Immigration) Minister and his statement,” he said.

“The positive development is that the family will be reunited on Australian shores very shortly,” Mr Frydenberg said.

However he refused to say whether the family would be allowed to stay in Australia permanently.

Mr Frydenberg defended government policies and processes as effective but added that every case was different and should “be worked through the system”.

“In this case through the courts. The courts have made determinations with respect to the refugee status of the family and as you know that’s pretty clear,” he said.

“But they were pretty distressing images of the family being separated.”

Asked if he believed bringing the Tamil family home would encourage people smugglers, Mr Frydenberg said, “I’m confident that the policies we have in place remain effective and will prevent unauthorised boat arrivals to Australia”.

The family’s lawyer confirmed they had not been offered a pathway back to their Biloela home.

Appearing on Sky News on Tuesday Carina Ford said she had received a press release from the government which notified her that the Murugappans would remain under detention once reunited.

“We have been advised that a community determination has been made so the family will be transferred and reunited in Perth and will reside in Perth with various conditions relating to their community detention,” she said.

“There has been no other movement in relation to any bar lift at this stage and we understand based on the press release that it is still being considered by the minister.”

Ms Ford added that an application to the High Court had been made for a temporary visa and citizen application had also been appealed.

Asked if allowing the Murugappans to return home would send a message to people smugglers, Ms Ford said there are many other measures in place which already do that and the Murugappans need not be another.

Visa options considered

Mr Hawke has also been considering whether to lift a bar that prevents the family – now living on Christmas Island — from applying for non-refugee visas.

Options available for the government include lifting the bar, which is in place for those who have had asylum applications fail, or granting specific types of visas at Mr Hawke’s discretion.

Priya and Nadesalingam Murugappan left Sri Lanka and arrived by boat in 2012 and 2013. Kopika, 6, and Tharnicaa, 4, were born in Australia and moved with them into detention in March 2018 after their parents’ claims for asylum were rejected. They were later moved to Christmas Island.

Sources briefed on the matter but not authorised to speak publicly said the government was attempting to balance a desire to be compassionate to children in long-term detention and the need to keep to a principled position.

No decision had been made on Monday, and the family could be moved into community detention.

Internal pressure has been mounting on the Morrison government to make a swift decision about the family’s future after Tharnicaa was flown with Ms Murugappan to a Perth hospital for urgent medical care last week.

Nadesalingam Murugappan, wife Kokilapathmapriy Nadarasa, known as Priya, and their daughters Kopika, right, and Tharunicaa, on Christmas Island last year. Picture: Colin Murty

She was diagnosed with pneumonia and had a blood infection.

Former deputy prime minister Barnaby Joyce on Monday became the latest Coalition MP to call for the family to be allowed to remain in Australia. “Maybe if their names were Jane and Sally we’d think twice about sending them back to another country which they’re not from,” he said.

Both Mr and Ms Murugappan have lost a string of legal appeals to be granted asylum, with the family settling on a bridging visa in Biloela, west of Gladstone.

Acting Prime Minister Michael McCormack said work was “under way” to reunite the family in Perth – after Western Australia’s most senior health bureaucrat last week wrote to the Home Affairs Department urging a reunion while Tharnicaa recovered. That process could take up to eight weeks of after she is discharged.

Mr McCormack said he was confident Mr Hawke would make a “good” decision for the family. “I appreciate that many people have a view on this matter but we will decide our view, through Alex Hawke who is the minister, with the proper oversight of this decision,” he said. “He will make that announcement this week and he will base it on humanitarian considerations, on health outcomes and on legal advice.

Angela Fredericks, a longtime refugee advocate and friend of the Muruggapan family said the two parents, Priya and Nades, had never given up.

“We all hope the minister does what he’s always had the power to do: bring this family home to Biloela,” Ms Fredericks said.

Mr Joyce’s intervention on Monday came after other Coalition MPs – including Katie Allen, Trent Zimmerman, Jason Falinski, Ken O’Dowd and Bridget Archer – at the weekend pushed for the family to be removed from Christmas Island.

It is unclear if Mr Murugappan and Kopika will be flown to Perth on the next scheduled flight on Tuesday, which only has seats available for medical transfers, or on a separate government charter.

Speaking on the sidelines of the G7 summit in the UK, Scott Morrison said offering a pathway to permanent settlement was not the government’s policy and offering medical attention was the priority.

“Other options that both are consistent with the government’s policy when it comes to these matters as well as the need to provide appropriate humanitarian and health support are being worked through right now,” the Prime Minister said.

Mr Murugappan was first told that the government did not consider him a refugee in late 2012, a decision affirmed by the Refugee Review Tribunal the following year.

The decision was upheld by the Federal Magistrates Court in 2014 and while a further appeal was pending in the Federal Court, Mr Murugappan and a pregnant Ms Murugappan were married. Soon after they moved to Biloela.

The Federal Court affirmed the decision in the same month of the wedding and another appeal was lodged in the High Court. Pending that appeal, Kopika was born in May 2015. A month later the High Court also affirmed the decision about Mr Murugappan’s refugee claim.

Under the Migration Act, Australian-born children of asylum-seekers who arrived by boat take on the visa status of their parents at the time.

In 2016, the Immigration Department concluded that Ms Murugappan’s case did not engage Australia’s protection obligations, a decision affirmed by the Immigration Assessment Authority in August 2017. Tharnicaa was born in June 2017.

Unsuccessful appeals were lodged regarding Ms Murugappan’s right to legal protections in the Federal Circuit Court, the Federal Court and the High Court.

New Home Affairs Minister Karen Andrews appeared earlier this month to raise the possibility that the family would be resettled abroad – possibly in New Zealand or the US – before clarifying that this was not an option.

That is because those resettlement routes are only open to those with refugee status.

Anthony Albanese said there had been ministerial interventions made in hundreds of immigration cases, as he called for the family to be permanently settled in Biloela.

“This is not a threat to our national sovereignty,” the Opposition Leader said.