Home Affairs ordered flags be removed from officials’ photos in ‘cultural reforms’
The Department of Home Affairs head ordered staff to remove the Australian flag from photos of officials as the department grappled with thousands of visa applications from Gaza and Lebanon and the fallout from the NZYQ High Court decision.
The head of the Department of Home Affairs ordered staff to remove the Australian flag from photographs of senior officials as part of “cultural reforms” in the organisation.
The instruction was issued between July and August this year at the same time as the department continued to grapple with thousands of visa applications from Gaza and Lebanon and the ongoing fallout from both the NZYQ High Court decision and the Albanese government’s Direction 99 order.
The decision to remove the Australian, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander flags came to light during a Senate estimates hearing in which the department also revealed that the thousands of visas granted to individuals looking to leave Gaza and Lebanon would not count towards Australia’s 20,000-person annual cap under the refugee and humanitarian program.
Asked by Liberal senator James Paterson about the removal of the flags from the photographs, which were displayed on the department’s website, Home Affairs secretary Stephanie Foster said she had ordered the change to make the photographs “less formal”.
“I think having photographs against the background of flags gives a certain formality to the photo,” she said.
“As you know, as part of our cultural reform, I’ve been working hard to make sure that the senior executive are very accessible to staff. It was one small change that I thought might assist with that program.”
Senator Paterson noted that at the time of Ms Foster’s decision to remove the flags, the department was dealing with major matters including the release of non-citizen serious offenders, the issuing of Palestinian visas, and a series of boat arrivals to the Australian mainland.
Ms Foster said that while she did not know how the flags were removed from the photographs, she did not believe that it would have been much work.
“It was a very small issue which took very little of my time and effort, I have no concerns about my capacity to focus on big issues facing the department,” she said.
The Home Affairs boss was quizzed at length about the numbers of visas issued to people from Palestine and Lebanon since the outbreak of war in October 2023.
Department officials said 3041 visas had been granted to holders of Palestinian travel documents, while 7252 had been refused.
Of the 15,525 temporary visa applications out of Lebanon, some 8333 had been granted.
Ms Foster confirmed that the intake would not count towards the refugee and humanitarian program.
It was revealed that one of those already in Australia had in the past few weeks had their visa cancelled on character grounds.
That individual was now in immigration detention, although Australia had ruled out forcefully returning anyone to Gaza.
That prompted Senator Paterson to ask if that individual was likely to be released back into the community due to the High Court’s decision in the NZYQ matter, which prohibited indefinite immigration detention.
Employment and Workplace Relations Minister Murray Watt said there was “a lot more work that has got to occur” before the NZYQ decision would come into play in that matter.
The updated figures around visas for Palestinians were seized on by Greens senator David Shoebridge and independent senator David Pocock, who noted that the department appeared to be taking longer to grant visas to people inside Palestine.
Senator Shoebridge noted the visa rejection rate for Palestinians was 70 per cent, while it was 15 per cent for Ukrainians.
While Ukrainian visa applications were being determined in a single day on average, Palestinian applications were taking an average of four months.
Senator Watt denied the two cohorts were treated differently.
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