Refugee status unrelated to wealth, Richard Di Natale says

Richard Di Natale hits back at Immigration Minister Peter Dutton’s attack on “economic refugees” who left Manus for the US.

Greens Leader Senator Richard Di Natale says Peter Dutton’s use of the term “Armani refugees’’ is a bit rich.

Greens leader Richard Di Natale has hit back at Immigration Minister Peter Dutton’s attack on “economic refugees” declaring the definition of a refugee is unrelated to how much money someone has in their bank account.

Mr Dutton yesterday hit out at the 25 refugees who left Manus Island bound for the United States this week.

“They’re economic refugees, they got on a boat, paid a people smuggler a lot of money, and somebody once said to me that we’ve got the world’s biggest collection of Armani jeans and handbags up on Nauru waiting for people to collect it when they depart,” Mr Dutton told 2GB.

Mr Dutton, who is in London, defended his comments overnight.

“I’m saying people who have paid $20,000 to people smugglers to hop on a boat to come to Australia, where that person is not a legitimate refugee, that displaces (genuine refugees),” he said.

Senator Di Natale said Mr Dutton had “piled cruelty upon cruelty” on innocent people feeling persecution.

“I heard the minister call them ‘Armani refugees’, which is a bit rich coming from a Reject Shop minister,” he told Sky News.

“The bottom line is, to be a refugee means somebody fleeing persecution and torture, and there’s a very clear definition. It doesn’t relate to how much money somebody’s got in their bank account.

“People are refugees when they are fleeing persecution and torture, and whether they have means or not is irrelevant to whether they satisfy the definition of a refugee.”

Mr Dutton also criticised refugees for posting photographs showing them enjoying themselves on Manus Island beaches on social media.

“Peter Dutton says that all things are great, that they’re in a tropical paradise. Well if Peter Dutton thinks that things are so great, maybe he should take his family there over the Christmas holidays and spend a week or two on Nauru to experience just how wonderful the conditions are for those poor people languishing in those offshore hell holes,” Senator Di Natale said, apparently conflating Manus Island and Nauru.

Self-described “mad Richmond supporter” Senator Di Natale also attacked Mr Dutton over his ban on Tigers star and Brownlow medallist Dustin Martin’s New Zealand father returning to Australia in light of historic criminal convictions.

“I don’t think it’s actually about Dustin Martin or his father. I think it’s a bigger issue than that, and it’s about again, a minister passing laws that I think in many cases deny people natural justice,” Senator Di Natale said. “The treatment of our New Zealand brothers and sisters in this country has often been shameful and I think it does require us to look again at laws which prevent people from coming into Australia.”