Anna Burke has represented the seat of Chisholm in the House of Representatives for the ALP since 1998. She is the former Speaker of the House (2012–2013), and has been a consistent advocate for asylum seekers. She will retire at the next election.
Q. We have just seen the Papua New Guinea government find that the detention of the asylum seekers on Manus Island is illegal. Do you think that shows that there is a more robust sense of human rights in PNG than Australia?
A. No, but I think it demonstrates that the law understands better the UN Charter of Human Rights than either the PNG or the Australian governments.
Nobody has taken this case about offshore processing to the High Court here, nor could they because technically it is in PNG, but as you saw with the Malaysian Solution, when they took it to the High Court here it was overturned.
So I think our legal, constitutional framework — I wouldn't say it was more lacking than the PNG government in any way size, shape or form, I just think it demonstrates that if you bring these into the realm of the legal sphere, then the legal system says you have to abide by the UN Charter of Human Rights, which neither government has been doing.
Does it reflect badly on Australia that we have no articulated set of legal rights in our constitution, such as freedom from arbitrary detention without trial?
I think our constitution is lacking in many areas, but I think this gets down to basically, we have — on all sides of politics — not been abiding by the UN Charters that we have adopted and signed and that we request other countries to follow. Instead of maintaining a humane and dignified approach to this difficult, complex situation we have played political football with it.
So I think there are issues to be addressed in the longer term, but in the here and now we need to deal with the 800 people on Manus who have been living in this horrendous, limbo situation for almost four years now.
"Instead of maintaining a humane and dignified approach to this difficult, complex situation we have played political football with it." — Anna Burke
Many people have spoken up in support of asylum seekers since the offshore camps on Manus and Nauru were reopened. Petitions have been signed, letters have been sent to members of Parliament, demonstrations have been held ... Yet it seems the government is not listening, and has never been listening. Do you think this ideological commitment to offshore processing has been run at the cost of democracy?
I think what the political process is, they see that, yes, the mood is changing, but they don't think it is changing significantly enough that it will impact them at the ballot box. They think by adopting a more humane approach they will lose votes at the ballot box. They would argue that what they are doing is actually democratic.
The point has been made by several legal minds, including Professor Triggs, that the use of arbitrary detention without trial so as to deter others from seeking asylum and coming by boat is a breach of the separation of powers. Normally the component of deterrence in a sentence of imprisonment can only be made by a court, and not by the Parliament. Do you see that the principle of the separation of powers has been breached?
I am not a lawyer, and I respect completely Gillian Triggs' views. What I think is the difficulty in this situation is that we have not got a system of detention for processing, we've got a system of indefinite detention. I have never said we shouldn't have some form of processing situation — although I have always been opposed to offshore processing. But what we have now got is this prolonged incarceration.
On Wednesday last week the Iranian asylum seeker, Omid, set himself on fire in desperation as he had given up hope after three years in detention. He was not transferred to the mainland for 24 hours and was brain dead, I believe, on arrival in Brisbane hospital. Do you see a systemic failure here, in the care of asylum seekers?
Yes, and I think the medical profession is now also saying that what is being offered in terms of getting approval to take people off the island [is not good enough], and that Nauru absolutely does not have the medical facilities to be looking after the volume of people that we sent there, and on this occasion the system has failed.
It seems that the harsh treatment of asylum seekers is a response to the racist attitudes of Sydney shock jocks and focus groups. It appears to be playing a 'race card' so as to appeal to particular vote banks. Is it possible for either party to get back to policies that have a moral basis and provide ethical leadership to the community, rather than dog whistling the worst elements?
I think that from the Howard days of Tampa we have seen that the race card has been used to create fear and loathing and mistrust. The creation of asylum seekers as 'other', calling them 'illegals', running that whole argument. I would say — with my political hat on — that the Liberal Party has been far worse at that than the Labor Party. The Labor Party hasn't gone down that path. But having said that, everybody plays politics with this situation.
"Asylum seekers on Nauru are still living in tents. The theory is that this will stop people drowning at sea. But it is appalling that we are putting people's lives in this situation." — Anna Burke
We have now got a world wide refugee problem — we don't have one here but we do have one world wide. It is now time to start having a rational debate about what we do with these people as opposed to playing the race card. But tragically I think we are going to go into an election where again asylum seekers are going to be used as political footballs, as opposed to having a calm debate with the populace about why Australia needs to be doing its bit and can.
I talk to men on Manus Island every day and I am aware that they do not have adequate food or clothes or medical care. A very large proportion are becoming addicted to pharmaceutical medications and are developing full blown mental illnesses. There is a massive problem of untreated injuries, skin diseases and chronic pain. Do you think the Australian public has any awareness of the sickness and squalor in which these people are living?
No, because the government has closed down information. The UN has been there and has reported now on many occasions. They are going back — I think they are there as we speak. I hope they will report and indicate what conditions these individuals are living in. Manus is bad but Nauru is worse. The majority of asylum seekers on Nauru are still living in tents. The theory is that this will stop people drowning at sea. But it is appalling, that we are putting these people's lives in this situation.
A German friend explained to me that after Dachau, all the concentration camps in the Second World War were placed outside Germany, in Poland and Ukraine and other countries, and that information about them was kept secret from the ordinary police and military. Do you think that offshore processing has parallels with the strategies of Nazi Germany, in placing the camps away from the mainland and making their internal operations secret?
I think it has the same political strategy that anything does where it is 'out of sight, out of mind'. The journalists are not allowed in, we are not having information because of 'on-water matters', I think it is a situation where these individuals have been dehumanised. They take away their being — having numbers, referring to them as illegals. It is a political strategy so that the populace doesn't really understand what is being done in their country's name.
How can either party put forward a platform that is truly international in focus and which takes into account the large scale movements of people engendered by war and political persecution which are causing refugees to flee their homelands?
Well, we did it post World War Two, but it is now an international problem. This is something that needs to be done on an international scale. Australia already has got an approach through the Bali Process in our region, we should be utilising that with our neighbouring countries who all have these issues as well, so as to adopt a rational approach. The Donald Trumps of the world want to put up walls, put up barriers, but it is not going to stop refugees. It is not going to resolve the situation we have. We are wealthy enough and big enough to find a resolution for this.
It is also about ending the conflicts so that people aren't having to flee. It is not just a situation of housing refugees. What are the root causes of refugees? No one talks about that. And until we actually start talking about these much bigger issues then we will constantly see political posturing across the globe — not just in Australia — about how to deter instead of how to prevent.
Di Cousens is an honorary fellow with the Australian Catholic University, a university administrator at RMIT and former vice-chair of the Buddhist Council of Victoria. After meeting refugees in detention in Australia she became friends with detainees on Manus Island through social media. For over a year she have been engaged in supporting them in various ways, mostly through daily conversations.