Shadowland Introduction
12 June 2007, 03:00AM
We are an odd, contradictory nation. We are prosperous and generous, yet our overseas aid is declining in real terms. We are welcoming and friendly, yet we have treated asylum seekers with a harshness which has shocked many and shamed us all.
This contradiction is perfectly illustrated at Baxter detention centre, in the South Australian desert. Baxter, five hours north-west of Adelaide, opened in August 2002. Mr Ruddock announced it as Australias ғfamily-friendly detention centre.
Stand outside Baxter, facing east and the view is a perfect Fred Williams landscape: dull grey-green scrub on red sand, tumbling away for miles to a rim of hills undimmed by distance.
Turn and face west: a silver shimmering electric fence, six metres high, fills the field of view; beyond it 20 metres of no-man's land, then another tall and glittering line of wire and mesh.
Inside the second fence is a series of compounds made of uncompromising corrugated iron, where the refugees are held. The compounds have no windows, so that the inmates have no view except of the sky. And Australians cannot see those who are locked inside.
Once you pass through strict security checks and enter Baxter you find the real tragedy, our hidden shame. Asylum seekers walk around as if still alive; they talk as if they still have a hold on rational thinking. They press hospitality on you: it is a deeply ingrained cultural instinct, but it seems more like the unwilled twitching of a dying animal.
They are not wholly present: they seem hollowed out, dried, lifeless things, washed up and stranded beyond the high-water mark; their minds gone, shredded, destroyed by hopelessness and despair.
Children are incontinent from stress; many inmates are afflicted with blindness or lameness which has no organic origin: the bewildered minds final, mute protest.
It is not an offence to arrive in Australia without papers. Nevertheless, Australia's Migration Act provides that anyone who arrives here without a visa must be detained until they receive a visa or are removed from the country. Detention of innocent people is a serious moral problem, difficult to justify for more than a very short time.
Australias policy of mandatory detention of asylum seekers has been criticized by church leaders and human rights organisations around the world.
On 8 July 2004, Mr Howard made a speech in Adelaide reaffirming his commitment to "a fair and decent Australia". This sits ill with the Howard government's recent conduct.
On 6 August 2004 the High Court decided a case concerning a failed asylum seeker. He has not been granted a visa. He asked to be removed from Australia. He cannot be removed because there is no country he can go to. The government argued for, and won, the right to hold him in detention for the rest of his life.
He has not committed any offence, but he faces the prospect of spending the rest of his life in a high security prison. The government could have amended the legislation to avoid that result. In its pursuit of a "fair and decent society" it prefers to imprison innocent people for life.
Those lucky enough to pass through the sharp blades of our refugee processing system are subjected to fresh torment. They are denied the chance to rebuild their lives: for they are given only temporary protection.
After three years they must relive the horror they fled by proving again that they are in need of protection. They spend their time in limbo: no-one can make sense of a life in which planning is impossible, an existence which is temporary.
"For those who come across the seas weve boundless plains to share ..." One day we will rediscover our values, and still our anxieties and resolve our contradictions.
One day we will look back on the images in Shadowland and recognise leading members of an Australian community made stronger by their presence.
And one day we will recognise the equal humanity of everyone languishing behind the electric fence at Baxter and we will purge ourselves of guilt and fear and resolve that this will never happen again.
Julian Burnside QC (2004)
Additional statement added 5 June 2007:
Australia's "family-friendly" detention centre. It is now to be "mothballed", but remains ready for anyone who dares to come asking for our help.
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