Temporary Protection Visas (TPVs), releasing some detainees to live in the community.21 The government fed the public perception that the nation was besieged by an ‘avalanche’ of ‘boat people’ who had to be stopped. A line had to be drawn.22 Detention centres became increasingly privatised and remote. They were progressively fortified until many resembled maximum-security prisons shocking some MPs during a visit in 2001.23 ‘Excision’ of Australian Territories and the ‘Pacific Solution’ On 26th August 2001 a rescue call was received from the Palapa 1, a dilapidated 20 metre Indonesian fishing boat with 433 passengers on board. The vessel was lost and struggling to stay afloat. Australian authorities complied with humanitarian principles and called for ships to locate and rescue the ailing vessel. The Norwegian freighter the Tampa came to the rescue. Its captain gave as much assistance as the cramped deck would allow. He asked permission from the Australian government to convey the asylum seekers to Christmas Island. It was refused and the government threatened to charge the captain of the Tampa with people smuggling if the ship landed them on Christmas Island. Determined to prevent asylum seekers from reaching Australian shores, the government orchestrated a ship-to-ship transfer. At the same time it rushed legislation through Parliament so as to avoid giving asylum seekers any right to legal processes in Australia and to force the Tampa (or any other boat carrying asylum seekers) back out to sea, providing immunity to the government, its officers and agents from civil or criminal prosecution for such action.24 Although the Opposition was generally supportive of the government resolve to ‘stop the boats’, they refused to support this legislation labelling it ‘ill-considered, draconian and unconstitutional’ and only agreed to support the bill if it was specific to the Tampa. The government responded by offering to introduce a six month sunset clause and the Opposition eventually supported the legislation.25 21. 22. 23. 24. 25. 26. 27. 28. 29. 30. 31. 18 More than eight days after the rescue, the Royal Australian Navy (RAN) intercepted the Tampa. Special Armed Services personnel forcibly removed asylum seekers onto the HMAS Manoora. The Indonesian government refused to take those who had been rescued, leaving the Australian government to cast about for a solution. The asylum seekers were eventually transferred from the HMAS Manoora directly to offshore detention centres in Nauru and Manus Island in the Pacific Ocean.26 Two pieces of legislation were passed with bipartisan support to give effect to offshore processing or the ‘Pacific Solution’: the Migration Amendment (Excision from Migration Zone) Bill 2001 and Migration Amendment (Excision from Migration Zone (Consequential Provisions) Bills 2001.27 The Tampa crisis generated fevered controversy in Australia in the lead up to the 2001 election, as did the ‘Children Overboard’ affair in October 2001. Following an encounter with the Royal Australian Navy frigate the Adelaide, the Olong, a woodenhulled boat carrying 223 asylum seekers, experienced engine failure. Amidst the panic on board some asylum seekers abandoned the boat leading to claims, which persisted throughout the 2001 election campaign, that asylum seekers were throwing their children overboard.28 As these events unfolded, the Prime Minister proclaimed: ‘We will decide who comes to this country and the circumstances in which they come.’29 A 2002 Inquiry into a Certain Maritime Incident found that no children had been thrown overboard and that the government had known that prior to the 2001 election. 30 Government Senators labelled the inquiry ‘an undignified sideshow’ and produced a dissenting report.31 The Howard government was re-elected in 2001 and again in 2004. In 2006 it introduced a bill to extend ‘excision’ of the migration zone to the mainland. Although it did not mean Australia had entirely abdicated all of its obligations under the UN Convention, its purpose was to stop boat arrivals from reaching the mainland and applying for asylum, with all the domestic legal and administrative protections that After the three-year term, refugees had to reapply and could be returned if their home country was then deemed to be safe. They could not sponsor family members and could access some but not the full range of services available to refugees with permanent status. Following the introduction of TPVs the numbers of boat arrivals with women and children on board increased. Janet Phillips and Harriet Spinks Immigration Detention in Australia, January 2012 Parliamentary Library, Parliament of Australia. Fr Frank Brennan, Tampering With Asylum, University of Queensland 2006. Joint Committee on Foreign Affairs, Defence and Trade, Report on Visits to Immigration Detention Centres, June 2001, P31 Australian Parliament. Nathan Hancock, Border Protection (Validation and Enforcement Powers) Bill 2001, Bills Digest, Parliamentary Library, Australian Parliament. Ibid p.3. Peter Mares, Borderline p126 UNSW Press 2002. Janet Phillips and Harriet Spinks Immigration Detention in Australia, P7 of 43 January 2012 Parliamentary Library, Parliament of Australia. David Marr and Marion Wilkinson, Dark Victory, Chapter 14, Allen and Unwin 2003. The Hon John Howard MP, Prime Minister, Federal Election Campaign Speech, 2001. Senate Select Committee, A Certain Maritime Incident, Australian Parliament, October 23, 2002. Cynthia Banham and Mark Metherall, Article, Liberal Senators Slam Children Overboard Inquiry, Sydney Morning Herald, 24th October 2002. Prison Service Journal Issue 205