Australia boatpeople bill tops $1bn

Thursday, 09 February 2012 10:37

SYDNEY: Australian Immigration Minister Chris Bowen on Thursday defended a steep rise in the cost of Canberra's mandatory detention of asylum-seekers, saying a surge in boatpeople arrivals had stressed the system.

Bowen said the near-quadrupling in the government's four-year contract with private detention centre provider Serco from Aus$280 million (US$300 million) to more than Aus$1 billion reflected the opening of 10 new facilities to meet demand.

According to official figures some 69 boats carrying 4,565 asylum-seekers arrived in Australia in 2011, down from an unprecedented 6,555 in 2010 but still the third-worst year on record.

"We have had to open new detention centres and this new budget, this new contract, does reflect those," Bowen told ABC radio.

"I've always said that detention is expensive and however you process asylum-seekers, whether it be in detention or in the community, is expensive."

Canberra had to relax its mandatory detention policy last year after the High Court struck down a deal to send boatpeople to Malaysia and opposition politicians refused to change the law to overcome the court ruling.

Families, children and others considered vulnerable are now permitted to live in the community while their asylum applications are processed and the government has been slowly releasing people from detention.

Bowen said there were around 4,000 people still locked up but a "substantial number" were now living outside detention.

He also defended the length of time it took to process applications, following Amnesty International criticism this week that some detainees had been waiting for up to three years and their mental health was suffering.

"If somebody turns up in Australia with no documentation at all, we are meant to work out whether they really are who they say they are, where they say they're from," he said.

"That takes time to investigate. It does make the process a lot longer and more complicated."

Though they come in relatively small numbers by global standards, asylum-seekers are a hot political issue in Australia and dominated national elections in 2010 due to the record number of boat arrivals.

Most come from strife-torn nations such as Afghanistan, Iran and Sri Lanka on rickety boats from Indonesia a dangerous sea journey that has seen a number of fatal accidents.

The most recent, involving the capsizing of an overloaded boat off eastern Java carrying 250 asylum seekers in December, claimed 90 lives.