At least 2000 people joined a vibrant protest in Sydney on World Refugee Day. Click here to see a photo of protesters outside DIMIA offices.

We demand a Royal Commission NOW!

Click here to download the national petition calling for a Royal Commission into DIMIA and its detention system. The petition will be tabled in parliament in the last week of June.

Drop the charges!

Sign the statement of support to drop the charges

Four refugee supporters were charged in December with signing false passport statements in relation to refugees attempting to flee Australia to find safe haven in other countries.
Two have since had those charges dropped.
Join our campaign to have the charges dropped against the remaining two.
Click here to read the statement and current list of signatories.

To add your name to the statement, or for copies of a Drop the Charges petition, email .Please indicate any organisation or profession you would like listed after your name.

Palmer inquiry not good enough – it’s time for action to end detention
Vanstone should resign with Farmer

RAC media release, May 27 2005

Initial reports of the findings of the Palmer inquiry seem to confirm the fears of refugee groups that it would both superficial and a cover-up.

“The Palmer enquiry shows every indication of being the waste of time and money we expected,” said Ian Rintoul, spokesperson for the Refugee Action Coalition. “As an exercise in damage control for the government, it is also a failure. The time for bandaids has gone. It is even more important that Labor gets behind the private members bills to at least make a start on some real change to the treatment of refugees.”

“The findings revealed so far do nothing more than state the obvious. The government has spent hundreds of thousands of dollars to find that ‘the quality of health and psychiatric care needs to be significantly improved’! Detainees and refugee groups have been saying that for years. The government should stop playing politics with peoples lives and announce the release all the asylum seekers in detention – including Nauru and Christmas Island.”

“The report will announce the need for better health care when it is abundantly obvious that it is detention itself that is making people sick,” said Ian Rintoul.

“As for establishing yet another body to review detention, this is the last thing that is needed. Bodies such as the Human Rights Commission, the Ombudsman, and the Independent Detention Advisory Group as well as various parliamentary committees have all issued damning reports of detention conditions and the government’s refugee policy over the past few years – and they have all been completely ignored.”

According to press reports, an Immigration department sourced says that the Palmer inquiry has found that the Baxter management unit ‘had been used inappropriately to control and punish detainees.’ “Who is going to take responsibility for the abuse inflicted on Cornelia Rau, Vivian Solon and the thousands of refugees who suffered behind the razor wire?

“It is all well and good to call for the removal of the head of the immigration department, Bill Farmer. But Bill Farmer has been implementing government policy. The government is looking for a scapegoat. It is minister Vanstone and former minister Ruddock who are politically responsible.

“The report will redouble the calls for an independent judicial inquiry into the immigration department. Nothing less can restore any confidence that the horrors that have been revealed are not going to be repeated.”

For more information, contact Ian Rintoul .