A 36-year-old Pakistani refugee on Nauru was hospitalised after setting himself on fire. The act of self-harm came amidst continued debate about the government’s proposed bill to repeal the medevac laws, reviewed by a Senate committee this week, as well as accusations from Medicines Sans Frontiers that Nauru has breached medical ethics.
Fifty-three asylum seekers being held at a detention facility annexed to the Bomana prison complex in Port Moresby are being restricted from talking to doctors and lawyers. A Senate inquiry heard that without access to phones, the asylum seekers are unable to be evacuated to Australia under the medevac legislation.
The Labor party claimed that the government has lost control of Australia’s borders. Labor’s home affairs spokeswoman, Kristina Keneally, argued that over 90% of the 81,596 asylum seekers who arrived by plane in the last five years were found not to be refugees. The argument came as Senator Kim Carr indicated Labor’s opposition to a Coalition bill to prevent asylum seekers who arrived by boat ever settling in Australia.
A report from Deloitte Access Economics found that increasing Australia’s annual refugee intake to 44,000 by 2023 would bring an extra $37.7 billion to the economy in the next 50 years. Commissioned by Oxfam Australia, the report called for the federal government to commit to the increase, and to create a visa stream for 10,000 humanitarian family reunifications annually.