Refugees have certain rights under international law, but whether they can enjoy them depends on the asylum system they encounter. Too often, national systems are failing. They are inefficient for governments, which waste resources without resolving asylum claims, and they are ineffective for refugees, who are left without rights or protection.
That’s where a vital, emerging area of policy and practice comes into play: asylum capacity development. It’s about strengthening the legal, institutional and social arrangements that are put in place to meet the needs of refugees.
A new Kaldor Centre Policy Brief sheds light on what asylum capacity development is, how it should be understood and put into practice, and spells out the best-practice standards for measuring success.
STATISTICS: Providing up-to-date statistics on asylum seekers in Australia and internationally. By Asylum Insight
PEOPLE IN ONSHORE AND OFFSHORE DETENTION
REFUGEES & PEOPLE SEEKING ASYLUM IN THE AUSTRALIAN COMMUNITY
BOAT TURNBACKS BY AUSTRALIA
GLOBAL STATISTICS
‘Power imbalance’: how Australia’s visa system leaves migrants beholden to their employers. By Rafqa Touma, The Guardian
Migrants on work sponsorships cannot apply for permanent residence without their employer, which experts say leaves room for exploitation.
Queensland Government slammed for abusing human rights of children. By Melissa Sweet and 180 organisations and individuals, Pearls & Irritations
More than 180 human rights and legal experts, social justice organisations and First Nations community groups have signed the open letter below condemning the Queensland Government for overriding the state’s Human Rights Act to lock children in the state’s police watch houses indefinitely.
'Powerful' grassroots efforts could be the decider for multicultural Australians' Voice to Parliament referendum vote. By Annika Burgess, ABC News
Mr Singh left Sydney on August 1 on a 25,000-kilometre road trip around Australia to promote the Indigenous Voice to Parliament to religious, multicultural and regional communities.
How Australia shaped Britain’s refugee policy. By Madeline Gleeson,The Saturday Paper
Why have former Australian government officials pushed so hard to promote their asylum policies abroad? Perhaps it is an attempt to rewrite history, casting offshore processing as something other than the failure it was, and seeking to validate Australia’s own unlawful approach.
How Australia shaped Britain’s refugee policy. By Madeline Gleeson, The Saturday Paper,
Does putting children in detention prevent or produce crime? AAP, SBS News
The younger a child is slapped with a probation order or locked up for committing a crime, the more likely they are to return behind bars.
So when Queensland brought in laws allowing kids as young as 10 to be held in police watch houses, human rights groups were appalled.
Indigenous advocates were also alarmed given the over-representation of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children in the youth justice system.
Does putting children in detention prevent or produce crime? AAP, SBS News
Pacific countries are not 'outposts' to grow labourers for Australia, Samoan PM says The Pacific. By Stephen Dziedzic, Dubravka Voloder and Johnson Raela, ABC News
Some Pacific nations — including Vanuatu, Tonga and Samoa – have become increasingly anxious that their own workforces are being depleted by the Pacific Australia Labour Mobility (PALM) scheme, and are reviewing their rules allowing workers to travel to Australia.
Chinese migrants believe Australian media fuels hostility towards them, study shows. By Daniel Hurst, The Guardian
Reports about China’s ‘influence’ made public more suspicious of Chinese-Australian communities, according to 70% of respondents to UTS survey.
The survey also sought to test feelings of inclusion by asking participants: “As a first-generation migrant, do you think the mainstream Australian community considers you to be an equal member of that community?”
Despite broader concerns about media coverage, the results showed 17% of respondents answered that they were “always” viewed as equal members of the community, 36% believed that was the case “often”, and 31% replied “sometimes”. On the other hand, 12% responded “rarely” and 5% “very rarely”.
Desperately needed aged care workers being kicked out of Australia due to their age. By Lexy Hamilton-Smith, ABC News
A review of migration policy is underway and will include "critical policy shifts", a spokesperson told the ABC. The federal government plans to release its new Migration Strategy later this year. Meanwhile….
Experts say migration key to Australia's growth as population ages. SBS News
Over the next 40 years, the number of Australians aged 65 and over will more than double.
That's the forecast from the government's Intergenerational Report. It means a significant proportion of Australians will age out of the workforce in the coming years.
Economists and groups like the Business Council of Australia are among those urging the government to look to migration to fill the vacancies those retirements will create.
Experts say migration key to Australia's growth as population ages. SBS News
Tiff fled Malaysia in fear. But starting a new life here as a trans man wasn’t easy. By Sandra Fulloon, SBS News
Tiff is packing donated clothing at a not-for-profit in Melbourne that supports refugees and asylum seekers.
The service is based in the city’s west, and has helped Tiff and thousands like him through extreme hardship during the pandemic and the current cost of living crisis.
“Without services like West Welcome Wagon, I would not be here. I would not have put food on my table, or have clothing, a bed to sleep on. Maybe I would be sleeping on the street.”
VIDEO: UN sounds alarm on declining food assistance for Rohingya refugees. ABC News
Médecins Sans Frontières Australia's Jennifer Tierney shares her experience of visiting a Rohingya refugee camp.
VIDEO: UN sounds alarm on declining food assistance for Rohingya refugees. ABC News
Refugees are finding it hard to rent a home in Australia for this 'pervasive' reason. SBS News
Ziersch also noted that racial bias could stem from how refugees are talked about by media and politicians.
"Some of the negative discourse around asylum seekers and refugees plays into it (the selection process) where landlords think people are going to be problematic because of their refugee background," she said.
Refugees are finding it hard to rent a home in Australia for this 'pervasive' reason. SBS News
Remembering escaping from Vietnam: SBS News in Depth, By Mahnaz Angury
"From 1977 through to 1991, Australia resettled around 150 thousand Vietnamese refugees and migrants. As we know the White Australia policy ended 50 years ago this year in 1973 so we could see that the arrival of Vietnamese refugees was really the first test to the disestablishment of the White Australia policy."
Fewer than 700 Australians reported Vietnam as their birth place in the 1971 census - but that number grew to more than 80 thousand 15 years later.
In the latest census, there were more than 268 thousand people who reported Vietnam as their country of birth.
Remembering escaping from Vietnam: SBS News in Depth, By Mahnaz Angury
Dear son, why I left you in Afghanistan – Full Story podcast. Presented by Jane Lee with Shadi Khan Saif and Ben Doherty, The Guardian
Forgive me Walo, perhaps I am not as powerful as you might think. In fact I often feel very hopeless as nothing seems to be working right to get us reunited. But hang in there, I have not given up and I will not!
‘Governments should grow up’: Liberal heavyweight Nick Greiner says refugee limbo must end. By David Crowe, SMH
The comments highlight the plight of more than 1000 refugees and asylum seekers who are being refused settlement in Australia because they arrived by boat and were processed on Nauru and Manus Island, a key policy under Labor and Liberal leaders over the past decade.
Victorian recycling company found to have systematically underpaid refugees and asylum seekers. By Ben Doherty, The Guardian
Refugees and asylum seekers employed to sort rubbish were systematically exploited and underpaid by one of the biggest recycling organisations in Victoria.
A recycling company formerly known as Polytrade, a linked subsidiary, and its owners, were fined more than $375,000 in the federal court this month, over what a judge described as “obnoxious conduct” and a “cavalier disregard” for the law, grossly underpaying migrant workers who spoke little English and were vulnerable to exploitation.
The five workers were in Australia on protection visas and bridging visas, pending the approval of protection visa applications. They had arrived in Australia as asylum seekers from south Asia.
Iranian asylum seekers share stories of living 'in limbo' as marathon quest for freedom drags on. By James Manley and Bransen Gibson, ABC Shepparton
Despite being offered a scholarship, Ms Kashani says she is unable to study law because a condition of her bridging visa is that she cannot study at university.
"You're meant to have the right to study. You're meant to have the right to education," she said.
"That's been deprived of me."
Refugee sent away by Australia savours life in Canada. By Abdul Hekmat, The Canberra Times
"The difference between Australia and Canada is that you are imprisoned in Australia, and now you're free in Canada," he said.
"They (the Australian government) took our freedom, made us sick, punished us every single minute and separated us from our families."
While in Canada, Myo has used his experience as an application writer to help medically evacuate refugees and asylum seekers from Nauru.
Refugee sent away by Australia savours life in Canada. By Abdul Hekmat, The Canberra Times