A controversial deportation bill could limit asylum seekers' rights and requires significant amendments, according to a parliamentary report.
The Parliamentary Joint Committee on Human Rights, which is chaired by Labor MP Josh Burns and includes other Labor politicians including Alicia Payne, Karen Grogan and Jana Stewart, tabled a damning report on the legislation on Wednesday.
It claims the laws could break up families by forcing a member to leave Australia, send immigrants back to countries where they could face persecution, and even infringe on their right to privacy.
"By requiring certain non-citizens to do things that would facilitate their removal from Australia ... the measure engages and limits numerous human rights," the report says.
Under the proposed laws, immigrants who refuse to co-operate with the government over their deportation would face a minimum one-year jail term and could spend up to five years in prison.
"The committee considers that mandatory minimum criminal penalties for non-compliance with such a direction are incompatible with rights to liberty and to a fair trial," the report says.
The legislation would also give the home affairs minister unilateral power to ban visa classes of relatives of asylum seekers who come from blacklisted countries that do not accept deportees.
The High Court on Wednesday heard an appeal from an indefinitely detained Iranian man who would not co-operate with his deportation to his home country out of fear he would face the death penalty.
If his appeal is upheld, about 200 immigrants in similar situations could be released from detention.
The government had attempted to pre-empt the hearing and tried to ram through the deportation bill during the last 36 hours of parliamentary sitting before the court date.
But the bill was blocked by an unlikely union between the coalition, the Greens and the cross bench, and sent to a Senate inquiry.
This follows a November ruling from the High Court that found indefinite detention was unlawful for those with no prospect of deportation and led about 150 detainees to be released.
Australian Associated Press
