AUSTRALIA

QUEUE JUMPERS

Feb 2001 – 45’

DENIS VOIGHT, SOUTH AUSTRALIAN COUNCIL OF CHURCHES: They have incredible baggage.

Torture, trauma, seeing family mutilated, family killed, family thrown from their homes, people persecuted, removed from their jobs -- a whole range of things that they have to deal with.

PHILIP RUDDOCK, MINISTER FOR IMMIGRATION: If I was able to remove them and put them back in this refugee camp where they could wait, I'd do so.

PROFESSOR PAT McGORRY, PSYCHIATRY, MELBOURNE UNIVERSITY: The stress that they're under is absolutely extreme.

You know, indefinite detention, not knowing when you're going to get out, the threat of being sent back to a country that you fear you're going to be murdered or tortured upon return. I mean, this is the most extreme form of stress you can possibly conjure up. And our country is doing this to these people.

STEPHEN McDONELL: Riot police using water cannon, tear gas and batons stormed a desert detention centre in South Australia seven weeks ago. They acted to quell a riot. Would-be refugees had set fire to buildings, pulled down a perimeter fence and were throwing stones at guards.

TV REPORTER: Four buildings were destroyed in all and another two set on fire, including the school which was only recently renovated.

STEPHEN McDONELL: The August riot at Woomera Detention Centre marked a new low in Australian public opinion towards the refugees.

BOB LITTLE, WOOMERA CARAVAN PARK OWNER: When they come over here, i.e.

jump the queue, destroy their paperwork and expect to be walking the streets in 40 days and if they don't, they spit the dummy and burn down buildings, I'm sorry, that's --

that's pretty negative, not only for the Woomera community but probably for the whole of Australia. You can't just take them out and shoot them. That's been made clear.

But there's other things that --

They've got to get to the source but you can't just throw them in the water and drown them.

You've got to process them but there's a way that process has got to take.

TALKBACK HOST: Look, I'm getting sick and tired of it and I'm sure you are.

I'm sure a lot of people listening to this program are as well.

It is time we kicked these bums out of the country who keep on breaking the law.

STEPHEN McDONELL: The closest capital city to Woomera is Adelaide.

There the riot sent talkback radio into a frenzy, just like the rest of Australia.

TALKBACK CALLER: They're used to being rather barbaric.

TALKBACK HOST: You just don't wreck the furniture in this country.

Can you imagine going over to one of their countries and then trying to do things our way?

TALKBACK CALLER: It's the way you're brought up, Jeremy.

TALKBACK HOST: We would get short shrift.

STEPHEN McDONELL: South Australia's newspaper, the 'Advertiser', warned in an editorial that, "We are all at risk."

Australia is alone in the Western world with its compulsory detention for asylum seekers.

Since Four Corners went inside our detention centres earlier this year, this policy has come under even further strain.

At the Woomera Centre, there have been two acts of mass disobedience.

Denied newspapers, radio, television and even local phone calls, they broke out of the isolated centre in June and staged a protest in town.

Two months later, detainees rioted.

This time, the Immigration Department responded with full force.

There were some 800 asylum seekers at Woomera.

51 were charged with alleged involvement in the riot.

JOURNALIST: The Immigration Department is yet to confirm what those charges will be but has said it is serious.

In fact, there's another refugee going in now so that makes 11.

STEPHEN McDONELL: Under heavy security, the alleged rioters were bundled off to Adelaide where they are currently in custody awaiting trial.

TALKBACK CALLER: What eruptions are they going to cause for our dear little South Australia?

It's going to turn out to be very ugly if these people are let in our community which the stupid Government's letting them in.

TALKBACK HOST: Well, we do things differently in this country.

STEPHEN McDONELL: In October last year, the Howard Government created two separate classes of refugees.

The first is for asylum seekers processed overseas and invited to Australia.

And the second is for those who make their own way here uninvited.

The Government calls them queue jumpers.

FARHAD NOORI, COALITION -- JUSTICE FOR REFUGEES: I escaped Iran.

I went to Pakistan in 1988.

And after a year of living the lifestyle of a refugee in Pakistan, I arrived to Australia with quite a contrast.

STEPHEN McDONELL: Farhad Noori came to Australia as an authorised refugee.

He successfully applied to Australian authorities back in the 1980s from inside a refugee camp overseas.

On his arrival, he received extensive support.

But this is not the case with those who are labelled as queue jumpers.

FARHAD NOORI: We're not realising that our investment on the first few weeks and months would help this settlement process in the long term, much easier.

STEPHEN McDONELL: Farhad works with a coalition of mostly church groups who help the second class of refugees, those who came here illegally, have been through the detention centres and who are treated very differently by the Howard Government.

These men are so-called illegals.

They were released from Woomera Detention Centre after Immigration concluded they have a well-founded fear of persecution back in Afghanistan.

Legally, they can't be sent back.

But life can be made hard.

As members of the second class of Australia's refugees, the Afghanis have been given three-year Temporary Protection Visas or TPVs.

This means they get $172 a week as long as they're unemployed.

When they were first released, the Government reserved a couple of nights accommodation for them in a backpacker hostel.

Then they were on their own.

Farhad found them this flat and those who moved in are a floating population.

'SAYED', AFGHAN REFUGEE: We are six people living in this house but sometimes our friends go to some place for work.

And after 10 days or 15 days, our other friends released from Woomera camp and come here to live with us.

FARHAD NOORI: If you could speak to some of these men.

I have recently had a baby and I take my baby around when I am visiting as much as I can.

And so many of them break into tears, just remembering their own childs --

uh, children.

Some of them have left pregnant wives back home.

They haven't even seen the pictures of their children.

They are not able to communicate the way that we know communication around the world.

Sending a message to their family is limited only to a few Red Cross messages that would take three months.

STEPHEN McDONELL: Here, 35 Afghani men occupy five flats in the same block.

And it's true, they have left behind their wives and, between them, over 100 children.

They were hoping they could bring their families out here but with the Temporary Protection Visas this is prohibited.

And they lose their visa if they leave the country to go and visit them.

The Afghanistan they fled is the Afghanistan of the fanatical Taliban Government.

Almost to the month they fled, the ABC witnessed public executions inside an Afghani soccer stadium.

These Afghanis are Hajaras.

They're Shiite Muslims from a country run by fundamentalist Sunni Muslims.

Afghani Shiites can face public execution for their faith, language and culture.

Their fears stay with them.

'SAYED' (TRANSLATION): Life is difficult for my people in Afghanistan.

Our beliefs are insulted.

That's why I left.

Everybody has a different reason to leave Afghanistan.

I have my own reasons but I don't think it's appropriate to discuss all the details with you now.

STEPHEN McDONELL: It hardly compares, but life is also a daily struggle in Australia.

Every night you'll find Sayed hunched over his book, desperately trying to learn English.

He's been learning to write letters.

'SAYED' (Reads letter in English): "It was my mother's wish.

She had some problems from her heart.

And always and she told me, 'My beloved son, I have a wish to see your wife and children because maybe I will be die very soon.'" STEPHEN McDONELL: He learns English at the local TAFE college.

MEREDITH GAUANON, ADELAIDE TAFE: When I started to read Sayed's first letter, I was overcome with --

with sorrow for him.

Describing the loss of his family, the loss of his mother, having to live like an insect under someone's floorboards for 18 months.

We had a look at some standard interview --

STEPHEN McDONELL: Sayed is learning English against the will of the Australian Government.

He only has classes because the South Australian Premier has defied the Federal Minister, a fellow Liberal.

These classes are funded by South Australians.

When the Howard Government created its special category for queue jumpers, it also denied them the English classes that other refugees receive.

They sometimes get English tuition in the detention centres and Philip Ruddock says that's enough.

PHILIP RUDDOCK: Why should I leave a situation in place where people are encouraged to engage organised criminals to bring them to Australia unlawfully in the most hazardous of vessels where they put their lives at risk?

Why would I knowingly allow that situation to go on by putting in place programs which I know were going to add an additional layer of incentive for people to seek to come to Australia that way?

Why would I do it?

JOHN OLSEN, PREMIER, SOUTH AUSTRALIA: My view is if you're going to give the people temporary permits as refugees and you want them to assimilate and make their own way within the Australian society, then they've got to have English language as a prerequisite to be able to do so.

Non-access to English language means you restrict their capacity to become self-sufficient within Australian society.

PHILIP RUDDOCK: I'm saying that if you now were to adopt a different approach to the one that we have, it would be an indication that the measures that we have taken are being unwound.

And I don't think that would be a good message.

MEREDITH GAUANON: I felt that teaching him English was really quite a superficial thing -- that he needed so much more than just English lessons.

I think most Australians could never conceive of the horrors he has faced.

JOHN OLSEN: If people are going to put their life into their own hands to take a boat trip across difficult waters to get to Australia, the fact that they're either getting English language lessons or not is not going to be a deterrent at the end of the day.

It will not, in my view, stem the flow.

STEPHEN McDONELL: Do you think it's a little mean-spirited of the Federal Government?

JOHN OLSEN: Well, I could put it that way.

I think --

STEPHEN McDONELL: So you think it is?

JOHN OLSEN: Well, I think the point is if they are granted refugee status after due process, then there is only one class of refugees.

You shouldn't have two classes.

We are making two classes of refugees and in the meantime --

STEPHEN McDONELL: Premier Olsen says all refugees should get professional support, accommodation services, English classes, legal advice and the freedom to leave the country.

In taking this stance, South Australia's Premier is quietly undermining his Federal Liberal colleague, a colleague whose message to the Temporary Visa holders is, "Well, you can stay here for the moment but you're not welcome."

PHILIP RUDDOCK: You know if I was able to remove them and put them back in this refugee camp where they could wait, I'd do so.

But our obligation under the Refugee Convention that we have signed is not to re-foul -- not to return them to a situation of persecution.

STEPHEN McDONELL: According to the Minister, all asylum seekers should apply with the United Nations High Commission for Refugees from within the refugee camps overseas and wait.

This process takes years.

ABDUL HAMDY, AL MOUSTAFA ISLAMIC ASSOCIATION: It's very hard.

If you apply through the legal, through the Application 842, you will receive a standard letter telling you that you have to wait for 72 weeks.

STEPHEN McDONELL: What -- you have to wait in the refugee camp?

ABDUL HAMDY: That's right.

Wait for the application.

That's the processing.

STEPHEN McDONELL: Abdul Hamdy from the Al Moustafa Islamic Association argues the official channel allows hardly anyone through.

He considers it a joke.

ABDUL HAMDY: They have no option, so --

STEPHEN McDONELL: What do you mean -- they have no option?

ABDUL HAMDY: I mean because as I said, the legal way or the authorised way is so slow, so long and hopeless, there is no hope to go through.

So they have been through a very hard situation where they feel their kids, their lives -- there is no future.

So they have to flee, you know, so --

STEPHEN McDONELL: What -- to try and come here the illegal way?

ABDUL HAMDY: Yeah.

I mean, it's very hard for them.

It's very hard.

STEPHEN McDONELL: Hajer and her daughter Neda are Iraqis who were recently released from detention.

Hajer's husband has not been released yet.

So they are left to fend for themselves in a new country.

The South Australian Government provided a temporary residence but their time here is now up.

Luckily, help is on the way.

NABIL MOUCASHA, FERTILE CRESCENT: I do about 370km plus 370km -- that's 740-something a week driving.

STEPHEN McDONELL: 700km a week driving around?

NABIL MOUCASHA: Driving around.

STEPHEN McDONELL: Nabil Moucasha is a volunteer working with the Arab-Australian organisation called the Fertile Crescent.

He spends a large proportion of his waking hours looking for flats, clothes and furniture for the refugees with three-year Temporary Protection Visas.

How do you feel about the fact that you've got to do this and not the Federal Government?

NABIL MOUCASHA: Well, I'm a --

I'm a voluntary worker.

I don't care what government and what other political part does.

I just do my own part.

As a humanitarian association, we are a social association.

STEPHEN McDONELL: Fortunately, Nabil has found Hajer and Neda a flat.

And as ever, he supplies the trusty Toyota to move their life's possessions.

Because Hajer doesn't speak English, her daughter shoulders much of the responsibility.

HAJER, (TRANSLATION): Try to sort out all these payments, my daughter feels responsible and is tying herself up with all these problems.

She has to handle all the files and visas.

We go to the lawyer, we got to Centrelink or different departments, like Housing, or the bank, and my daughter is feeling the pressure and she's very worried about her father.

NEDA, (TRANSLATION): We never thought it would take this long -- four months or more.

We were hoping for him to come out so soon, we didn't even say goodbye properly.

It was like Dad was in one queue and we were in another.

We just said goodbye and left.

RADIO REPORT: And welfare groups say the level of public support for Australia's newly released refugees is waning after comments by Immigration Minister Philip Ruddock.

PHILIP RUDDOCK: The people involved are going from one organisation to another.

That suggests to me double-dipping.

STEPHEN McDONELL: Another day, another list of jobs for Nabil that he'll never complete.

More scrounging for fridges and clothes.

More begging real estate agents to let refugees with no rental history move into their flats.

And you're even missing your own son's birthday party today.

Is that right?

NABIL MOUCASHA: Yes.

My son's birthday is just about started now.

So if I make other people happy, I think my son will be happy too.

STEPHEN McDONELL: What did you say to your son?

NABIL MOUCASHA: I said to him I'm going to go and help this family.

They've got two kids.

Because my son met these two kids.

And I told him, "How would you feel like you sleep on the floor?

And you have a good birthday, you have cake to eat.

And there they have no cake, nothing to cook and in the fridge.

Which one is better -- come to your birthday and wish you a birthday or go help this family?"

And he said, "No, help the family."

So he understand more as well.

STEPHEN McDONELL: So who lives here, Nabil?

NABIL MOUCASHA: This is Haider and Tara and they've got two kids.

They live in the house since Tuesday night.

And I'm very upset because I'm trying every other organisation to scab some furniture for them.

And like you see, they've got no furniture.

They've been here since Tuesday night.

They sleep -- they sit on the ground, even they have their meal on the ground there as well.

I collected something from the rubbish collectors, you know, not from any other charities.

STEPHEN McDONELL: Haider and Tara are both accountants.

They fled Iraq one night late last year.

For the safety of their family in Iraq, we can't tell you why they left.

But Immigration authorities have heard their reasons and accepted them as refugees.

When they arrived with their two little boys they had US$800 and a couple of bags of clothes.

Again, because their arrival was unauthorised they were only granted Temporary Protection Visas.

NABIL MOUCASHA: Even I wish if I got some furniture myself to bring them here, a couple of chairs like this so they could sit during the night-time.

Also there's no TV.

STEPHEN McDONELL: Mmm.

NABIL MOUCASHA: Not even one seat in the house.

STEPHEN McDONELL: Yes, it's certainly very sparse, isn't it?

NABIL MOUCASHA: Yeah.

Like, I mean, they've got a few things to cook with and a couple of pots and a frypan -- that's all that I could collect.

And all the organisations you go through asking for a bit of help, they only give you a voucher for small crockeries.

They've got no furniture.

They're all drained out.

And the trouble is I've got another family living on Days Road.

They need some furniture.

They've been almost two weeks in that house.

And I've got another family at Foster Road, they've going to move out very soon.

We can't get even furniture for them.

Secondly, I have a big group coming on Wednesday morning.

And there's 10 family in that group.

What are we going to do then?

STEPHEN McDONELL: Because TPV holders survive on a $172 weekly allowance they get cooking implements from the likes of St Vincent de Paul.

But the charities are running out and there are busloads of refugees on the way.

So what you're saying, you're finding it hard to get furniture for the families that are already here.

NABIL MOUCASHA: Very, very hard.

FARHAD NOORI: Just imagine about 1,000 refugees have been dropped off in the city of Adelaide.

More or less, it's going to happen in the next few weeks.

And the thought of providing all these services for them to be relied on just some welfare organisations, just to rely on second-hand furniture that is tucked away in some shed.

I just don't know what the Government was thinking.

Or is thinking.

JOHN OLSEN: I think Philip Ruddock is a very good Immigration Minister.

He is what I would count as a friend.

On this policy issue, however, I have a different point of view.

And it's that different point of view on policy that I've expressed.

STEPHEN McDONELL: A few of the things he said, for example, are that these people are double-dipping, for example, by going to several charitable organisations and getting, I suppose, clothes from different places.

Do you agree that that's a problem?

JOHN OLSEN: Well, they're only double-dipping because they've been denied access to support to get on their own feet.

Once again, we come back to this argument -- either they're a refugee, or they're not.

STEPHEN McDONELL: You've also accused these TPV holders of double-dipping on the charities.

Now if I could quote to you from Premier Olsen, he says, "They're only double-dipping because they've been denied access to support to get on their own two feet."

What do you say to that?

PHILIP RUDDOCK: Well, it's just simply untrue.

Ah, I mean, they get access to income support, rent assistance, health -- if they've got children they get support for their families.

NABIL MOUCASHA: And this is the mattress like I was talking about and the blankets.

That's all.

I mean, this family of four persons that sleep in one room on these kind of mattresses.

I don't think they do understand.

They think they're refugees, they come here and they live in luxury.

But like you see around this house, is that luxury?

Is that luxury?

STEPHEN McDONELL: No, it doesn't look like it.

NABIL MOUCASHA: For any family?

STEPHEN McDONELL: Church charities have even been able to find some toys for the children.

But there are certain things, the Government argues, the refugees simply should not have.

PHILIP RUDDOCK: I mean, it's amazing, isn't it, that we're dealing with a group of people who seem to have in large part, access to mobile phones Which many would see as a luxury within the context of Australia.

Many pensioners would perhaps like to be able to afford to buy a mobile phone.

DENIS VOIGHT, SOUTH AUSTRALIAN COUNCIL OF CHURCHES: You need to be able to communicate, especially if you're job-hunting, especially if you're looking for English classes, if you're looking for flats, if you're getting your health checks, you need to have a phone, you need to have the cheapest phone system that you can find.

And in Australia today, the cheapest phone systems you can get often are mobile phones.

Common sense would dictate that.

STEPHEN McDONELL: Haider and Tara paid a smuggler US$20,000 to bring their family to Australia.

They took photos of the last leg of the journey, a perilous boat trip from Indonesia.

TARA: We took this photo for the future.

For our kids.

To show them how we get to Australia.

How we suffered for seven days in a hard trip in sea, in a small boat and not safety.

So you can see how it's -- the boat.

HAIDER, (TRANSLATION): The trip took seven days instead of four.

We got lost.

On the last day the sail was ripped but Allah saved us.

STEPHEN McDONELL: And maybe Allah was working through the Australian Navy, which rescued them.

TARA: It was a hard trip.

It was a hard feeling.

We can't forget it forever.

So I still, to now, I scare from the sea and from the waves.

My husband told me we can go for the beach to see the sea.

I told him no, I will not go there again.

STEPHEN McDONELL: Because you're afraid of the ocean?

TARA: Yeah.

'Cause I'm afraid.

When I stand near the beach I fear the waves will come and get me.

The sea.

STEPHEN McDONELL: The Government doesn't have ears for refugee survival stories.

They just don't fit into the Minister's strategy.

PHILIP RUDDOCK: Look.

You can have a test.

And the test might be the hero test.

We'll say, "We will accommodate as refugees in Australia those people who are prepared to submit themselves to a life-threatening situation, a hazardous voyage and have enough money to pay a people-smuggler."

Now that could be the test.

Or you could have a test which says there is an international body with offices all around the world that you can go to and register and you can have your situation judged as to whether or not they are more compelling circumstances that warrant resettlement than others.

Now, in my judgement, the preferable, the preferable way of deciding it is to, ah, is to, ah, avoid the hero test, and to enable a judgement to be made by experienced officers as who is in the most compelling circumstance.

STEPHEN McDONELL: The refugee dilemma is not simple.

Nor is it Australia's alone.

With tens of millions of displaced persons internationally, all governments face the arrival of uninvited asylum seekers.

But the number of refugees picked up along the Australian coast is very small compared with other nations.

Yet Australia's unique contribution is its policy of compulsory detention.

So which other countries, then, detain illegal asylum seekers on the same level that we do?

PHILIP RUDDOCK: Um, the country that has recently moved to institute similar arrangements to ours is Canada.

STEPHEN McDONELL: Anyone else except them?

Can you just list them for us now?

PHILIP RUDDOCK: Well, Canada, the United Kingdom and Ireland are now looking at instituting policies similar to our own.

But the fact is --

STEPHEN McDONELL: But which countries are currently doing it?

It seems like there's not many countries apart from us doing this, are there?

PHILIP RUDDOCK: Um, most countries are not in a position, with water borders, to be able to make the decisions that we can make.

Many countries only find that people have entered unlawfully well after the time that they've arrived.

STEPHEN McDONELL: According to the Government, our special system is working.

We're able to identify genuine refugees from within the detention centres.

The Minister stated after the recent riot that those involved were not legitimate refugees.

Facing deportation, he said, they turned to rioting.

REPORTER, (28 AUGUST, 2000) : You said they were people whose refugee applications had been denied.

PHILIP RUDDOCK: There are people from a number of countries whose claims for refugee status have clearly been rejected.

They've been found to be, using the formal term -- unfounded.

STEPHEN McDONELL: It's very hard to tell how accurate the claim is that our assessment system is fair, when departmental secrecy prevents the asylum seekers' personal stories being told.

It's impossible to know just who has a well-founded fear of persecution.

Nevertheless, an Adelaide court provided one window of opportunity.

Morteza Hashemi was charged for alleged involvement in the Woomera riot.

Four weeks ago, his lawyer applied for bail, hoping the 18-year-old could return to Woomera to comfort his mother.

His lawyer said that, back in Iran, Morteza's father was abducted in the middle of the night.

His father's mutilated, dismembered body was later delivered to the family home.

When Australian Immigration officials snatched Morteza from his Woomera bed, at about 6:00am, to transport him to Adelaide, his mother feared her son would be killed, just like her husband.

Bail was granted, but Immigration has refused to let him go back to Woomera.

Six weeks on, he's still separated from his mother.

This court case sits uncomfortably with official statements that none of the Woomera rioters had legitimate claim to refugee status.

The Government remains unapologetic over its stance, but the wisdom of refugee policy is now being questioned by long-term observers.

In another detention centre, Victoria's Maribyrnong, Melbourne University has carried out secret research.

Researchers found the mental health of detainees to be much worse than even that of those struggling with uncertain status outside.

PROFESSOR PAT McGORRY, PSYCHIATRY, MELBOURNE UNIVERSITY: We're talking about an order of magnitude four times more severe, based on the assessments that we've carried out from a very rigorous scientific standpoint.

STEPHEN McDONELL: And measuring what sorts of things?

PROFESSOR PAT McGORRY: Levels of depression, traumatic stress, suicidal ideation, anxiety and also just the general level of functioning of the person.

Professor Pat McGorry is an internationally recognised psychiatrist who's worked with refugees in detention for 13 years.

He says the time has come to abolish detention for asylum seekers.

PROFESSOR PAT McGORRY: The stress that they're under is absolutely extreme.

Indefinite detention.

Not knowing when you're going to get out.

The threat of being sent back to a country that you fear you're going to be murdered or tortured upon return.

I mean, this is the most extreme form of stress you can possibly conjure up.

And our country is doing this to these people.

STEPHEN McDONELL: The Melbourne University team made a special study of asylum seekers from the civil war in Sri Lanka, where brutality is commonplace on all sides.

TAMIL REFUGEE, (TRANSLATION): When I saw those torturings -- I can still see a friend of mine being tortured.

He was arrested by the Indian Army and burnt with a hot iron.

His skin was peeled off.

They tied him to a stake in the sun.

I saw it with my own eyes.

STEPHEN McDONELL: Maritza Thompson is a Chilean-Australian psychologist who treated these Tamil men for trauma inside the Maribyrnong Detention Centre.

Two years ago, management at the centre changed.

She was denied access and hasn't seen them since.

Like her Melbourne University colleague, Professor McGorry, she is deeply concerned at the effect of new Australian policies on already-damaged people.

All these men were tortured before they came here.

In Maribyrnong, they secretly painted representations of their fragile emotional condition.

What do these skeletons represent?

MARITZA THOMPSON, PSYCHOLOGIST: The skeletons represent the detainees in the detention centre.

A lot of the times I've been told maybe it's exaggerated and it's too much.

But my question, at that point, in my own mind is, is it exaggeration, or is it about the people's feeling?

And that we need to be able to open up to their feelings and what they're going through.

TAMIL REFUGEE: I was arrested by the Intelligence Service and jailed in Colombo.

I was accused of a bombing in Dehiwala and tortured in jail.

In the jail they asked me, "Who is your leader, where are the bombs and what is your next target?"

They tried to make me sign a document but I refused.

So they pulled out my fingernails and burnt me with a hot iron.

They tied my legs together and hung me upside down.

It was as close as you can go to knowing death.

ANOTHER TAMIL REFUGEE: The unforgettable thing is when they tie your thumbs together behind your back, but your legs are not touching the floor in that position.

Your whole body is strung up by the thumbs.

That is the position in which they beat you.

Your mind wants to touch the floor.

When you pull and pull to rest on the floor, all you do is dislocate your shoulders.

STEPHEN McDONELL: Mungunthan was also hung upside down with his head wrapped in a plastic bag, a bag partially filled with petrol.

He also was taken to the point of death.

PROFESSOR PAT McGORRY: Those memories are laid down in such an incredibly intense way that when they are unlocked, the person is totally overwhelmed and actually can't cope, usually, with the memory.

Certainly, untrained detention centre staff, for example, and departmental -- Department of Immigration -- staff, have great difficulties appreciating this, and they tend to label behaviour of refugees in detention or asylum-seeking situations as manipulative, malingering and so on.

STEPHEN McDONELL: Chandran was accepted as a refugee after a long battle, but only because Maritza convinced Immigration to consider his torture experiences.

MARITZA THOMPSON: I mean, it was obvious.

When I met him, I looked at him and I said, "What -- what --

what happened to you?"

STEPHEN McDONELL: What do you mean?

What was obvious?

MARITZA THOMPSON: His torture marks.

I mean, the nails had all been removed, and you could see that.

They were just starting to grow, some of them.

Others were still there.

His toenails you could see.

The slash in his back.

The torture which is on the sole, where they get beaten underneath the sole.

You know, you could see the --

You couldn't touch him at that point.

Because just to be touched, he would jump.

PROFESSOR PAT McGORRY: 70 per cent of a significant sample of Sri Lankan Tamils that we assessed had been severely tortured during their time in Sri Lanka, and yet these people had to go through the wringer, really, in terms of their asylum-seeking process.

They clearly were tortured on multiple occasions, and yet it took, on average, about two years for their claims, ultimately, to be upheld.

The Department attempted to deport a number of these people before they were eventually accepted after a major arm wrestle in many cases.

STEPHEN McDONELL: Professor McGorry and Maritza Thompson's clandestine research on Tamil detainees found 88 per cent had been close to death.

92 per cent had a friend or family member murdered. 96 per cent had witnessed the murder of a stranger.

And 72 per cent had been tortured themselves.

The researchers concluded further detention in Australia only added to mental distress.

MARITZA THOMPSON: All of them will present with severe symptoms of clinical depression, uh -- high levels of anxiety, and also post-traumatic stress disorder, which is very common.

PROFESSOR PAT McGORRY: The detention centres are clearly causing mental illness in that they're producing new disorders in people, but they're also exacerbating and worsening existing disorders.

As I said, four times the level of symptoms to those outside.

STEPHEN McDONELL: Professor McGorry and Maritza Thompson say they sent their research to the Immigration Minister.

PHILIP RUDDOCK: I mean, if there are people out there studying these matters who believe that they have --

have produced outcomes that will demonstrate this, then I'd have thought they'd put it to me.

I haven't seen those.

STEPHEN McDONELL: If it could be shown to you that detainees were suffering from clinical depression, trauma and post-traumatic stress disorder, which was caused and/or exacerbated by their detention, what would you do?

PHILIP RUDDOCK: Um -- in relation to providing a humane detention environment, we will continue to provide appropriate professional care and support for the people who are detained.

STEPHEN McDONELL: You wouldn't rethink the policy of detention?

PHILIP RUDDOCK: No.

Not at all.

STEPHEN McDONELL: Even if this could be shown to be widespread?

PHILIP RUDDOCK: Well, um -- I don't believe it is widespread.

STEPHEN McDONELL: All the refugees we've met tonight say they're hugely grateful to be here, but they'd rather live at home and only left because of extreme fear.

Many will stay for good.

There is no clear policy on what will happen when their three-year protection visas expire.

But unless conditions change at home, the refugees will almost certainly have to stay.

Meanwhile, they live with uncertainty.

Like past generations of refugees, a good number will become New Australian citizens, but they will have had a tough start -- a welcoming that only adds to the trauma and guilt of leaving families and communities behind.

TAMIL REFUGEE: For us -- for us -- for us -- for us, we have everything here. With hard work we can do anything here.

Even though we have everything here.

But the Australian Government --

I mean, I am very happy here.

But if you could go back to your country and do something there --

If only you could provide freedom for those people.

(Sobs)

Reporter: Stephen McDonell
Producer: Wayne Harley