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Submission to the National Inquiry into Children in Immigration Detention from
Centacare Sydney
Centacare Sydney, as an agency with more than sixty years experience in the provision of services to children and young persons, in both family and out of home settings, is pleased to have the opportunity to comment on the current situation of children in immigration detention in Australia.
Comments are made from two perspectives; the first from Catholic chaplains who regularly visit the Villawood detention centre in Sydney's outer Western suburbs. The second perspective is that of the broader professional perspective of Centacare staff who provide care and protection to children
We believe that the care of children and young people should be based on the following principles:
- In all matters relating to the welfare of children, the essential goal is to achieve the best interests of the child or young person.
- The rights of Children and Young people are based in their own dignity as human persons and are not derived from parents or family.
- As far as is consistent with their human development and capacity for self-determination, the wishes of children and young people are to be taken into account in respect of their own lives.
- Parents have a right to found a family, and to receive state care and support. Children have a right to the care of their parents. (CROC, Art.18)
- Children and Young people, including refugee and asylum seeker children, have the right to appropriate protection and humanitarian assistance, especially in relation to family reunion. (CROC, art.22)
- Children and young people have a right to education. (CROC, art.28)
Centacare submits that each one of the above principles is in danger being compromised or negated if the current policies and practice of the Australian Government are continued.
On average twenty children are being detained at the Villawood detention centre at any one time. This detention is having an observable detrimental effect on the health of children. One example at the Villawood detention centre is the action of two boys; [words deleted] who recently attempted suicide. Both are presently being treated with medication. Both of these boys have had no formal education for [words deleted] years. There is no secondary school teacher at Villawood. The local State High school has refused to take the boys as students. The local Catholic high school has offered to take the boys for education but the Department of Immigration would not allow the boys to attend. It was reported by the worker who knows the boys well through her regular visits that the motivation for their self-destructive acts is a deep sense of their life chances deteriorating. These boys are acutely aware that other children their age have access to education and broad opportunities for a rewarding and dignified life.
When children detainees at the Villlawood detention centre reach the age of 14 years 9 months the they no longer have access to any education. In Article 6 of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child (CROC) we find that State parties shall ensure to the maximum extent possible the survival and development of the child. Without access to education or meaningful work the cognitive, social and emotional development of these children is arrested. The practice of ceasing to provide educational opportunities to children at age 14 years 9 months clearly is not ensuring that they children are developing to the maximum extent possible.
In Article 12 of CROC we find that the child has the right to express his/her opinion freely and to have that opinion taken into account in any manner or procedure affecting them. The children at the Villawood detention centre have no means of expressing their opinions to the body that is detaining them, the Australian Government, and their opinions are not sought with regard to any manner or procedure that affects them directly or indirectly.
A regular visitor to Villawood detention centre has reported that initially children blame their parents for their plight. Wives blame husbands, and husbands blame wives. The children caught up in this cycle of blame and counter blame internalize the emotional maelstrom and end up seeing themselves as responsible for the plight of the whole family. This process of self-blame on the part of children is well documented in many family studies; it is a crippling sense of responsibility. In article 19 of CROC we find that the State shall protect the child from all forms of mal-treatment by parents or others responsible for the care of the child and establish appropriate social programs for the prevention of abuse and the treatment of victims. There are no social programs conducted at Villawood designed to prevent the children being abused through this unintended, but non-the-less corrosive dynamic.
Interaction with peers in play is a constituent component in the developing sense of self for a child or young person. A strong sense of identity is integral in the formation of robust young adults. Culture, religion, sense of place and family are critical factors in the development of identity. Article 31 of CROC refers to the child's right to leisure, play and participation in cultural and artistic activities. According to reports from the Catholic chaplains who visit the Villlawood centre on a regular basis, the children and young persons in detention have no opportunity to participate in meaningful peer interaction. A twelve-year-old boy is caught between making friends with either an eight-year-old boy or seventeen-year-old young person. He interacts with both for different activities but the nature of the friendships retards normal healthy psychosocial development. His sense of self is developing in a distorted and truncated manner. It is accepted by social science researchers and other professionals who work with children that this distorted sense of self will have long term consequences with regard to psychosocial adjustment in adult life. These consequences will occur in the ongoing lives of these persons irrespective of their ultimate status as Australian citizens or another nation.
As a direct result of detention, children and young persons at Villawood are restricted in their access to the symbols, rituals and stories that shape their cultural identity. The disruption that accompanies movement from one detention facility to another combined with the insecurity of not knowing his or her ultimate destination or determination vis-a vis refugee status has a severe negative effect on the cognitive, emotional and social development of children and young persons at Villawood. The profound loss of hope and clinical depression observed in the children and young persons in detention by the regular visitors is a specific result of the deprivation of peer interaction, a stable sense of place and a lack of exposure to ethno-specific cultural expressions.
The children and young persons at Villawood are there because their parents desired a better life for them. The Australian social fabric is being stretched and tested as we continue to detain children whose only crime is being the children of asylum seeker parents. Centacare is deeply concerned at the long-term consequences of detention of children and young persons. The effects of detention will impact negatively on communities, families and individuals well into the future.
Centacare's Children and Youth Services programs work predominantly with children needing the care and protection offered by the Out of Home Care system in situations where their own parents are unable to care for them, for whatever reason.
The principles and objects of the legislation guiding this work are centred around the need to provide environments for children that are free of violence and exploitation to ensure their safety, welfare and well being. The provision of services to children and their caregiver families, which will foster children's health, developmental needs, spirituality, self respect and dignity is of paramount importance.
Centacare sees the negative effects on our children where these essential elements have not been met. When a daily regime of emotional instability and disconnection to appropriate family functioning is the norm, as is evidenced at the detention centres, it is extremely difficult to resolve the psychological effects on the child. The hope of re-encultrating the child into a nurturing environment, that is so needed for a child's normative development is, sadly, often not able to be achieved.
The strength of the bond between children's love and commitment to their parents and their desire to remain in the care of their parents is undeniable in our work. It is our role and responsibility to assist families to meet the needs of the children, such that the community as a whole is strengthened by the growth of intact, stable family life.
The present situation in detention centres around Australia has, as a by-product, the suffering of innocent children in environments that cannot possibly lead to their normative development. Reputable and consistent theories of attachment strengthen the argument to keep families intact. The return to normative development can only be redressed by children, with their parents, being released and assisted to live in the community. Only in this context will the children be able to develop to their deserved potential. How could these families send their children out of detention? Who would they trust? Losses are compounding for these children; they have already lost their homeland, their extended family, friends and cultural identity. The family unit is all that is left intact.
To separate children from their parents is a wrongdoing and hopefully we have seen the error of this from past practices. To use historical learning of non-separation as an excuse to keep children and their families in detention is equally a travesty of justice and seems to indicate that the Australian Government has no commitment to the agreed principle of the CROC.
Centacare stands with many individuals and agencies with a willingness to commit resources to assist families currently in detention to live in the community. We see no reason why an agency like Centacare could not house and support asylum-seeker families with children in community settings without jeopardising the government's assessment procedures relating to their proper refugee status in this country. In so doing, many of the detrimental effects on these children could be gradually reversed through accepted practice of "normalisation" in the general community, at least for an interim period.
Last Updated 9 January 2003.
