Immigration minister Philip Ruddock's proposed law to allow strip searches of refugees, increase prison terms for those that flee detention and further restrict visitor access to detention centres are a disgrace.
Their introduction into parliament on April 5 followed two weeks in which the government's inhumane policy on refugees was even more exposed than usual.
First, on March 26, 14 refugees who faced being sent back to persecution fled Villawood detention centre, in Sydney's western suburbs. The government responded by sending agents to invade and search the homes of more than 50 refugee rights campaigners.
Second, on March 29, refugees at Port Hedland detention centre erupted in protest. A few days later, refugees at Curtin followed suit. Some of the protesting refugees had just been informed that their asylum applications had been rejected, on the grounds that another country should take them.
Third, on April 2, a Pakistani refugee, Sharaz Kayani, set himself alight in front of Parliament House in Canberra in a shockingly desperate attempt to force Ruddock to allow him to bring his family to Australia.
Kayani was granted a protection visa five years ago. Under normal conditions, he would have been able to bring his wife and three children out to Australia. But Kayani's eight year old daughter has cerebral palsy, and our government is too stingy to risk paying up to $17,000 a year in medical care.
Despite repeated warnings from doctors and psychologists that Kayani was becoming suicidal, Ruddock refused to act.
Kayani now has burns to 50% of his body. If he recovers, he will be unrecognisably disfigured, and will need medical care for the rest of his life.
These are not isolated incidents. They are the direct consequence of a bi-partisan policy of denying Australian residence to as many of the world's poor and oppressed as possible.
Ruddock, and the opposition spokesperson on immigration, Con Sciacca, are not interested in the courage, experience and diversity that refugees bring to Australia, nor the jobs that are created by providing refugees with social services. They are certainly not interested in any humanitarian argument that Australia has a duty to provide a refuge for all those in need.
All they are interested in is reducing public spending (and employment) by slashing services, and granting ever bigger investment incentives to their big business mates thus ensuring money in the coffers for the next election campaign.
That is why refugees are locked up in the most isolated and remote areas of Australia, and then subjected to the psychological torture of harassment and systemic denial of information.
That is why these centres are managed by a company which uses ex-prison guards to run them, and makes a profit out of persecution.
That is why families are separated, and relatives of asylum seekers left to the mercy of the government that persecuted them.
It is only the poor who are thus targeted. The vast majority of illegals' in Australia are visa overstayers from Western Europe and the United States. But they are not hounded down by the immigration department and dragged into detention camps. They are not chained together like dogs when found picking fruit illegally.
This hypocrisy was made particularly clear on April Fool's Day, when Ruddock announced that the government would welcome 200 refugees who were soldiers of the notorious South Lebanese Army. Puppets of the Israeli military, the SLA's persecution of dissidents during their time in power in Lebanon has been compared to Hitler's. Not surprisingly, they are now not welcome in Lebanon.
The SLA soldiers can come to Australia, while Kayami's daughter cannot, because Ruddock is far more willing to help another imperialist power than he is to help those suffering under imperialism. Under capitalist values, the powerful work together to screw the rest.
These are not our values. It is not enough to slowly increase the refugee quota: any quota will deny safety to those who need it. We need a policy which offers residency, and our standard of living, to all who want it, whether they flee desperate poverty or political persecution. Then and only then could Australia boast of a non-racist immigration policy.