Yesterday's announcement that into the community on bridging visas has again been met with disappointment from refugee advocacy groups who say the government is “outsourcing its obligations”.
As the government deals with overflowing detention centres, Immigration Minister Brendan O'Connor announced on Tuesday that more asylum seeker families would be moved into the community on bridging visas.
Mr O'Connor said this move would be cheaper than holding the potential refugees in detention.
A bridging visa is a temporary visa allowing a person to stay in Australia as a lawful non-citizen under certain circumstances, without a substantive visa.
The families , and will receive financial support equivalent to around 89 per cent of the dole, however advocates say it is “not possible” to survive on this alone.
“It's about $200 a week which I think we all know, living in Melbourne or Sydney where most people are coming to, that is not enough to be able to pay rent and to survive,” Jana Favero, spokesperson for the (ASRC), told SBS.
“We've seen various media reports and heard from people that they're not surviving on this meagre amount. They're being forced to sleep on the floor and forced to rely on other charities.”
Ms Favero says it makes “no sense” to be releasing people into the community with “no means for them to be able to access work if they're able to, to be able to support themselves and to be able to work and be part of the Australian community.”
An ASRC campaign backed by dozens of charities calls for all asylum seekers on bridging visas to be given working rights.
says moving asylum seekers into the community but denying them work rights is essentially outsourcing support to “already overstretched and under resourced charities,” and has the
Minister O'Connor's office says people on bridging visas can undertake voluntary work, and the level of support is “adequate”.
“It's not generous, it's adequate, he said.
“That is a deliberate decision. You know, we do not want to provide any incentive for people to get on vessels. But it's also a cost-effective way to manage the network.”
The ASRC disagrees, and Ms Favero said they are getting feedback from multiple mainstream charities that asylum seekers are seeking help with them.
“The government is outsourcing its obligations to provide protection and a safety net to asylum seekers,” said Ms Favero.
“Any budget they did have for such things as housing or material aid to give to people is being taken up in a number of months when it should have lasted a whole year,” said Ms Favero.
“It's traditionally services that asylum seekers haven't accessed, but they're facing such destitution because they can't work, and can't have an income, they have an uncertainty because they haven't even started going through the legal process, but they're absolutely desperate.”
The ASRC says that denying asylum seekers access to employment is “a fundamental breach of very basic human rights,” however they support the plan to move more people into the community.
“We are happy that people are being released from detention because community models are a lot cheaper, people can then contribute, but they have to have an adequate level of access to a safety net and also a level of rights. We shouldn't be stripping away one set or rights once they come out of detention.”
Minister O'Connor said the released families will have their claims processed no faster than if they applied from an overseas refugee camp, as part of the government's
“And we do that because we want to deter people getting on vessels and endangering their lives. We do that because we want to ensure that the humanitarian places that we have - 20,000 in all - are there for those people genuinely seeking asylum.”
