New data on the mental health of children being detained in Australia’s centres will also be revealed at Thursday's hearing, a source has said.
Department secretary Martin Bowles will be among the Immigration and Border Protection staff giving evidence at the third hearing of the inquiry, launched by the Australian Human Rights Commission in February.
Commission President Gillian Triggs said compulsory powers may be used to allow people previously prevented by confidentiality agreements to give testimony.
“By requiring a person to attend and give evidence, people who may have signed confidentiality agreements are lawfully able to give full and frank statements about what they witnessed and experienced,” she said.
The third hearing, held at the Commission’s headquarters in Sydney, will focus on conditions at Nauru and Christmas Island, as well as the impacts of long-term detention on children and their families.
Pre-transfer assessments of children and mothers sent to “regional processing countries” will also be examined.
Senator blocked from centre
The inquiry hearing follows the blocking of Senator Sarah Hanson-Young from a detention centre in Western Australia.
The Greens Senator was denied access to the Curtin Immigration Detention Centre on Wednesday, less than a week after 157 Sri Lankan and Indian asylum seekers had been transferred there.
She and her staff were almost at the centre when they were informed of the denial over email, she told SBS World News.
“There was very little explanation at all,” she said
“It was put down to management of the centre.”
Senator Hanson-Young said she had been given access to reports from inside the centre, detailing the health and mental health of the children and adults being detained.
“The medical team in the last couple of days have been assessing the health and mental health of all of those involved and are reporting very high levels of torture and trauma,” she said.
“These are the types of things that the minister [Scott Morrison] clearly doesn’t want me to see or the Australian people to hear about.”
Immigration Minister Scott Morrison has since told the ABC that the decision was “based on the interests of the good management and safety of the centre”.
“Senator Hanson-Young was previously denied access to the Pontville Detention Centre by Minister Burke in July 2013 for ‘operational reasons’,” he said.
Share
