Children would be removed from Australian immigration detention centres and workers would be forced to report any abuse under changes to government legislation made by the Senate.
But the immigration minister would have to consider the public interest when releasing anyone from detention and could not give a tick for relocation in the event of an adverse security ruling.
The Greens won Labor and crossbench support for a series of amendments to a technical migration bill on Monday, which would also require the minister to grant reasonable media access and release details of any declined applications.
The changes also clarify that detention workers, like doctors, can reveal details about what goes on inside the centres without fear of prosecution.
Greens senator Sarah Hanson-Young said it was about time children were released from detention.
"It is a national shame that we have kept them locked up, that we have effectively stolen this amount of time from their childhood," she told the parliament.
Labor amended the Greens changes to inject ministerial discretion into the decision to release children in hopes of reducing any national security risk from dangerous parents.
Assistant Multicultural Affairs Minister Concetta Fierravanti-Wells said the government couldn't forcibly rip children away from detained parents with adverse security assessments.
"As a government we can't just take children out if their guardian or parent does not wish them to be removed from them," she said.
The changes were unnecessary because minors were only detained as a last resort and it was already mandatory for assaults to be reported, she said.
Senator Fierravanti-Wells said the changes were well outside the scope of the bill, which was largely technical in nature.
But Labor frontbencher Kim Carr said the opposition was determined to boost accountability and transparency and had always opposed the "excessive secrecy" surrounding immigration detention.
Australians had a right to know what was happening inside the centres at a large cost to the taxpayer, he said.
The changes wouldn't apply to offshore detention as the government maintains Australia "does not detain people offshore".
The changes will have to be approved by the House of Representatives, where the government has the numbers.
