Inside Australia's Immigration Detention

As you must have noticed, I was really cranky yesterday.  The culmination was at night when a guard came to tell me that she had put a new girl in my room.  Of course, I said 'No'.   The guard asked me whether I wanted to speak to a manager.  I thought I would get the one whom I always speak to first thing in the morning next day rather than speaking to an unfamiliar one at night.  But I changed my mind when I was filling in a complaint form.  So I grabbed the manager of the day.  I told him that I was unhappy and gave him an unhappy stare.  He was mumbling one thing or another but soon agreed to do something in the morning.  Since I am not unreasonable (even though I may not be reasonable), I agreed to put up with a roommate for a night.  But when I came back to my room, the roommate came with her friends and collected her belongings and left.  I could not understand why the supposedly new girl had friends here and a...

Even the High Court justices heard migration cases in January but my Federal Court judge is still enjoying holidays.  It is February but he is still on holidays.   The High Court listed for the judgment in a migration case next week but my case in the Federal Court has no future listings because my judge has not even started working this year yet.  You are right.  I am cranky today. By the way, the High Court case which will be delivered next Wednesday is the Falzon case.  So if you are a migration lawyer, you have to keep an eye on the High Court page (www.hcourt.gov.au) next Wednesday. The Minister seems to want the public voting to select judges.  My inclination today is the partial support for the Minister's idea.  I propose a voting to strike off the judges of the Federal courts before a voting to select the State Courts judges.  Lazy judges should be struck off!  Yes, I am cranky today.  But I am also interested in w...

I got some documents from the Immigration through FOI.  It seems my litigation is looked after by a senior legal officer in the legal section.  The senior legal officer is taking instructions from the Directors of cancellation branch etc.  Obviously, I was severely demoted from 2006 when the Director of the legal section was taking instructions from the First Assistant Secretary who reported to the Deputy Secretary who had a meeting with the Minister regularly.  I am very happy with my rapid demotion in the last 11 years.  Hopefully, I will be demoted even further in the next week or two. Today, I tried an activity entitled 'Music'.  In that activity, a lecturer (the same one as knitting and ESL) distributed a sheet of paper which the lyric of one of Adele's songs was printed with some words were deleted.  Then while we listened to the song, we were required to fill in the missing words.  That's not music.  That's dictation!   ...

My friend whom I call a 'problem child' here finally got a visa today and got out of here.  Thank goodness.  One less worry now.  Another friend eventually received a long-awaited notice today to be sent back to his country where some money he recently had got unexpectedly as inheritance or whatever is waiting.  Yesterday, another friend who is an overstaying tourist successfully negotiated with the Immigration about a visa to go back home.  Last week, my stateless asylum seeker friend got a visa and went out.  So people here are going one after the other.   But my judge is still on holiday... Grrrr! Decades ago, my Parter often ridiculed me by saying 'When Villawood Survivor is not happy, the entire world will know.'  That was not true at all but today, I decided to lodge a few complaints to let someone know that I was not happy.  So I went to the website of the Australian Human Rights Commission to make a complaint by an online co...

This morning, people were upset because three very peaceful pleasant guys had been taken to Christmas Island at 4 am this morning. One of them is a young black overseas student from an African country.  He was here at one time with her sister.  His sister got a bridging visa, I think, last year.  His application was knocked back.  He went to the court yesterday and was told that he would get a decision within 24 hours.  Before that time comes, he was taken to a remote island where no one can contact him.  Isn't that great?  Someone told me that if he wins, the Immigration will bring him back.  But I am not sure.  We will not be notified by the court whether he wins or not and he is not contactable (at least at this moment).  So no one will know anything from now on until and unless he gets back on the Internet from some place in the world.  I do not like the sneaky way of treating a very young overseas student.  Student...

It was an extremely busy day.  The problem was that I attended four activities without giving up my normal routine of having coffee and reading newspapers.  Every activity starts at half past and finishes at quarter past.  So during these fifteen minutes break, I rushed back to my compound to work on emails.  I served my final submissions on the other side, knocked off the last assessment of the online course and so on. Other than ESL and circuit training at the Gym, I tried one science(-like) course and the movie club today.   The lecturer of the science(-like) course showed us a TV program which was concerned with scientific research of the illicit drug use and its effect.  The real drug users participated in the experiment.  I learned the kinds of commonly used illicit drugs, how to use them and the effect of them....  For an ignorant person from a country where the drug control is almost flawless, all the information was new....

It's Day 88.  Still one week before the Federal Court will resume the hearing.  Some judges subcontract (?!) writing entire judgments to their Associates but in many cases, judges write the conclusion by themselves.  So chances are, until and unless my judge, after coming back from holidays on 5th, starts and finishes writing something, I will be here.  My judge is not the slowest worker amongst the ones who hear migration cases in Queensland.  But he proved to be lazy last year so I am worried....  The slowest worker in Queensland is definitely my other judge.  I have a pending case against some Government organisation in the Federal Court.  I filed the case in 2016 and have been waiting for the judgment since May last year!  This dispute occurred in March 2009 and ended up in the Federal Court first time in 2013.  I won the case in 2015.  After the remitter, the Government organisation made the same decision agai...