(August 19, 2010)

JULIA Gillard will not change the review process for asylum seekers, despite the fact that 90 per cent of failed cases are overturned on appeal.

The Prime Minister indicated on morning radio today that the number of overturned decisions was not conclusive enough to inform a broader judgement about the merits of the appeal process or to give a commitment to overhaul it.

She also declined to say how many failed refugees had already had their decisions overturned because the "overwhelming majority" of those cases were still in the review process.

"The cases that are on appeal… are overwhelmingly in the review process so there is not a new stat to give about how those cases under current conditions will go," she told 3AW.

The Australian reported this morning that Ms Gillard’s plan to stop people smugglers was in disarray after 88 per cent of Afghan asylum seekers had their refusals overturned on appeal.

The figure was based on about 14 cases, but is consistent with the experience of refugee lawyers contesting negative decisions on behalf of clients, with one lawyer revealing that all the firm’s clients had been successful in appeal.

This morning Ms Gillard said she saw no need to change the appeal process when questioned about the likelihood of a refusal being overturned.

"The laws and the processes here are the same that the Howard government used," she said. "We haven’t changed the definition of refugee or the processes for appeal. They are the same.

"I don’t think they need to be changed. They are exactly the same ones as when Tony Abbott sat round a cabinet table."

But Opposition immigration spokesman Scott Morrison refuted Julia Gillard’s claim there had been no change in the appeal process since the Howard government.

“They (Labor) created a special deal to appeals which extended to a merit-based review provided by a panel,” he said. “It has bogged down the process of appeal significantly”.

“We would remove Labor’s special appeals process. We would return to the UNHCR system, which is a referral to a single case officer,” he told The Australian Online.

“Under Labor, we’ve got people staying on endlessly after they’ve got a ‘no’ and they’re on shore now,” he said.

Afghans comprise the largest single category of asylum seekers in Australia with more than 3800 having arrived since late 2008.

Ms Gillard has tried to harden her credentials on border protection, supporting an offshore regional processing centre and warning that more asylum seekers would be deported as country conditions improved in one of her first policy speeches as Prime Minister in July.

This morning she denied that the chances of establishing a regional processing centre in East Timor were unravelling after the armed forces and the Catholic Church in the tiny nation condemned the proposal.

"We're in discussion with the government… but the door is open. Discussions will proceed if I’m elected on Saturday," she said.

"We will continue to dialogue with East Timor."

(Source:theAustralian)