When it docked in Sydney, NSW, cruise ship "Ruby Princess" & its more than 4,000 passengers and crew were primarily the responsibility of the federal Morrison Coalition Government - but almost no-one gets off unscathed in recently published NSW Commission of Inquiry report

"The human consequences of the scattering upon disembarkation have not yet played out. That is the salient feature of an uneliminated infectious pandemic." [Report: Special Commission of Inquiry into the Ruby Princess, 14 August 2020]

Evidence of human-to-human transmission of SARS-CoV-2 (as COVID-19) emerged almost immediately following the discovery of the virus in Wuhan, China in early January 2020.

On 6 January 2020 a traveler returning by air from China arrived in Sydney, New South Wales, carrying the COVID-19 viral infection.

As the global pandemic grew so did the number of factors to be considered when implementing infection controls.

By early February 2020 concerns were being raised around the world concerning the number of international cruise ships which potentially might be carrying infected passengers.

As of 19 March 2020 the number of confirmed COVID19 cases in the NSW totaled 307 and community concern was mounting.

The “Ruby Princess” - a foreign-owned cruise ship which has capacity for 3,080 passengers and 1,200 crew members - docked in Sydney to board and disembark passengers from its 24 February to 8 March 2020 and 8 March to 19 March 2020 voyages. 

When it entered Sydney Harbour it became a Commonwealth responsibility under federal statutes; Customs Act 1901, Migration Act 1958, Australian Border Force Act 2015 and Biosecurity Act 2015 (an act which in part addresses human biosecurity and whose provisions are administer by the federal departments of Health & Agriculture, Water and the Environment).

By 19 March it was suspected that a number of passengers and crew might possibly have contracted the highly virulent COVID-19 infection.

Five days before the ship's docking Australian Prime Minister & Liberal MP for Cook Scott Morrison had informed the general public that Border Force had implemented measures to screen incoming cruise ships for the coronavirus - "In specific cases where we have Australians on cruise ships then there will be some bespoke arrangements that will be put in place directly under the command of the Australian Border Force to ensure the relevant protections are put in place".

However, it seems that the "Ruby Princess" was exempt from some of Morrison's so-called "bespoke arrangements", in that it had permission to come into Sydney when as a safety measure it should have been refused permission until after 15 April 2020.  It was exempt because it had departed a port outside of Australian waters before midnight on 15 March 2020. 

So, despite the prime minister’s statement on the morning of 19 March 2020 at least 2,700 passengers – a mix of Australian nationals and overseas visitors - were allowed to disembark in Sydney without being screened for the virus.

This mass disembarkation was the direct result of the NSW Dept. of Health Expert Panel classifying the "Ruby Princess" as 'low risk', together with an ongoing failure of a federal department to fully perform its legislated biosecurity functions and, finally verbal permission being given by an unauthorised Border Force official for all passengers to leave the ship on that morning.

With Border Force refusing to release cruise passenger details to airlines, there was no way of tracking passengers once they had left the ship and so infected passengers spread out across the state, across Australia and then by air across the world as oveseas travellers returned home.

Ruby Princess passengers dispersed around the world in the days after it docked. Some of them later displayed coronavirus symptoms.(ABC News: Emma Machan) 

It has been calculated that at least 662 "Ruby Princess" passengers contracted COVID-19 and over time 26 of these died.

By the time the "Ruby Princess" sailed out of Sydney on 23 April 2020 it was thought to be responsible for about one in every ten existing COVID-19 cases in Australia.

An est. 183 crew members were also thought to have become infected.

On 15 April 2020 the NSW Berejiklian Government created a Special Commission of Inquiry into the Ruby Princess.

The Morrison Government did not assist the Inquiry in that it refused to allow a federal bureaucrat to answer any summons received from the Inquiry.

Indeed a summons to a Commonwealth officer to attend and give evidence about the grant of pratique for the "Ruby Princess" resulted in steps being taken towards proceedings in the High Court of Australia.

The Inquiry was due to report the the NSW Governor and Premier by 14 August 2020.

Report: Special Commission of Inquiry into the Ruby Princess, 14 August 2020, can be read and downloaded at:

https://www.dpc.nsw.gov.au/assets/dpc-nsw-gov-au/publications/The-Special-Commission-of-Inquiry-into-the-Ruby-Princess-Listing-1628/Report-of-the-Special-Commission-of-Inquiry-into-the-Ruby-Princess.pdf.

This report contains a litany of errors at federal, state and cruise ship operator level, as well as uncovering deficiencies in current legislation and regulations.

Australia’s Border Farce lives down to its nickname

Minister for Home Affairs and Liberal MP for Dickson Peter Dutton’s poor oversight and lack of managerial skills is on display for all to see…….

The Sydney Morning Herald, 6 June 2018:

The benefits of the merger of the Immigration and Customs departments and creation of Australian Border Force  haven't been proven and promised increased revenue hasn't materialised, a damning audit report has found.

While the Department of Immigration and Border Protection did achieve the merger effectively, it "is not in a position to provide the government with assurance that the claimed benefits of integration have been achieved," the report said.

The merger of the Department of Immigration and Border Protection with the Australian Customs and Border Protection Service took place in 2015, with its functions now covered under the Department of Home Affairs. Controversial at the time, it heralded a move to focus more on guarding the country's borders over resettlement and migration.

In the business case for the merger, the department committed to a "Benefits Realisation Plan," but because the plan was not implemented, the claimed benefits have not been measured and can't be demonstrated, the report said.

While the business case for the integration of the departments promised an increase in revenue from customs duty, less than half of the promised revenue increase has materialised. At the end of 2017, just 42.2 per cent of the extra revenue committed to had been achieved, and the report predicted that at the current rate just 31.6 per cent of the additional revenue promised would be delivered.

When the merger was announced, then immigration minister Scott Morrison promised "hundreds of millions in savings" would be reinvested back into the agency.

Auditor-general Grant Herir slammed the department's record keeping, which the department admitted was in a "critically poor state," and said there was no evidence that the Minister Peter Dutton was given written briefings on the progress of the integration of the departments.

In its response, the Department of Home Affairs acknowledged it had issues with record keeping and committed to making improvements a priority. The report didn't look on this commitment favourably though, pointing to more than 10 years of audits and reviews that have made similar findings.

The problems and their solutions are known to the department, and it has an action plan to address them, although numerous previous attempts to do so have not been successful," it said.

The report also found that the department experienced a loss of corporate memory through the merger.

"Almost half of SES officers present in July 2015 [were] no longer in the department at July 2017," it said.

The report also found that out of 33 consultancy contracts with values of more than $1 million, just 2 were evaluated for value for money, meaning that it was unclear if the other 31 contracts had been value for money.

Spending on consultancy in the department more than doubled in the years after the merger, topping more than $50 million in each of the 2014-15 and 2015-16 financial years…..

The Age, 19 June 2018:

The multimillion-dollar college that trains Australia’s border security personnel has “overpromised and underdelivered” and immigration and customs officials have repeatedly abused their powers, a scathing report has found.

The government-commissioned findings also said many department staff lack the training needed to perform their jobs and “jaws of death” have gripped officials struggling to complete more work with fewer resources.

In May 2014 the Coalition Abbott government controversially announced the creation of the Australian Border Force (ABF), as part of a merger of customs and immigration border operations. Crucial to the new super-charged agency was the establishment of the ABF College, with multiple campuses, to ensure recruits and existing staff “have the right skills to do their jobs”.

Under the former department of immigration and border protection, consultants RAND Australia were asked to evaluate the progress of the merger, ahead of the creation of the Home Affairs portfolio in December last year which combined immigration, border protection, law enforcement and intelligence.

The findings concluded that “clear and unequivocal” progress has been made towards building a “modern border management capability”.

However, success had been “uneven” and in particular, the ABF College “largely remains a disappointment to senior leaders across the department”.

The report involved interviews with senior department officials, who cited concern that the college’s curriculum was “not adequate for actual training needs”.

The college’s use of technology was poor and, in many cases, was used to “automate bad learning environments” rather than improve training.

The college was supposed to train staff across the department, however many officials were not given time to attend courses.

Overall, the college and other training opportunities in the department “overpromised and underdelivered to the detriment of the workforce and the morale”.

One senior official was so frustrated at the problems that he suspended a board examining the issues “until new terms of reference and fresh ideas were developed”.

The report is dated 2018 but it is not clear exactly when it was finalised. The Department of Home Affairs did not answer questions from Fairfax Media on how much had been spent on the college and where its campuses were located. Officials have previously said the 2014-15 budget included $54 million to establish the college and other training measures, and that several campuses would be established including in Sydney and Canberra.

Across the department’s broader workforce, senior officials said staff in many cases lacked “the capability to do the work required of their assigned positions”.

This included customs and immigration investigators “not understanding the law, use of force protocols, and rules of engagement” which in some cases led to “abuse of power,” the report said.

One official said field compliance officers “were doing dangerous jobs without proper training” and another described a junior officer who was “unable to manage shipboard operations due to a lack of proper training and experience”.

Department staff described being held in the “jaws of death” as they juggled an increased workload and declining resources. Senior officials repeatedly raised concern that the ABF received more resources than other divisions but “has not been subjected to the same level of scrutiny”….

As a local member it appears that Dutton is also having ‘workforce’ issues ahead of the forthcoming federal election…..

www.peterdutton.com.au as of 20 June 2018:

Peter is working hard but could use your help.
If you can spare an hour or two to help Peter in Dickson, please join the team.

The most shameful evidence of Peter Dutton's management style is found when one condiders that as Minister for Immigration and Border Protection since 23 December 2014, he currently has ultimate responsibility for the welfare of asylum seekers held in custody. 

As of 26 June 2018 there have been 15 deaths in custody of persons being held in onshore and offshore immigration detention facilities since Dutton became the responsible minister. 

Bringing the total number of deaths in onshore or offshore detention and in the community to est. 64 people since January 2000. 

That is the equivilant of almost four deaths each year on Peter Dutton's watch and around three deaths per year overall.

According to MSN on 21 June 2018; There are nearly 700 men currently in detention on Papua New Guinea, and more than 900 men, women and children on Nauru.

No need to worry about the possibility that a Liberal-Nationals Federal Government will impose censorship on the free press in Australia

The time to fret over the possibility of government censorship of the media is over because in February 2018 it ceased being a distant possibility and became fact.

This is what the Australian Press Council stated about the News Corp online article….

Australian Press Council (APC):   

Adjudication 1732: Complainant/news.com.au (February 2018)

The Press Council has considered whether its Standards of Practice were breached by an article published in news.com.au on 31 May 2017, headed “Islamic State [IS] terror guide encourages luring victims via Gumtree, eBay”.

The opening paragraph read: “ISLAMIC State has released a step-by-step guide on how to murder nonbelievers, which includes how to lure targets via fake ads on Gumtree and eBay”. The article proceeded to relay in detail how an article in “[t]he latest edition of the terror group’s English-language propaganda magazine … encourages would-be terrorists to advertise products on second-hand selling sites … to lure victims and assassinate them”. The article mostly comprised extracts from the source material describing the steps necessary to perform such acts.

The Council considered that the article did publish much of the source material from IS verbatim, with limited accompanying analysis or context, such as comments from experts and websites such as Gumtree. The Council accepted there was no intention to encourage or support terrorism, but considered that republishing content from terrorist entities in this manner can perpetuate the purpose of such propaganda and give publicity to its ideas and practices.

However, the Council accepted the public interest in alerting readers to potential risks to their safety. It considered that on balance, the public interest in alerting readers to the dangerous content of the terrorist propaganda and its instructional detail was greater than the risk to their safety posed by the effective republication of terrorist propaganda content. Given this, the Council concluded that the public interest justified publication of the article. Accordingly, the publication did not breach General Principle 6.

The Council noted that great care needs to be exercised by publications when reporting on terrorist propaganda to ensure that public safety is not compromised. In particular, effectively republishing source material comprising instructional detail in how to carry out particular terrorist acts could pose a risk to public safety, and reasonable steps should be taken to prevent such an outcome.

This is what the Turnbull Government did…….

News.com.au, 28 February 2018:

…the article titled “Islamic State terror guide encourages luring victims via Gumtree, eBay” no longer exists.

A week after it was published on May 31, 2017, the Attorney-General’s office contacted news.com.au to demand it be taken down, saying the Classification Board had ruled it should be refused classification as it “directly or indirectly” advocated terrorist acts.

It appears to be the first time section 9A of the Classification (Publications, Films and Computer Games) Act 1995 has been used to censor a news report, since it was first added in 2007.

The action has alarmed the publisher of news.com.au as Australian media in general were not informed the Classification Board had the power to ban news stories or that the eSafety Commissioner had the power to instigate investigations into news articles.

“The first news.com.au knew of this matter was when contacted by the Attorney-General’s Department and advised of the Classification Board decision,” news.com.au argued as part of a separate Press Council investigation into the article.

“The department, board and the eSafety Commissioner did not contact news.com.au beforehand to advise of the investigation. Consequently, news.com.au was not given the right to make submissions or a defence in regard to the article.”

News.com.au removed the article as it was facing legal penalties from the Australian Communications and Media Authority (ACMA) if it refused, including fines or even civil or criminal legal action.

In justifying its decision, the Classification Board noted the article contained “detailed references and lengthy quotations from Rumiyah (Islamic State’s propaganda magazine)” with limited author text to provide context.

News.com.au asked the board why there was no opportunity for news organisations to defend the article based on public interest grounds but a response provided by a spokesman for the eSafety Commissioner did not directly address this.

The spokesman said the board did consider whether the material could “reasonably be considered to be done merely as part of public discussion or debate, or as entertainment or satire” before making its decision.

He also acknowledged this may have been the first time a news article had been censored using this section.

However, as a government which to a man fails to grasp how the Internet works their well-laid plans seldom go off without a hitch and, the article that Turnbull & Co wish to erase from memory remains on national and international news sites as I write.

"Lucifer" Dutton takes up role as Australian Minister for Home Affairs on Sunday 17 December 2017

The Saturday Paper, 6 December 2017:

Attorney-General George Brandis has confirmed immigration minister Peter Dutton will take up the new home affairs “super ministry” on December 17. The home affairs portfolio, announced in July, will give Dutton sweeping powers over Australia’s intelligence, security and border control apparatuses, and has been criticised for centralising too much authority under one figure and stripping the attorney-general position of its ability to hold security agencies accountable. Brandis denied rumours he will retire from politics before the December reshuffle, saying he intended to stay put. Last week a Canberra Times investigation found a web user with an IP address connected to the Australian Taxation Office edited Dutton’s Wikipedia page, briefly changing his middle name to “Lucifer”.

The Home Affairs super portfolio will merge Australia’s immigration, border protection, law enforcement and domestic security agencies in a single portfolio, including spy agency ASIO, the Federal Police, Border Force and the Australian Criminal Intelligence Commission - under the control of millionaire former Queensland police officer and Liberal National Party MP for Dickson Peter Dutton, with allegedly increased oversight by Australian Attorney-General and Liberal Senator for Queensland George Brandis.

A political pairing from Queensland which may yet turn out to be the stuff of nightmares, given these two gentlmen's attitudes to human rights and civil liberties.

Deaths caused by Australian immigration policies in 2017

Monash University, Border Crossing Observatory:

The Australian Border Deaths Database maintains a record of all known deaths associated with Australia’s borders since 1 January 2000.

The database was begun by Professor Sharon Pickering and Associate Professor Leanne Weber as part of BOb’s Deaths at the Global Frontier project, culminating in the publication of the book Globalization and Borders: Death at the Global Frontier in 2011.

The Border Crossing Observatory continues to periodically update The Australian Border Deaths Database in line with the methodology detailed in Globalization and Borders: Death at the Global Frontier. 

The most recent version records deaths at the Australian frontier for the period 1 January 2000 – August 2017, with a recorded 1,995+ border deaths. [my yellow bolding]

Deaths in 2017 to date:

8-Mar-17 New Zealander, male - suspected suicide by hanging in Maribyrnong Immigration Detention Centre.

7-June-17 Matthew Taylor, New Zealander, male - committed suicide in New Zealand, a year and a half after his deportation under s501 of the Migration Act. He was in a desperate situation in New Zealand with limited support and ties to the country following his return. He moved to Australia with his family as a toddler and had never left Sydney until his deportation following his prison sentence for a string of minor offences. He has a young child in Sydney and his immediate family still live there.

3-July-17 (week beginning) Majid Hassanloo (brother of Saeed Hasanloo), 39 years old, Iranian, male - found dead in the house he was minding in Sydney from a suspected drug overdose. Majid was released from detention in December 2015 but was not offered adequate support. His psychological deterioration was profound.

7-Aug-17 Hamed Shamshiripour, 31 years old, Iranian, male - found dead in the forest near the Australian-run East Lorengau refugee transit centre on Manus Island. Suspected suicide.

More wheels are falling off the Turnbull Government train

BuzzFeed News, 14 September 2017:

Australia's immigration detention regime is facing a crisis in healthcare staffing following the resignation of the surgeon-general of the Australian Border Force (ABF), and the departure of three senior medical staff on Nauru.

Rumours have circulated online for several days that the surgeon-general of the ABF, Dr John Brayley, who oversees the healthcare of asylum seekers in immigration detention, had resigned.

BuzzFeed News has now confirmed that the surgeon-general resigned last week. A senior immigration department source confirmed his resignation, although the department has declined to comment.

Brayley's department email now has an indefinite out-of-office message. His phone has been switched off and is no longer receiving voicemail. His Linkedin profile has also recently removed his position as surgeon-general as his current occupation.

Brayley's resignation comes at a difficult time for the department. The ABF is continuing to face allegations of medical treatment failures at detention centres. A whistleblower on Nauru recently warned that pregnant women on Nauru were being denied terminations.

The department is also facing further internal changes in the lead up to the creation of the new Home Affairs department that will see the ABF merge with agencies including the Australian Federal Police and Australian Security Intelligence Organisation.

Brayley's position — and extensive background in medicine — placed him uniquely to manage healthcare matters in the department and recommend appropriate clinical care for asylum seekers. But his position as surgeon-general also made him a focal point for criticism. He routinely received correspondence from advocates about asylum seeker healthcare matters.

Any decent federal government with an ounce of compassion would end this terrible situation on Manus and Nauru islands.

Australian Border Farce still letting the uniform go to its head

Business Insider Image: Australian Border Force

On 27 February 2017 the Australian National Audit Office released its report into the Australian Border Force Farce use of statutory powers and it appears the uniform is still making personnel giddy with power.

This is the third critical ANAO report and The Sydney Morning Herald carried this same day response from a department obviously unhappy with this report:

Immigration boss Michael Pezzullo conceded to "a number of administrative deficiencies" within his department but shot back at the National Audit Office over "loose terminology" and findings he called "unworldly".

Excerpt from report, with full report available here:

Audit objective and criteria

3. The objective of the audit was to assess the establishment and administration of the Australian Border Force's framework to ensure the lawful exercise of powers in accordance with applicable legislation.

4. To form a conclusion against the audit objective, the ANAO adopted the following high-level audit criteria:

Is there an effective accountability and reporting framework for the lawful exercise of powers?

Do Border Force officers have adequate knowledge of their powers and how to use them?

Conclusion

5. As part of the integration of Immigration and Customs, the department has made progress towards establishing a framework to ensure Border Force officers exercise coercive powers lawfully and appropriately. However, significantly more work needs to be done to gain assurance that controls are effective.

6. The department's enterprise risk management framework does not adequately address the risk of officers exercising coercive powers unlawfully or inappropriately. Several internal assurance reviews have uncovered problems relating to the exercise of statutory powers. The Border Force has established an integrated operational quality assurance team, which has not yet finalised any reports. Delegations and authorisations for coercive powers are complete and in place but not all instruments are accessible to officers.

7. The ANAO found instances of potentially unlawful searches and failure to comply with instructions under both the Customs Act and Migration Act, which indicate current internal controls for mitigating the risk of unlawful or inappropriate use of coercive powers are inadequate.

8. The department has not provided adequate instructions and guidance for officers exercising coercive powers. There is currently no single source of instructions and guidance material for Border Force officers, and much of the guidance material available is out of date and inaccurate. While positive foundational work has commenced on integrating the former Customs and Immigration training regimes, officers have been exercising significant coercive powers without having undertaken pre-requisite training.

Supporting findings

9. The department's approach to risk management at the enterprise level has been developing over the past two years. It has established an enterprise risk framework and is finalising profiles for each of its enterprise risks. The current profile relating to unlawful or inappropriate use of coercive powers conflates this risk with integrity and corruption risks, which require different internal controls. This has the potential to divert attention from controls relating to the risk of unlawful or inappropriate use of coercive powers.

10. The department has undertaken several internal assurance reviews that have uncovered problems relating to the exercise of statutory powers. The Border Force has recently established an integrated team responsible for operational quality assurance testing. The team has not yet completed any reviews. Prior to this, the department did not have satisfactory mechanisms for gaining assurance that officers understand their powers and are exercising them lawfully.

11. Instruments of authorisation and delegation for coercive Migration and Customs Act powers are complete and up-to-date. While Migration Act instruments of authorisation and delegation are available on the intranet, instruments relating to the Customs Act (and other Acts) are not accessible to officers.

12. Some personal searches of passengers at international airports examined by the ANAO were unlawful or inappropriate, indicating weaknesses in the control framework. A number of searches of premises under the Migration Act potentially exceeded the authority of the warrant which authorised them, and officers routinely questioned people without documenting their legal authority to do so. Officers also frequently failed to comply with departmental policy instructions, including compliance with certification and recordkeeping requirements.

13. The department has commenced a project to identify the statutory powers of officers of the integrated department, with a longer term view to possibly amending some powers. As part of the project, in July 2016, the department completed a consolidated inventory of all powers available to departmental officers under Commonwealth legislation. Such an inventory will enable the department to identify overlap, duplication, redundancy and inconsistency within and between Acts. It will also assist with identifying any gaps or deficiencies in powers in order to be able to submit a proposal for potential legislative change for government consideration.

14. The Border Force is developing a coordinated systematic framework for reporting on its use of coercive powers. It presently does not have such a framework.

15. Many of the instructions that are provided to Border Force officers on the department's intranet are out of date, incomplete, inaccurate and are not accessible to all officers. A project to remedy this situation was endorsed by the department's executive in December 2015 and has to date delivered only a very small number of operational instructions for Border Force officers.

16. The department has made progress in integrating the former Customs and Immigration training regimes and addressing deficiencies identified through pre-integration training audits conducted in 2014. The establishment of an integrated Learning and Development Branch and the Border Force College has been managed as a priority project, under the Reform and Integration Taskforce. While this project has delivered solid foundations for enhancing the learning maturity of the department, at the time of examination the results of these foundational efforts had yet to be realised.

17. Not all officers exercising coercive powers under the Migration Act and Customs Act have received pre-requisite training. The department has established an integrated Learning Management System but issues remain in relation to the completeness of training records.

18. The department has been undertaking a project to transition to a new workforce model, which has involved establishing 'vocations', profiling job roles under each vocation, mapping required competencies, and developing high level curricula. Training needs analysis for the Border Force vocational stream commenced in October 2016………

Compliance with legislative and policy requirements

3.5 The ANAO examined internal records relating to 69 personal searches undertaken at Australian airports during 2015–16.25 The test results in Table 3.2 demonstrate the detention officer was unauthorised for five (12 per cent) of the 42 external, internal medical or body scan searches in the sample, which means these searches were unlawful.26 With regard to certification, 20 (29 per cent) of the 69 searches sampled involved at least one uncertified officer, meaning these were inappropriate searches.27 All body scan operators in the sample were authorised. [my highlighting]

Australian child sexual abuse royal commission choosing its words carefully

Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse, media release, 15 August 2016:

Statement on immigration detention centres

15 August, 2016

The Royal Commission does not ordinarily comment upon operational matters. However, because of the level of public discussion in relation to immigration detention centres the Commission indicates the following.

The Royal Commission has an ongoing investigation in relation to the Department of Immigration and Border Protection’s response to allegations of child sexual abuse in detention centres. Whether or not a public hearing is warranted has not been determined.

The Royal Commission is conscious that a Child Protection Panel was established by the Secretary of the Department of Immigration and Border Protection in May 2015. The Panel’s terms of reference indicate that ‘a final report will be provided to the Secretary by mid-2016 covering both better practice and a comprehensive sample of reviews.’ The Royal Commission anticipates that the report will deal with the Department’s response to, among other matters, allegations of child abuse in detention centres. The Royal Commission will have regard to that report in the course of its investigation into immigration detention issues.

Human Rights Law Centre advice to Australian Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual...

https://www.scribd.com/document/321201052/Human-Rights-Law-Centre-advice-to-Australian-Royal-Commission-into-Institutional-Responses-to-Child-Sexual-Abuse

Australian Dept. of Immigration, Border Force and Federal Minister Peter Dutton damned by these findings

A ministerial portfolio, government department, contractor and officers medically negligent and/or corrupt…….

The Guardian, 28 June 2016:

Australia’s immigration department failed to appropriately oversee the multinational that provides healthcare for asylum seekers and was unable to cope with the “commercially aggressive practices” that led to numerous failures to meet medical benchmarks, a series of damning internal reviews have found.

The findings substantiated a number of key allegations published by Guardian Australia in July 2015 about the relationship between International Health and Medical Services and the immigration department.

Leaked documents showed IHMS failed to meet medical targets, deliberately included incorrect data in reports and admitted it was “inevitable” fraud would occur as it tried to meet government standards. The documents also revealed that IHMS failed to undertake working with children checks and police checks on Manus Island.

Three reviews were commissioned by the immigration department to examine the allegations. Two were internal and one was to be conducted by KPMG.

IHMS, a subsidiary of the global healthcare giant International SOS, has received more than $1.6bn in government funding to provide asylum seeker healthcare in Australia and on Manus Island and Nauru.

The detention assurance review team report, released under freedom of information, which drew together findings from the KPMG audit and the first initial internal audit, said: “Through the review processes, both internal and external reviews agree that IHMS took an approach of seeking to maximise profits, including through actively reducing opportunities for the department to seek contract abatements.”

It later continued: “There is a fundamental conflict between contractual and clinical objectives where profit and cost dictate clinical operations.”

ABC News, 27 June 2016:

Australian Border Force staff have been referred for investigation over more than 100 cases of alleged corrupt activity in Australia's skilled and student visa program.

A 7.30-Fairfax Media investigation has discovered that in the last 12 months, Australian Border Force chief Michael Pezzullo has referred 132 cases of suspected corruption inside the department to the national corruption watchdog, the Australian Commission for Law Enforcement Integrity (ACLEI).

It comes as a former immigration official claims that a focus on boat arrivals has allowed migration crime involving people arriving by plane to flourish unchecked.

"In the border security debate, it has been easy to deflect the public's attention to boat arrivals," said Joseph Petyanszki, who worked at the Department of Immigration for 27 years and was joint head of the Department's investigation office between 2007 and 2013.

"But this fear-mongering has totally ignored where the vast bulk of real fraud is, most significantly undermining our immigration programs."

 The man responsible for this shocking state of affairs.....

Peter Craig Dutton former police officer, current Liberal MP for Dickson and Minister for Immigration and Border Protection.