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ChilOut Ambassadors' visit to Canberra

On Thursday 11 March 2004, eight teenage Ambassadors for ChilOut visited Parliament House to ask politicians, including the Minister for Immigration, Senator Amanda Vanstone, to release all children from immigration detention. The Ambassadors presented signatures from over 5,000 Australian children, calling for a permanent end to the detention of children and their families, to Senator Andrew Bartlett and Tanya Plibersek MP, who tabled the petition in Parliament.Ambassadors meet for the first time, Wednesday dinner

 

The Ambassadors gathered in Canberra on Wednesday night, and met for the first time over dinner at "the best Turkish restaurant in town". Not just enjoying a delicious meal and good company, the Ambassadors got down to business, discussing what was happening the next day and what they were going to talk about. 

 

The day in Canberra

The Ambassadors' day began with meetings:

Senator Andrew Bartlett, Leader of the Australian Democrats, provided lunch for the Ambassadors, joined by Ms Tanya Plibersek MP, Member for Sydney.

After the morning's meetings, the ChilOut Ambassadors held a Press Conference with Andrew Bartlett and Tanya Plibersek. 

 

Hannah and Nahid presented Senator Bartlett and Ms Plibersek with the petition of 5000+ signatures of Australian kids. 

After the Press Conference, the Ambassadors watched Question Time in the House of Representatives.

Finally, ChilOut presented them each with a certificate of Appreciation in the forecourt of Parliament House.

 

ChilOut Ambassadors in the forecourt at Parliament House

In the forecourt of Parliament House afterwards

KNEELING, L TO R: Alanna, Reza, Zahra
STANDING, L TO R: Bonne, Dianne, Hannah, Fabienne, Joan, Krystal, Nahid

 

You can view more photos from the trip here, thanks to Joan for making these available.

Trip reports from our Ambassadors

Bonne's views...

Bonne, 15, goes to school in Port Augusta, SA, with Baxter detainee children. Bonne has won a UNHCR Encouragement Award for her efforts to help her friends.

Read more from Bonne:

Fabienne's views...

Fabienne, 14, is from Sydney’s north shore and goes to North Sydney Girls’ High. She has pen pals in both Baxter and Nauru.

Hannah's views...

Hannah, 16, from rural Victoria, is a year 11 student at Castlemaine Secondary College. Hannah writes to two asylum seeker detainees in Australia and some others detained on Nauru. Hannah was a Girlfriend magazine "Girlfriend of the Year" finalist in 2003, chosen because of her involvement in refugee activism. In February 2004, she appeared in Girlfriend again with a report on her last visit to Baxter detention centre.

Joan's views...

Joan, 17, who has just started university, hails from Ulverstone, north-west Tasmania. She is part of the social justice network in her community and the online advocacy group, ‘Nauruwire’, and writes to many Iraqi and Afghan asylum seekers on Nauru.

Read Joan's viewpoint piece for ABC Radio, June 2004

Krystal's views...

Sixteen year old Krystal from Wagga Wagga, NSW, is doing Year 11 at TAFE. She has experienced a lot in her young life, including the death and illness of close family members, but she has come through it all wanting to help people, especially children in detention. Krystal is a volunteer art teacher, and plans to become a school teacher. She is also an outspoken member of Greenpeace.

Zahra's views...

Zahra, 18, is a student at Holroyd High in western Sydney, NSW. Following her father’s murder by the Taliban, Zahra fled from Afghanistan to Pakistan in 1998, where she lived in a refugee camp for a year. She and her mother and little brother came to Australia as part of the offshore humanitarian program. While Zahra has not been detained in Australia, she has plenty of friends who have been.

Press clippings

Ulverstone youth speaks out for asylum seekers 

17 March 2004,  From The Advocate, Tasmania

Bonne's message of hope

12 March 2004, From The Advertiser

Young put case against child detention

12 March 2004, From The Canberra Times

Vanstone makes unpopular impression on kids  

11 March 2004, AAP

Government Takes Two Years To Fix Its Own People Smuggling Laws

11 March 2004, Stephen Smith, ALP, Shadow Minister for Immigration

Teenagers lobby Australian minister over detained children. 

11 March 2004, ABC Radio Australia

Teenagers lobby Australian minister over detained children.

11 March 2004, ABC Asia Pacific

Teenagers push for release of child detainees

11 March 2004, ABC

Kids Behind Bars

10 March 2004, ABC Radio National, Breakfast 

Teenagers Demand End To Child Immigrant Detention

8 March 2004, Scoop, NZ

ChilOut Media Releases

Australian children say, "Release kids from detention, Minister!"

8 March 2004, ChilOut Media Release 

Read other press releases on our visit to Canberra...

 

About the petition

PETITION AGAINST INDEFINITE, NON-REVIEWABLE, MANDATORY
DETENTION OF CHILDREN
We, the undersigned, being under the age of eighteen, are deeply concerned at the treatment of Children in Immigration Detention Centres. We believe that the detention of any child should, in accordance with the International Convention on the Rights of the Child, only be a last resort and for the shortest possible time.

We petition the Parliament of the Commonwealth of Australia to amend the 1958 Migration Act to exclude Children and their families from mandatory detention.

Thanks to Jo and Philippa Hind for all the hard work they put into gathering signatures for our Young People’s Petition. We ended up with over 5,000 signatures so thanks also to everyone who signed and everyone who asked young people to sign. (One of our Ambassadors scored a detention for her trouble…) We had contributions from far and wide. Many arrived “anonymously” in our Post Box but significant contributions we could identify came from (among many others):

Our Lady of Mercy College, Parramatta, NSW
St Patrick’s College, Sutherland, NSW
The Channon, NSW
Townsville, QLD
Nightcliffe High, NT
Craigslea High, QLD
St Mary’s, Hobart, TAS
Waverley College, NSW
Camberwell AGGS, VIC
International Grammar School, Ultimo, NSW 
And top ranking goes to Kilbreda College, Menstone, VIC who sent in almost 600 signatures!!!

Tanya Plibersek tabled the petition in the House of Representatives on 22 March 2004. You can read the entry in Hansard for that day, pp25861 - 25862. In part, she says:

I think what is particularly special about this is that we have a very dedicated group of young people who really have a vision of the sort of country that they want to live in and the sort of community that they want to build. They have gone out and put many hours into collecting these thousands of signatures from all over the country. I commend their work.

Thanks again to all the wonderful young people who contributed towards our Petition and made our trip to Canberra possible.

Chocolate croissants

On Tuesday 30 March ALP Senator Sherry moved amendments (first introduced in December 2002) aimed at ensuring unaccompanied children are not detained at length and that families can live together in the housing projects. (See Hansard p22035...) 

 

Senator Bartlett spoke on these amendments, drawing attention to the fact that among other things, children in housing projects cannot have visitors. Bonne gets a mention:

Senator Vanstone met with a group of children who were Ambassadors for ChilOut, the group that advocates getting children out of detention. The group included a young woman from Port Augusta whose name was Bonne—she had a colourful shirt on and I think she was about 14 or 15—and other young people from around Australia who have got to know children out of detention. In Bonne’s case they were children who had gone to school in Port Augusta, so she knew some children who were still in detention. She was the one who talked about how she could not visit her friends.

And then... Chocolate Croissants! (yes, really, see Hansard p22040...)

Senator VANSTONE—The senator referred to the ChilOut Ambassadors who came. That reminds me of an apology that I owe them. I can put it on record here, which will save me writing to them, actually.
Senator Sherry—They might be listening.
Senator VANSTONE—They might be, but I do not think that they will mind. I did see the ChilOut Ambassadors. In fact, I made a point of coming in early—not that early, but early enough—to provide them with breakfast.
Senator Hogg—Chocolate croissants.
Senator VANSTONE—Yes, chocolate croissants. I genuinely thought that this was a great idea. These kids were coming from all around Australia. I wondered what they would like. I thought: ‘They won’t want a boring breakfast. I’ll get them chocolate croissants and orange juice.’ I understand that there was a complaint in another office that they had been invited to Senator Vanstone’s office for breakfast and all they got was a chocolate croissant. I am sorry. I admit that I mucked it up; I got it wrong. They did not like the chocolate croissants. I will never do it again. I will just have standard meetings without the breakfast.

Ok, Ambassadors. Reading the trip reports, we get the picture, you were very hungry by lunch time. But what's the story with the croissants? :-) 

 

Bonne describes them as "[...] these rolls. Like pastry, covered in icing sugar and in the middle filled with bits of chocolate." Morning tea with biscuits in Larry Anthony's office was "more appetising" in Bonne's view. Bonne also acknowledges: "If [Amanda Vanstone] wasn’t the face of the immigration policy, I suppose I would probably get along with her ways fine".

 

Photo courtesy of the Adelaide Advertiser

ChilOut Ambassadors at Parliament House

FRONT ROW, L TO R: Reza, Bonne, Nahid
BACK ROW, L TO R: Hannah, Joan, Zahra, Fabienne, Krystal