The Albanese government turned vessels back or returned asylum seekers aboard them on seven occasions in its first nine months in office, quietly continuing the Coalition’s Operation Sovereign Borders policy.
New details of the ventures to Australia reveal that almost 200 people, including 14 children, have attempted to come by boat since Labor’s election in May 2022.
Labor has faced more than twice as many boats a year than attempted to come to Australia in each of the final years of the Coalition, which – despite its boast of having “stopped the boats” – turned or took back two to three vessels a year from 2016-17 to 2019-20.
The Albanese government has abolished temporary protection visas, but otherwise kept the core pillars of Operation Sovereign Borders (OSB). These include offshore detention, turnbacks – in which vessels returned to just outside the territorial seas of the country of departure – and takebacks, where Australia sends asylum seekers back by plane or through an at-sea transfer.
According to answers to questions on notice, seven boats attempted to come to Australia in the nine months to 31 March 2023, including one with 15 adults reportedly flown back to Sri Lanka just days after Labor took office.
Many of the other six ventures have never been reported, including three more takebacks in June 2022, one with seven children and one with three children.
In August 2022, 46 men were taken back. Some 16 people were turned back in December 2022, including four children. In January, 10 men were subject to a turnback.
The answers do not specify the country of origin or where asylum seekers were taken back to. Regular OSB updates reveal only the number of “unauthorised maritime arrivals” but not the number of turnbacks or takebacks.
In October Guardian Australia revealed 11 asylum seekers were taken to offshore detention on Nauru, in what Border Force officials confirmed was the first such transfer in nine years.
The Refugee Council said: “Australia’s policy of boat turnbacks is not only dangerous and harmful but also unlawful under international law.”
(January 1, 2018) 5 interceptions total under the Morrison government
One boat intercepted in 2018, three in 2019, and one in 2020 (58 adults and 5 children total).
(May 8, 2022) Albanese government elected; one boat intercepted
12 men taken back.
(June 7, 2022) Four boats intercepted
- 15 men taken back.
- 23 adults taken back.
- 34 adults and 7 children taken back.
- 43 adults and 3 children taken back.
(August 7, 2022) One boat intercepted
46 men taken back.
(December 7, 2022) One boat intercepted
12 adults and 4 children turned back.
(January 7, 2023) One boat intercepted
10 men turned back.
“This policy undermines Australia’s long history of providing safety to those fleeing persecution and sets a dangerous precedent,” a spokesperson said.
“The reason people flee by boat is because there are few alternative pathways to find safety. If Australia is indeed concerned about the use of dangerous boats, it should be doing everything it can to increase safe options for people fleeing violence and persecution.
“The pathways offered to those fleeing Ukraine are an excellent example of ways Australia can allow safe access via air.”
The Greens’ immigration spokesperson, Nick McKim, said Labor had continued the Liberals’ “draconian policies” in “an active and cruel choice to disregard human suffering”.
“Their recent secretive decision to reuse Nauru as a place of exile and detention is a testament to their failure to offer a humane approach to refugee policy,” he said. “Labor’s wholehearted embrace of this failed and inhumane policy is a betrayal of the values they claim to hold.”
The Albanese government maintains that OSB is legal and argues its policies are “tough on borders” without being “weak on humanity”.
A spokesperson for ABF said in the five years before OSB “approximately 50,000 people arrived in Australia on 820 boats, and more than 1,200 people are known to have lost their lives at sea attempting to come to Australia”.
“It has been almost 10 years since last known loss of life at sea in an attempt to migrate to Australia by boat,” the spokesperson said.
“In the past 10 years, 1,123 people from 47 ventures have been returned to their country of origin or departure.”
The spokesperson said the ABF does “not comment on operational matters to avoid providing advantage to criminal maritime people smugglers”.
“These arrangements balance the public’s right to know, the safety of all involved, and the implementation of our border security objectives and national security interests.”
Guardian Australia contacted the home affairs minister, Clare O’Neil, for comment.
