New camp to take Woomera off boil
By Carol Altmann, Claire Konkes and staff reporters
30jan02
The Australian
DETAINEES are expected to be relocated from Woomera to a new detention centre in late March as the federal Government moves to defuse the mounting crisis within the desert compound.
Immigration Minister Philip Ruddock yesterday ruled out closing Woomera, 500km north of Adelaide, but gave the strongest indication yet that the El Alamein army barracks near Port Augusta, South Australia, would be used as a main processing centre while Woomera became a holding centre for deportees and overflows.
"We do have a new facility that will come on stream," Mr Ruddock said, adding the centre would be called Baxter.
"The professional advice I get is that it's better to have smaller numbers of people in more facilities, so obviously when we have a new facility available there will be some people who will be transferred to it.
"Decisions on operations will be made at that time."
Port Augusta mayor Joy Baluch said the Department of Immigration and Multicultural Affairs took her on a tour of Baxter two weeks ago and indicated it would be finished by early March.
Mr Ruddock's comments come after the acting chairman of the Government's Immigration Detention Advisory Group, Ray Funnell, said Woomera, which has 785 detainees, should be phased out to avoid a "human tragedy of unknowable proportions".
"What we would suggest the best thing for Woomera now is essentially to put it in a mothball state ... to be used in the event of contingencies if there's an influx of boatpeople, which is why Woomera was used as a detention centre in the first place," Mr Funnell told ABC radio yesterday.
Woomera has been hit by a 15-day hunger strike in which more than 230 detainees have refused food or self-harmed in protest against conditions and the slow processing of visa applications.
The protest has drawn widespread condemnation of Australia's detention policy, but John Howard remained firm.
"Nobody likes what is occurring but there is no alternative and we're working in a sensible way to try and talk to the people in the centres and to point out the futility of what is occurring," the Prime Minister said.
Mr Funnell and members of the advisory group were meeting with protesters last night for the third time in a week.
A lawyer for the detainees, Rob McDonald, said solicitors had made protesters aware of the Baxter plan, but they were unmoved.
"They don't want to be just moved to another facility, They want to be processed in the community. They want out of here," he said.
DIMA said 246 detainees remained on a hunger strike yesterday, but only nine had their lips stitched after 36 agreed to have their sutures removed as a goodwill gesture on the eve of the advisory committee visit.