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AUSTRALIA-POLITICS-DUTTON
Au pair scandal hits Australia politician who ousted PM
SYDNEY, Aug 31, 2018 (BSS/AFP) – Australia’s home affairs minister was
under mounting pressure Friday to formally explain why he personally
intervened to help au pairs from France and Italy after their tourist visas
were cancelled.
Peter Dutton, the driving force behind a bitter Liberal party coup that
unseated Malcolm Turnbull as prime minister last week, has strongly denied
any wrongdoing.
But the scandal is deepening with a Senate committee inquiry due to
scrutinise his decisions next week at the request of opposition politicians.
In the first case Dutton, then immigration minister and known for his
support of hardline policies, used his discretionary powers to free a
Frenchwoman from detention in November 2015 and allow her to stay in the
country.
The move was made after an appeal to his office by Australian Football
League boss Gillon McLachlan, documents released under freedom of information
showed.
The woman was reportedly planning to work as a live-in babysitter for a
relative of McLachlan, but did not have the proper paperwork when she
arrived.
National broadcaster ABC and other media said Dutton’s intervention also
helped a wealthy family that was also a Liberal party donor.
The Labor opposition party has been demanding to know whether their
political donations influenced his decision to free the woman.
A second case emerged on Thursday involving an Italian au pair.
That woman was detained at Brisbane airport, also in 2015, because border
force officials believed she planned to work as a babysitter in breach of her
tourist visa.
Dutton overruled the decision which benefitted the family of a man he used
to work with when he was a police officer before entering politics, according
to leaked documents cited by ABC and other media.
Critics have contrasted the cases with Dutton’s unwavering commitment to
keeping asylum-seekers in overseas detention under Canberra’s hardline
immigration policies.
But Dutton on Friday insisted they were “common sense” decisions.
“I make a decision that I believe is in the best interest of our country. I
do it every day with visas,” he told commercial radio 2GB.
“That’s the whole reason for ministerial intervention, because you believe
the department has made a decision that is not right.”
He added in a separate statement that he dealt with hundreds of
representations over immigration matters every year.
“I consider cases on their merits. Any suggestions cases are determined on
any other basis, including whether I knew the individual who referred the
matter, is completely ridiculous.”
But Labor immigration spokesman Shayne Neumann said the public would be
stunned by the “troubling pattern” of interventions.
“It’s not about the powers, it’s about the process,” he said, adding that
most people would have expected the au pairs to be “put back on a plane and
deported”.
Dutton, an arch conservative, launched a leadership challenge against
moderate Turnbull last week, but was defeated by Scott Morrison in the race
to become prime minister.
Senior Labor frontbencher Anthony Albanese suggested the leaks about the au
pair cases were “payback for his role in wrecking the Liberal Party last
week”.
BSS/AFP/MRI/0847 hrs