Monitoring Asylum in Australia

Australia has a national asylum system in place to determine whether people claiming asylum are refugees.

UNHCR closely monitors the situation in Australia and works to promote respect for the international human rights of asylum-seekers.

UNHCR staff meet with members of the communities at The Neal Family Community Cente is located in the area of Asentamientos Humanos (Human Settlements) in San Pedro Sula.

Asylum seekers who arrive in Australia without a visa are subjected to a number of punitive measures that can significantly impair their mental health and general well-being. These measures have also greatly impacted their ability to meaningfully engage in the refugee status determination process. They include:

Waiting up to four years to be granted permission by the Government to apply for protection
The inability to apply for permanent residency
The removal of free legal assistance (with only limited exceptions)
The imposition of an accelerated (fast track) determination process without adequate procedural safeguards
The indefinite inability to reunite with immediate family members.

There are approximately 30,000 asylum seekers affected by these measures, labelled by the Australian Government as the so-called ‘legacy caseload’. Negative political rhetoric and the resulting community stigmatisation of this group of asylum seekers has also had a harmful impact on them.

People who seek international protection have endured traumatic experiences before arriving in Australia and their resilience is eroded by punitive measures they experience in Australia. Many asylum-seekers suffer from clinically diagnosable mental disorders including anxiety, depressive disorders and Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD).

UN Resources

Culture, Context and Mental Health of Rohingya Refugees (2018)

UNHCR facsheet on the protection of Australia's so-called 'legacy caseload' asylum-seekers (2018)

UN's Committee against Torture guidelines on asylum seekers' rights (2018)

UNHCR Guidance Note on the Psychologically Vulnerable Applicant in the Protection Visa Assessment Process (2017)

Expert Roundtable on Mental Health in Refugee Status Determination (2017)

UNHCR Position on Legal Representation for Asylum-Seekers (2017)

Report of the Special Rapporteur on the right of everyone to the enjoyment of the highest attainable standard of physical and mental health (2017)

UNHCR Submission to the Senate Legal and Constitutional Affairs Legislation Committee, Migration and Maritime Powers Legislation Amendment (Resolving the Asylum Legacy Caseload) Bill (2014)

UNHCR Handbook and Guidelines on Procedures and Criteria for Determining Refugee Status (2011)

Community-based protection and mental health and psychosocial support (2017)

The protection of persons with mental illness and the improvement of mental health care (1991)