Media Contact: Simon Dowding – (02) 6277 7860 or 0411 138 541
Media release
Senator Chris Evans
Leader of the Government in the Senate
Minister for Immigration and Citizenship
106.09
30 October 2009
Opposition must come clean on Temporary Protection visas
Malcolm Turnbull has today signalled that the Liberal Party wants to revive the Howard
Government's discredited asylum seeker policies. If Mr Turnbull's policy is to reinstate
Temporary Protection visas (TPV), he must come clean and tell the public that TPVs did not act
as a deterrent to people smuggling.
TPVs did not stop boats arriving.
TPVs were introduced in October 1999. There were 3722 irregular maritime arrivals that year.
During the next two years there were 8459 irregular maritime arrivals, including 5520 arrivals in
2001 alone. An unfortunate consequence of this was that it forced more women and children to
risk their lives with people smugglers on leaky boats because the harsh conditions attached to
TPVs prevented people from being reunited with their families.
From 1999 to 2001 the proportion of women and children among Iraqi and Afghan irregular
maritime arrivals more than tripled. In 1999, 12.77 per cent of protection visa applications
lodged by Iraqi and Afghan irregular maritime arrivals were from women and children. That
figure rose to 27.56 per cent in 2000 and 41.81 per cent in 2001.
People granted TPVs did not leave Australia
By the time TPVs were abolished last year, nearly 90 percent of people initially granted a TPV
had been granted a Permanent Protection visa or another visa to remain in Australia.
More than 11 000 people were granted TPVs. Of these, 9841 had already been granted a
Permanent Protection visa (9690) or another visa (151) as at 8 August 2008. Only 379 people,
or about 3 per cent of those granted a TPV, had departed Australia.
The Liberal Party did not oppose the abolition of TPVs
The Liberal Party was silent when the Government announced the scrapping of TPVs in May
2008 and did not oppose the regulation changes in the Parliament in August that year.
The UNHCR is against TPVs
UNHCR Submission to Senate Select Committee on Ministerial Discretion and Migration
Matters (June 2000)
"The conditions of the Temporary Protection Visa are unacceptable to UNHCR in their denial of
the (Refugee) Convention right to travel documents as well as the denial to family reunion."
UNHCR Submission to Senate Legal and Constitutional References Committee (July
2005)
“UNHCR has a number of concerns in relation to Australia’s Temporary Protection visa (TPV)
and Temporary Humanitarian visa (THV) regime.”
NEWS 
