Robert Taylor has lived in Australia since he was a baby but is facing deportation after being convicted for aggravated burglary. There are calls for him to be allowed to die with his family beside him.
My BIL is an immigration lawyer. People like the person in the article often come to him for help.
Forgetting the person for a moment, there’s a reason why cases like these are very important. No one wants to establish any kind of precedent where someone can be automatically deported, especially when they have dependent family in the country.
Second, just deporting someone without a consideration of where (or what) they’re going back to is something that just shouldn’t happen. You could be condemning someone to persecution or it could be as simple as sending someone back to a country they were born in but never learned the language or no longer have any connection to i.e., no family or anyone who can ensure their welfare once they get there, or even where the individual is no longer recognised as being a national (stateless).
It’s very complex and not something that I can accurately sum up in a comment (ianal), but put simply, we have a responsibility to the individual regardless of whether their circumstances are of their own doing or not.
I’m all for “toe the line” but the law just isn’t black and white. There’s plenty of scenarios under which someone can end up with a conviction recorded against them, and some of them are not exactly reasonable if it were to become a basis for deportation.
I get that not all cases are clear cut and I’m all for human rights lawyers fighting for cases like the Biloela family, who have done nothing wrong. But this guy’s case is pretty black and white. He had ample opportunities to become a citizen, and to stop being a dickhead, but chose not to at every turn. Meet consequences.
I would argue fighting cases like this is more likely to create precedent that ends up being more conservative than it should be. If the case was someone who was sentenced to > 12 months in prison for some trivial like not paying a traffic fine because they didn’t receive the fine due to not having a permanent address and then having their visa cancelled, that’s worth fighting. But because this guy fought to stay, the traffic fine guy is gonna have to also fight this precedent that didn’t need to happen.
This is my point. Don’t fight cases that don’t pass the pub test unless you want to set a precedent that closes legal openings for those that are worth fighting for.
And no we’re not responsible for this guy. We’re responsible for our citizens for legal reasons, but this guy chose not to become a citizen. He had decades to take it but didn’t. He doesn’t get to now choose to put the responsibility on our country because it now suits him.
I’m not arguing for the guy. He’s clearly made mistakes and is now paying for it, noting that he’s also served his time in addition to this. But, and I think it’s important, is it worth the effort and cost for this to go through the courts? Being terminally ill, I would have no issue if the minister exercised their right to intervene and let him live out his remaining time here with his family.
The Nadesalingam family is a very different situation and really can’t be compared to this. But, if you want to consider it from a black and white perspective (equal application as for this other person), then they are criminals as per the migration act (and UN protocols to which we are signatory to) having arrived with the assistance of people smugglers and should have been deported. They weren’t, thankfully, given their situation change due to having children (that we’re responsible for even as non-citizens), the situation in their home country that would certainly have put them at risk of persecution or at the very least found them stateless.
If we could find it in ourselves to grant clemency in that case then I think we can do the same here.
My BIL is an immigration lawyer. People like the person in the article often come to him for help.
Forgetting the person for a moment, there’s a reason why cases like these are very important. No one wants to establish any kind of precedent where someone can be automatically deported, especially when they have dependent family in the country.
Second, just deporting someone without a consideration of where (or what) they’re going back to is something that just shouldn’t happen. You could be condemning someone to persecution or it could be as simple as sending someone back to a country they were born in but never learned the language or no longer have any connection to i.e., no family or anyone who can ensure their welfare once they get there, or even where the individual is no longer recognised as being a national (stateless).
It’s very complex and not something that I can accurately sum up in a comment (ianal), but put simply, we have a responsibility to the individual regardless of whether their circumstances are of their own doing or not.
I’m all for “toe the line” but the law just isn’t black and white. There’s plenty of scenarios under which someone can end up with a conviction recorded against them, and some of them are not exactly reasonable if it were to become a basis for deportation.
I get that not all cases are clear cut and I’m all for human rights lawyers fighting for cases like the Biloela family, who have done nothing wrong. But this guy’s case is pretty black and white. He had ample opportunities to become a citizen, and to stop being a dickhead, but chose not to at every turn. Meet consequences.
I would argue fighting cases like this is more likely to create precedent that ends up being more conservative than it should be. If the case was someone who was sentenced to > 12 months in prison for some trivial like not paying a traffic fine because they didn’t receive the fine due to not having a permanent address and then having their visa cancelled, that’s worth fighting. But because this guy fought to stay, the traffic fine guy is gonna have to also fight this precedent that didn’t need to happen.
This is my point. Don’t fight cases that don’t pass the pub test unless you want to set a precedent that closes legal openings for those that are worth fighting for.
And no we’re not responsible for this guy. We’re responsible for our citizens for legal reasons, but this guy chose not to become a citizen. He had decades to take it but didn’t. He doesn’t get to now choose to put the responsibility on our country because it now suits him.
I’m not arguing for the guy. He’s clearly made mistakes and is now paying for it, noting that he’s also served his time in addition to this. But, and I think it’s important, is it worth the effort and cost for this to go through the courts? Being terminally ill, I would have no issue if the minister exercised their right to intervene and let him live out his remaining time here with his family.
The Nadesalingam family is a very different situation and really can’t be compared to this. But, if you want to consider it from a black and white perspective (equal application as for this other person), then they are criminals as per the migration act (and UN protocols to which we are signatory to) having arrived with the assistance of people smugglers and should have been deported. They weren’t, thankfully, given their situation change due to having children (that we’re responsible for even as non-citizens), the situation in their home country that would certainly have put them at risk of persecution or at the very least found them stateless.
If we could find it in ourselves to grant clemency in that case then I think we can do the same here.